Item 168 - Letter from Ruth to George Mallory, 31 October 1916

1 Item, paper

Acknowledges his last letter and asks him about his comrades. Describes making a dress for Clare and the designs on her bowl. Tells him about singing folk songs for Robert Graves during his visit and the suggestion that she should invite a boy called Peter from Charterhouse to tea. Expresses her thoughts on friendship and tells him about a new friend called Mrs Mercer. Describes the issues Mrs Mercer is having with her husband being called up. Tells him she has received his letters and that she will send him a song book. Describes the reading suggestions given to her by Robert Graves. Discusses living arrangements for when he is home. Asks him about how his book is progressing and insists he receive the hot water bottle she suggested.

Robert Graves attended Charterhouse School where Mallory taught before the war. He sang in the choir, where he met an aristocratic boy three years younger, G. H. "Peter" Johnstone, with whom he began an intense romantic friendship. The scandal led ultimately to an interview with the headmaster. Graves himself called it 'chaste and sentimental' and 'proto-homosexual,' and though he was clearly in love with Peter (disguised by the name Dick in Good-Bye to All That), he denied that their relationship was ever sexual. He was warned about Peter's morals by other contemporaries.