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Alive

Dreamed c. May 30, 1940, plus 1941 follow-up dream, by Barbara Cartland

January 4th, 1941

A letter received from Lieut. Derek Woodward, 209 Battery Worcestershire Yeomanry, British Prisoner of War OFLAG VII, Germany, says:

All our guns were out of action and word had been given to make for the coast. On May 30th at about 8:30 AM we were about 20 miles from Cassel making our way about 2 miles east of Watou along a ditch bordering a lane, but we were not moving very fast as mist was rising and the country was getting open.

Ronald called me forward. While with him we saw German tanks going into action against other troops half a mile ahead. We decided to conceal ourselves, but later three tanks converged on us and we had to get up. As Ronald rose he was hit in the head by a bullet and killed instantly. I was about five yards away with 50 men following. We were marched off immediately.

I didn't tell my mother at the time, but when Ronald was missing after Dunkirk I had a strange dream.

I dreamt I saw him with a round bullet hole in the centre of his forehead. He was very pale and did not speak when I spoke to him.
This letter is the first indication we have had that he was shot in the forehead.

I am writing down now another dream which I had later. It was so vivid!

I was walking along a narrow path when Ronald came round the corner. He was looking full of life and vitality, as he always did, and I rushed up to him to cry: 'Darling, you are alive! I knew you were, how wonderful!'

We turned and walked the way I had come. I said: "Mummy will be thrilled and she has all your press cuttings. You will be so amused at all the marvellous things people said about you when they thought you were dead--"

He laughed and while I am radiant with happiness I wake up.

I have written a poem about that dream.

ALIVE

I dreamt last night of you,
It was so real, so true, I knew
You lived--although they said
You were dead.

I dreamed you kissed me, then
We laughed, just as we did when
You were here--before they said
That you were dead.

I know now you are alive
I cannot see you but you are beside
Me still, as you were before they said--
So stupidly--that you were dead.

EDITOR'S NOTE

Cartland isn't just indulging in blind faith here; she's making the point that if in one dream her spirit could foresee the details of her brother's physical death, then why shouldn't she trust the second dream too, claiming souls outlive such death? The materialists having been proven wrong already.

Cartland's hardly alone in this; see Carl Jung's dream The Wild Hunt.

--Chris Wayan

SOURCE: The Tiger Garden: A Book of Writers' Dreams by Nicholas Royle, 1996, p.45-6


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