195 - MERMOZ, Jean

MERMOZ, Jean 2 letters “Jean,” Buenos Aires, October 16 and 31, 1929, to his “Dearest Mom”; 1 and 3 pages, in-4 format, on Via Aéropostal paper. Expansion of the Aéropostale; test flights of the plane for the raid; his love for Gilberte. October 16. “Imagine, I was supposed to leave today, Friday, by plane for France. A telegram from Paris urgently requested my presence for test flights of a new aircraft intended for the flight from Dakar to Natal. The General Manager replied that I could not leave the Americas at this time. In fact, the new Latécoère aircraft that I plan to use for my flight has arrived here. I am continuing to test it and have been tasked with launching it and promoting it in all the major cities of South America. My departure is therefore temporarily delayed. […] I returned this evening from Chile and am leaving tomorrow to present the new aircraft we have just received to the Paraguayan government in Asunción. It is the same one I plan to use for my flight”… October 31. His arrival should not be long in coming. “The Director General has just left for France. He is to arrange and organize two or three flight plans with Latécoère as soon as he arrives. He will telegraph me immediately to come. In the meantime, I’m flying the aircraft with which I plan to carry out my projects throughout South America. Eight days ago I went to Chile; I’m just back from Paraguay; tomorrow I’ll inaugurate the route to Tierra del Fuego—still in my plane—and upon my return, I’ll head back to Chile, where I’ll pick up two company directors who’ve arrived from Paris, and then set off for Peru, Colombia, and Brazil. My suitcase is always packed at home—in short, I don’t think there’s a man in the world more nomadic than I am!! […] If I were sure my expedition wouldn’t take place before March, I’d have you come here immediately… but I’m always afraid that a telegram might send me off just as you’re on your way to Buenos Aires, and then that would be ridiculous. Of course, once you’re here, you’ll be just as welcome here as you would be in France […] Besides, you know, in Buenos Aires, Mermoz’s mother would immediately feel right at home, and Gilberte’s family would be happy to meet you. We often talk about you, and you’ll see that your future daughter-in-law will be nothing more and nothing less than your own daughter, because she is very gentle and possesses a sincerity and a freshness of feeling that are rare among young women today”… Gilberte is in France, and he fears that her lifestyle may be difficult to reconcile with family life: “I no longer set out with enthusiasm, but once I’m gone, it comes back—if only you knew!!—with such force; and all I know now is the effort, the bitter and harsh satisfaction it gives to those in the know, and then the moral ecstasy of the struggle within the beauty of things that those below do not know—the intense emotional shock of all the renewals of strange sensations that make one no longer feel human… and so far away… so far… from the narrowness of the earthly masses… and that terrifies me at times because I love with all my soul, and the one I love deserves a rare and absolute love; I could not bear to see her suffer by sacrificing a part of her existence to my secret passion”… Etc. Source: - Jean Mermoz (1901–1936); - Gabrielle Gillet-Mermoz (1880–1955); - Then passed down through the family