MERMOZ JEAN (1901-1936)

Beautiful autograph letter from Jean Mermoz, Mazamet March 31 [1935, to HIS GRAND PARENTS]; 1 page 3/4 in-4 (the bottom of the 2nd page has been cut, probably to remove a too intimate passage). Very moving letter on the death of his brother-in-law Edouard Chazottes in an airplane accident. ""You must have learned from the newspaper the sad news: the fatal accident that happened to my little brother-in-law Edouard at Istres. As he was descending to land without having the time to realize what was happening to him, another plane crashed into his fuselage, cutting him in two, and the two planes crashed! Edward had made no mistake, the other paid with his life for a mistake that was heavy with fatality... To tell you the sorrow of Gilberte: it is useless .... She is very strongly touched; mine is deep. Since Edouard was in Istres for three months, he had changed a lot! Aviation had made him a man. I advised him, guided him: he replaced the family brother that I did not have... he was also my little spiritual brother in aviation... As I watched him gradually transform himself, I thought that he would continue to be my brother in the future. He had all the qualities for that: prudence, will, courage. He was born... but he was getting ready to live the life that I live. I would not have wanted him to precede me in such a fatal way. That he would follow me there later, much later, it would have been in the order... He no longer suffers: he is happy. [...] he was going to be twenty years old. He died in the middle of a dream. He was on his last school flights. I had him posted to Algiers where he was happy to go: he had just been posted, he was named master corporal. [...] God governs our destinies! One must know how to resign oneself without bowing one's head and to continue always more forward, towards the future"...