Dear Sir, - I have been a reader of London Life for some time, and I have been immensely pleased to see just lately how well to the front (if I may use the expression) the one-legged brigade have been, of which I am happy to be a member, as I am also one-legged.
I lost my parents when I was quite a kiddie, and was looked after by a maiden aunt, the only relative I had. I went away to school until I was eighteen, and not long afterwards I was involved in a motor accident in which the lower part of my right leg was badly smashed, which I learned afterwards had to be amputated through the knee joint by the method of disarticulation. I made a good recovery from this type of amputation, which does not necessitate sawing through any bones, and was soon hopping about between a pair of armpit crutches. A little while later, preferring to have one hand free, I commenced to hop on my one leg with just a single crutch cuddled under my right armpit, and within six months of becoming one-legged I was able to hop on and off buses and up and down stairs, as easily as though I had only had one leg all my life. About this time I lost my aunt, who left me a nice little income, which, when augmented to the income I was already receiving from the damages which were awarded me for the loss of my leg, made me quite independent of having to follow a profession, for which I was very glad.
I am now twenty-five years old, and have therefore been one-legged nearly seven years, just long enough, I am sure you will agree, to know what it is like to hop on just one leg supported by a single crutch, and also long enough, I am glad to say to have a preference to be one-legged! Perhaps this may sound rather peculiar to some of your readers, but I can honestly assure you that it is quite true, and I am not in the slightest degree ashamed or afraid to put in writing this earnest satisfaction to be as I am, a one-legged girl. I am supposed to be rather good-looking, being very dark, with jet black hair, which is brushed well below my shoulders. I prefer the natural, though rather accentuated pallor of my cheeks to any make-up, but I do apply, and rather generously too, a very vivid purple lipstick on my lips, and also I colour my fingernails, and my five toe-nails in the same shade. I am about average height, a little on the plump side, with a few soft, warm curves and a rather full bust, which, with my one and only leg gives my figure a rather "cuddly" appearance. I find my stocking bill a rather expensive item, as I am obliged to have one of every pair cut and shaped to fit my shortened limb, which tapers right down to the knee, where it is rounded off, but it is impossible for me to wholly conceal it, as the present fashion of short skirts reveals a couple of inches slightly swaying with my one-legged hopping movements.
My single crutch is of the slender pole type, and has a pneumatic shoulder-rest which is very yielding to the soft flesh under my armpit, and I experience a decided buoyant feeling as I hop along which is caused by my pneumatic shoulder-rest and the rubber shoe at the bottom of the pole of my crutch.
I soon began to observe how my one-legged condition appealed to the opposite sex, and it has no infrequent occurrence for me to be stopped by complete strangers in the street, who would ask me to go out with them. Although I have always been a one-legged sport, I naturally did not accept these promiscuous invitations, which I knew were only offered owing to my rather intriguing one-legged condition.
There is undoubtedly something which it is difficult to describe about being one-legged.
Firstly: There is the feeling of physical incompleteness, which takes some getting accustomed to, especially when quite innocently you endeavour to demand from your crippled limb the same functions as you do from your single leg. I find this a most peculiar and yet pleasurable feeling, until the realisation of my inability to do so is made manifest.
Secondly: There is without doubt the attention paid to me when I hop on a bus. All the men glance down at my obvious one-legged condition and seem to vie with each other in offering me their seat, and then when I sit down, my palpably noticeable one-leggedness makes me the cynosure of all eyes.
Then thirdly: There is what I might call the reactionary feelings of yourself to your one leg and stump condition, and this I should say depends quite a lot on one's temperament. As I have already stated, I have discovered that I actually prefer having one leg, because I know that the fact of my being one-legged is so very apparent that it immediately dispels any doubt which may exist in the minds of anyone who takes the look properly at it, which I can assure you everyone seems to do.
I am shortly getting married to a very charming man who is twenty years my senior. He has just given me a beautiful sable coat, loose-fitting, with side slit pockets, so that I can manipulate my crutch with my hand inside the pocket, and underneath the coat, so that the shoulder-rest of my crutch is under my armpit inside the coat, which prevents it from rubbing the sable, not only under my arm but also at the side, as my stump is slightly inclined to rub against the pole of my crutch, as I hop one-leggedly along. My fiance worships the very ground my one leg steps on, and if anyone in this world is as enamoured of a girl with one leg as he is of me, then they have a very passionate wooer. I, on my part, am absolutely in love with him as much as any girl could be, one-legged or otherwise.
I should like to write again and tell you about my wedding, which is going to be a grand one, but personally I wish it were not; and if you would like a photograph of me which I had taken quite recently, I should love to send it to you for publication. The reason I do not send it now is because it naturally reveals my palpably one-legged condition, and I did not know whether this would be suitable to your wishes. Perhaps you will add an editorial note to this letter, which I hope you will publish.
Yours truly,
Definitely One-Legged.