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Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Ira's WWII Memoirs - full text now on the web

I have loaded the file onto the web via Google. Clicking this link http://sites.google.com/site/irawellinsmemoirs/ira-wellins-memoirs-of-wwii will take you to a website where you can click on the document and read it.

2022 update. These memoirs, while heartfelt when written, were written some 40 years after the events and have, upon further digging into official records, been revealed as... often factually inaccurate, to the point where I'm really unable to vouch for any of it. Ira's own CONTEMPORANEOUS handwritten record of his missions, recorded in the flyleaf of a pharmacy textbook he apparently took with him to England, exactly match the official record of his service as recorded in meticulous detail on the website of his unit. My father was always truthful, so I am forced to conclude that the memoirs offer a fascinating peek into how, over several decades, our memories of past events can be muddied with others' anecdotes, things we may have read in newspapers or heard from colleagues, dreams, and a soupcon of wishful thinking.