While we were reminiscing family history one evening in Brigantine, where we were spending a couple of weeks together with Ace, Bob and their families in the summer of 1978, it occurred to me that I should tape record or write down some of my recollections of our Exodus in 1940-41.
After unsuccessfully trying to dictate to a tape recorder, I finally started writing some of my recollections during my Christmas vacation in 1978. That narrative was intended to cover the period starting with the German invasion on May 10, 1940 and continuing through May 1941 when we reached New York. The initial handwritten draft ended up covering only the first few months in France and helped correct a number of Ace's erroneous recollections. After an interruption of almost 12 years I resumed the write-up in 1989 after my retirement.
This narrative is based on a diary I kept during the year we spent in France and the first few months in the U.S., and on correspondence from that period. Dad saved drafts of most, if not all, of the letters he sent from France as well as many letters and telegrams we received. This collection of letters, some in French and some in English, not only helped reconstruct the chronology of the events of the period but also gives the reader a feel for the times we were living in and the anxieties we experienced. The mails brought mostly disappointing if not outright bad news. Occasionally, however, they brought us a piece of good news. I have catalogued these letters for easier reference and will refer to them in the text that follows. There is a total of 212 letters and telegrams almost evenly divided between incoming and outgoing. Copies of the correspondence have been incorporated into an appendix.