LOST and FOUND - The provenance of Capt. G. R. Ames' Papers
May 23, 2016 18:10:36 GMT 8
Karl Welteke and beirutvet like this
Post by EXO on May 23, 2016 18:10:36 GMT 8
A very important part of the role of our website is that it has been able to give voice to many stories that people never would have otherwise known. When I first started developing it, a former POW called Al McGrew took me aside and told me that part of my obligation for his allowing me access to these materials, these stories, was that I must publish them freely to as many people as I could, so that those who had not returned could be remembered by them.
I compiled all the unit histories I received from Al McGrew and put them into the website, and later, into a book. At the time, I didn't know the details which Karol Ames recently posted to our forum, and which people should be aware of. I thank her for her service to history of these good men. This is what she wrote:
I appreciate my father's Diary entries being on this site, and wish to tell the exact "provenance" of the over 500 pages he wrote and buried at Cabanatuan. The diaries were recovered postwar, found below the floor boards of the Chapel Bldg, in a large mayonnaise jar. Dad had been selected to go to Japan on the 3 vessels of the Oryoku Maru. Before he left he told an officer friend, who was an amputee, and not selected to go to Japan, where his diaries were hidden. After the War, the diaries were recovered and photo stated byWACS in Manila, I presume.The originals were returned to my mother, in the States, Rockaway Beach NY. Sadly over the years most except the first booklet were lost.
In the early 1960's Mom was contacted by the Belote brothers who were writing "Corregidor,Saga of a Fortress.", asking her permission to quote from the "diaries," photostats in the Army Records Center in St. Louis.We were thrilled that those existed. I typed the first booklet in the late 50's, at my job as a secretary at IBM's Corporate Hqs in NYC, encouraged by the executives in our department who were WWII Vets. That copy was given to family and eventually to others. Then when I had time, quite a few years later in the 1980s, I went to the U S Archives Bldg, to the attic of that old edifice, still in downtown DC, and the archivists were terrific in their help. I found all of the diaries, plus others such as Capt. Paul Cornwall's book there as well.
During the l980's I typed most of the booklets, that were semi-legible. In 1885, my Mom and I returned to Corregidor with the West Point Memorial tour, sponsored by my Dad's USMA Class of 1937. I stayed after the tour left for the States for three days on Corregidor, at the old Corregidor Inn, run by Patsy an Charlie Altomonte. Her Dad, Gen. M.Q. Salientes was a Classmate of my Dad's. Al McGrew and his wife Marjean were among the guests there, as well as several other former Corregidor POWs. I gave Al McGrew a copy of Dad's diary, and he also shared it with Mr. Lindgre, I had also sent it to Mr. Miller, the Historian of the ADBC, and to men with whom I became to know who were surveyors of "C"Btry. Chicagp. That is the provenance of the Diaries of Capt. G. R. Ames. Also a correction of the date a few lines above, "1885" should be "1985! I think this website is absolutely fantastic!
In the early 1960's Mom was contacted by the Belote brothers who were writing "Corregidor,Saga of a Fortress.", asking her permission to quote from the "diaries," photostats in the Army Records Center in St. Louis.We were thrilled that those existed. I typed the first booklet in the late 50's, at my job as a secretary at IBM's Corporate Hqs in NYC, encouraged by the executives in our department who were WWII Vets. That copy was given to family and eventually to others. Then when I had time, quite a few years later in the 1980s, I went to the U S Archives Bldg, to the attic of that old edifice, still in downtown DC, and the archivists were terrific in their help. I found all of the diaries, plus others such as Capt. Paul Cornwall's book there as well.
During the l980's I typed most of the booklets, that were semi-legible. In 1885, my Mom and I returned to Corregidor with the West Point Memorial tour, sponsored by my Dad's USMA Class of 1937. I stayed after the tour left for the States for three days on Corregidor, at the old Corregidor Inn, run by Patsy an Charlie Altomonte. Her Dad, Gen. M.Q. Salientes was a Classmate of my Dad's. Al McGrew and his wife Marjean were among the guests there, as well as several other former Corregidor POWs. I gave Al McGrew a copy of Dad's diary, and he also shared it with Mr. Lindgre, I had also sent it to Mr. Miller, the Historian of the ADBC, and to men with whom I became to know who were surveyors of "C"Btry. Chicagp. That is the provenance of the Diaries of Capt. G. R. Ames. Also a correction of the date a few lines above, "1885" should be "1985! I think this website is absolutely fantastic!
Karol Ames