Posted by Hello all!
In December 2010, there was a fire at Barbara Henry’s storage unit and the fire department had to drench everything in every unit to make sure that everything was out. Ellen, George and Tim went to salvage what was inside the unit and took home various boxes to store for the time being. My dad (Tim, you know him, the tall-ish, bald-ish, FedEx guy) and I took what was in the boxes that he brought home out to air dry and found that the contents was not just tax information and various paperwork, but probably close to 250 letters, dating from December 1942 to late 1945 from John Henry.
Out of pure curiosity and that nagging nature of mine to learn and consume as much knowledge and history as I can, I started sorting the letters into chronological order by the date they were written and started reading them and transcribing them so I could put the letters into a book in a fashion like the Captain Henry letters. I just finished transcribing letter number 50, and I’m not even a quarter of the way through…1943.
I’ve had people show interest in the letters and I would be more then willing to post, share, update, and email what I have as I go along. I am making slow but steady progress with them, due to the ever growing work load from the life of a college student and my slightly chaotic work schedule, so updates will be far apart until I’m done with the semester at Lakeland. But once the semester is over, I’ll have lots of time to get the letters typed up and shared amongst the Henry Clan. I’m going to be transcribing the letters first and when I’m done with those, I’ll be doing an intense research project (my favorite kind) and going through the letters, finding information of the references made, and making it into a serious, well researched, well presented and well preserved book of a huge part of Henry history.
I’ll be happy to answer any questions as well as welcome any additional information that I can get on the escapades of the Henry brothers’ during WWII, whether it be on the front line or back home. Until next time!
Sheila
1942 Enlistment Letters
The letters as promised! I’ve put them into PDF format, which will hopefully work. There are only a couple, but there were only a couple letters from 1942. The next update will be 1943, probably January and February, depending on how many letters there are in each month. Enjoy!
A quick note: there might be spelling errors and grammatical mistakes, but those are all transcribed as written. Other things are/were very very VERY difficult to read when I was transcribing (Grandpa’s handwriting can be classified as worse then my Dad’s in places) so I did the best I could to translate and there were really only a couple of places where I couldn’t understand what he was saying so it shouldn’t be too hard to read.
January – February 1943 Letters
As follows in the attached file (PDF format) are the letters from January – February 1943, when John Henry was in going through basic training in Miami Beach and at Buckley Field, Denver, Colorado when he was going through Armorer School.
In these letters he mentions just about everything in his training and what he is going through in his day to day life as an in-training soldier. He also mentions Ball & Chaines, which to my understanding is a fraternity at Hiram as well as mentions the Fenn-Hiram Wooden Brick. One of these letters is addressed, not to his parents as other letters have been, but to Uncle Don, which I found particularly sweet. Enjoy!
January – February 1943 Letters PDF
March 1943 Letters
Only one month for this update. These letters start with Grandpa’s bout of the Measles and take us on an adventure of what his day to day life at Buckley Field was like.
In other news, I’m doing a side project along with this one. I’m actually writing a paper for one of my classes on Boeing B-17 “Flying Fortress” Bombers, which is the craft Uncle Fred flew. Also I’ve found a couple pictures which I will try to get uploaded here soon.
Thank you for the support! I really appreciate it and I’m glad people are enjoying these letters as much as me.
Until next time!
April – May 1943 Letters
Back with tales of seeing “Pride of the Yankees” for the first time, a little girl trouble, gas mask training, being transferred to Hunter Field in Savannah, Georgia, being assigned to his squadron, and the start of the Army Censorship.
There is a note made about the censorship when you get to that point in the letters. The letters start to get spaced out further and further apart date wise after he ships out, so I think in the next update you’ll be seeing a lot of time passing between letters. 1943 is coming to a quick end, the most recent letter I’ve transcribed was a September letter.
Also the paper I’m writing on B-17s is coming along nicely and if I can, I’ll try to post it, because I have tied Uncle Fred into it (my professor is big on making our papers and research personal).
On a completely different note, I’ve been officially accepted to Hiram College for the Fall Semester of 2011! Very excited and a little nervous.
Until next time!
Hello fellow Henry Howlers!
I wanted to let everyone who has been following the “Letters to Home” series know that there is going to be a delay for the next few weeks on the next update. Things with me are a bit crazy, mostly due to the very happy news of my acceptance to Hiram! Whoever said the application process of college was hard was wrong; it’s the paperwork and meetings after the paperwork that are the hard part! April is a favorite month for orientations, form deadlines, and meetings so I’m tied up with that and other delightful things involving my last few weeks at Lakeland such as finals and projects.
As soon as things start slowing back down to a pace where I can breath, sleep and eat again, I’ll get back on track with the letter updates. I’ve gotten a couple of messages from people who have enjoyed the letters thus far and I’m glad to hear it! This entire project is something I love and hearing that people are appreciative of the work I’m doing to share and the interest in my grandpa’s story warms my heart.
Thanks to all and have a Happy Easter!!
Sheila