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General Gavin Letter


philliephanatic
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philliephanatic

I received the following letter from my grandparents. My grandmother's brother was in the 82nd Airborne Division and was killed in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge. Her mother recieved this letter in 1945 from General James Gavin. I was wondering if he signed these letters personally, or if he had an aide or stamp to do that. I would think that there were a lot of letters like this after the Battle of the Bulge and that a General, such as Gavin would have been very busy. I would love to hear what anyone out there has to say about the signature. (I blanked out my great uncle's name and serial number and my great grandmother's address so those are not holes in the letter.) The letter is very fragile and I was thinking I would put it into a 1 pocket sleeve, similar to those I have for autographed photographs. There are some other letters from the Army Service Forces and the Quartermaster that I will do the same with. I also have some v-mails that I will find smaller pages for, and the dreaded newspaper articles that I have already scanned for preservation. I will keep them separate from the letters since they are so acidic.

 

Thank you in advance for any information.

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Just sent a link to this page to Jimmie Hallis, Collections Manager at the 82d ABN DIV Museum at Fort Bragg to get his take on it

 

Chris

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Manchu Warrior

I am no expert but it looks as if the signature on your letter fades from dark to light and I would assume that it was because of uneven pressure while the signature was written with a pen and not stamped. I also looked at other signatures the good General signed. One being another war time letter to someone that wanted an 82nd patch. That signature on that letter looks more even so it may have been stamped. The other signature was on a book the General wrote and signed in 1982. And again I am no expert but you can compare them and the the G in the last looks the same.

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I would bet on your signature being real.

I just don't think a man like Gavin....a Commanding Officer, would write such a letter to the mother of one of his trooper's explaining his death, then place his signature on the letter by process of stamping it on. The entire letter is just to personal. My opinion.

RDarby

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PETER HENDRIKX
I received the following letter from my grandparents. My grandmother's brother was in the 82nd Airborne Division and was killed in Belgium during the Battle of the Bulge. Her mother recieved this letter in 1945 from General James Gavin. I was wondering if he signed these letters personally, or if he had an aide or stamp to do that. I would think that there were a lot of letters like this after the Battle of the Bulge and that a General, such as Gavin would have been very busy. I would love to hear what anyone out there has to say about the signature. (I blanked out my great uncle's name and serial number and my great grandmother's address so those are not holes in the letter.) The letter is very fragile and I was thinking I would put it into a 1 pocket sleeve, similar to those I have for autographed photographs. There are some other letters from the Army Service Forces and the Quartermaster that I will do the same with. I also have some v-mails that I will find smaller pages for, and the dreaded newspaper articles that I have already scanned for preservation. I will keep them separate from the letters since they are so acidic.

 

Thank you in advance for any information.

 

This is a real autograph by Gavin himself. No question about that. It is also interesting to note that Houseknecht was a member of the 82nd Division HQ, so there is a chance Gavin may have known Houseknecht professionally.

 

Peter Hendrikx

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philliephanatic
This is a real autograph by Gavin himself. No question about that. It is also interesting to note that Houseknecht was a member of the 82nd Division HQ, so there is a chance Gavin may have known Houseknecht professionally.

 

Peter Hendrikx

 

I never really thought about the fact that he may have known Gavin. He was just a Pfc so they probably never talked but he probably saw him. The soldier was my grandmother's brother and I received the items from my grandfather's estate. He recently passed away so I am just now getting things. There were some letters from training in there. It was interesting to read about how they dug trenched during training and that they got in the trenches and had tanks drive over the trenches.

 

I talked to someone in the 101st who was an officer and he told me that their reconnaissance troops took terrible casualites. They found the enemy by scouting ahead of the rest of the units until they encountered the enemy. It is a lot different than today where we have drones, helicopters and satellites.

 

Thank you all for your help.

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Here's the email response I got from Jimmie Hallis, Curator for the 82d Airborne Division Museum at Fort Bragg:

 

Chris,

 

From what I can see on the letter, and compared to the ones in our archives, it is his signature. Would recommend they store the letter flat, and keep away from sunlight and excessive humidity.

 

Jimmie

 

AATW!

 

Chris

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Nice piece of history, sad story... Cool collectible, apart from the fact that that letter should never have been written.

 

Cheers

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  • 2 weeks later...
philliephanatic
Here's the email response I got from Jimmie Hallis, Curator for the 82d Airborne Division Museum at Fort Bragg:

 

Chris,

 

From what I can see on the letter, and compared to the ones in our archives, it is his signature. Would recommend they store the letter flat, and keep away from sunlight and excessive humidity.

 

Jimmie

 

AATW!

 

Chris

 

Thanks for forwarding that Chris. I am an archivist so I'll get some acid free folders for it and will unfold it.

 

Brent

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