There are a few omissions, a few details that I believed at the time but later found to be incorrect, and not a few barefaced lies. Certain details have been obscured to protect others still alive. This story is, as might be expected, me-centred. Had I not been asked to tell the story, to write this book, I would have been happy to leave the past where it belongs, in the past.īut then, those who do not learn from the past are condemned to repeat it. It is not, after all, just my story, but that of everyone who lived in Ingalls and contributed to the 2nd Reconstruction.
No, I didn’t want to write the book because I didn’t feel that I had the right to tell the story. There is very little dispute over what I did, perhaps not even over the why. Not, I should say right from the start, because I was afraid. You may like Ed, or you may grow to hate him, but he was a product of his time and he did what he thought he had to do. I have not altered details, with a handful of exceptions, mainly factual details relating to events outside Ed’s area of operations. Ed himself has asked me to make clear that he may have forgotten details, or altered his reasoning later, but it is the best that he could do. The story covers the post-war world as he saw it, written in hindsight. I found it hard to convince him that it was worth the effort of writing it, although I was surprised to discover that I had the support of several members of Ed’s family in my efforts. The book you hold in your hand was written, at my request, by Ed himself. The detractors are free to put what spin on them they like. The stories about him – and he really did do most of what they said he did – have grown in the telling, but they are nothing, but bare facts. He is hated and loathed by many others, including some of the people who worked with him in Ingalls after the war.
He has won the grudging respect of others who would not normally have a kind word for the military. He has his friends and admirers who will not say or hear a word against him. He is, and remains, one of the most controversial figures in recent history. There are hundreds of such stories, the lives of people who stepped forward to rebuild our country after the war, and yet, so many of them are deconstructed. The stories about Patrick Hessessy, who led post-war recovery efforts in Panama, remain important to us today. The tale of Mike Harmon, of Georgia, is still a thrilling story for Americans. There are many tales from the Final War and its aftermath that have been told, in books and movies and even face to face.
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