I'm writing a book with all my grandfather's WWII letters

Hi, I'm Conrad, 55, living in Boston MA. My handle here is PuzzleRad because I use that handle on some other sites like IG (I make hand-made wooden jigsaw puzzles as a hobby).

It took me a decade, but I finally typed all 243 of my grandfather's letters that he wrote home to my grandmother during WWII, into a Word doc. I'm hoping to eventually publish a book, not to make money, but so that my grandfather's descendants and their descendants all have a copy. Now I'm going back and trying to fill in all the words I didn't recognize on my first pass, now that I'm better at reading his handwriting and have seen the same terms written many times, sometimes more legible than others. I'm also enjoying using Google to learn 1940's or WWII terms (or locations, names, books, etc.) that I never knew about before, and I'm adding footnotes to explain the terms for the modern reader. But some terms or abbreviations I just can't figure out, so I'll be posting those kinds of questions on this site. If there is a certain sub-forum that is most applicable for those kinds of questions, let me know.

He was in the Army Officers Reserve Corp, then was called up to serve in England, North Africa, Sicily, and Italy, from Aug 1942 to Jan 1945, mostly with or commanding the 331st Anti-Aircraft Battalion.

Thanks!

 

Greetings from Arizona. You came to the right people.

 

Welcome to the forum. Rich A. in Pa.

 

1) Photos. Must have. Even a few post war ones with him and your grandmother when she was younger
2) The guns. Some detail but not much.
3) Their movement through Europe (you might have to get it from the parent unit history)
4) Annotate. If he mentions "Smith" find out about Smith and what happened to him. Pictures of Smith. Etc. with Jones, Williams, et al.
5) Running commentary. Explain the situation they were in. Talk about the place. If he mentions a town, talk about it and its significance of any.

Good luck!

 

Deleted. Go fish.

 

@Slipdigit - you said xlibris and authorshouse will rip you a new one. Please elaborate.

Puzzlerad - don't forget veteran groups. Most of those guys are gone, but descendants and website (parent division and associated units (regiments) may have insights as to what happened where and when. Check the web for them. BatteryPress in Nashville reprints a lot of divisional history. Schiffer Press does a lot of airforce stuff so if you know what fighter/bomber group his battery was assigned to, look into them (just for unit movements).

 

Looks like this was just a drive by.

 

He checked in two hours after I took 5 minutes to do a look-'em-up to correct his misstatement of the unit ID. He couldn't be bothered to acknowledge my post. Would have taken him 20 seconds to say thanks.

 

Dayam Biak. I read a long time ago vanity presses serve to make money for themselves. What you and Slipdigit told me rings true. B&N print on demand is much better. I suspect Amazon is very much the same (but you still have to get your own LOC #).