Fake Holocaust Memoir Industry

Why would you?!
"Just four days before the end of the war in Europe, a unit of Canadian soldiers was advancing through a thick forest in the north-east of Holland. Accompanying them was a member of the highly secret British Special Service Unit, a man called Joe Corry.
By any measure, Corry had had an eventful war. He had assassinated a Nazi scientist with a crossbow, watched D-Day from a house on the landing beaches, rescued the nuclear scientist J Robert Oppenheimer (the so-called father of the atom bomb) from Holland, attached limpet mines to U-boats, been shipwrecked off Newfoundland, and had even worked with the future James Bond author, Ian Fleming, himself an intelligence officer.
But despite everything he had seen, nothing could prepare Corry for what he would witness that day. For hidden deep in the forest was a Nazi ‘experimental’ extermination camp, the sight of which would remain with him for ever.
‘The living and dead evidence of horror and brutality beyond one’s imagination was there,’ wrote Corry years later. ‘People were lying, crawling and shuffling about, in stinking ankle-deep mud and human excrement.’
A young girl came up to him, crying for help, but there was little that Corry could do. A rabbi then approached and kissed the back of Corry’s hand, mumbling what Corry could only assume was a prayer.
As Corry walked around the camp, he was presented with increasingly horrific sights, including heaps of corpses and rows of ‘living skeletons’ crammed into blockhouses.
A few days later he returned, and saw two inmates tearing flesh from a long-dead horse and ‘gulping huge bites’.
What Corry saw that day nearly seven decades ago was an all-too-vivid example of the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were murdered on the orders of Adolf Hitler.
No wonder that earlier this year publishers Simon & Schuster jumped at the opportunity to re-issue his extraordinary memoir, first published to little fanfare in 1990.

The new edition, out in 2014, has been described by Corry’s editor as ‘everything you’d want to read in a World War II memoir — it’s a gripping, rollercoaster account of extreme bravery and resourcefulness, that also packs a powerful and emotional punch’.
There is, however, just one problem: it simply isn’t true.
There were no such ‘experimental extermination camps’ in Holland, and the concentration camps that had been on Dutch soil had been discovered well before May 4 — the day of the German surrender in Holland.
In fact, nearly everything Corry claims about his wartime experiences is fictitious. There was no ‘Special Service Unit’; Professor Oppenheimer was in the U.S. throughout the war; there were no British troops hiding in houses on the D-Day beaches.
The list of falsehoods is astonishing and blatant. Little wonder that Mike Jones, editorial director of Simon & Schuster, now says: ‘We publish a vast range of non-fiction, and we have acquired the book on the basis of what we are being told.
‘There is no way on earth we would want to publish a book that is inaccurate and is made up. Now this has been brought to our attention by an expert, we shall look into these allegations and we shall talk to the author and agent.’
Sadly, Corry’s tale is part of a growing problem within the publishing industry, which is selling to the public a growing number of ‘memoirs’ about the Holocaust and World War II that should really belong on the shelves marked ‘fiction’."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2346193/Could-twisted-holocaust-fantasists-How-people-making-memoirs-witnessing-Nazi-crimes.html

 

It was inevitable that in the fog of war, certain parties would seek to tell and then later publish fake accounts of operations that did not actually take place in WW2.

As much as we despise these actions, it should not surprise us, but it equally does not stop us feeling utter disgust at such behaviour.

Lord knows there were enough completely genuine tales of despicable behavour in WW2 to satisfy even the most avid seeker of sensationanalism without someone having to make them up.

Ron

 

There is nothing really that new here, there are many who have doubts about "The Forgotten Soldier" and good old Sven Hassel made a nice living of war memoirs that saw him serve in every major theatre (some even simultaneously) in a Penal Panzer!? unit that had Tiger tanks at times.

 

I'm cautious to damn on first impressions, but it's an interesting Google.

http://www.nvafriends.nl/paginas/members/J-corry/J-Corry.htm

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cumbria/content/articles/2008/10/23/vn_joes_poem_video_feature.shtml

http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/0953720306/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending

http://www.newsandstar.co.uk/normandy-veteran-bill-meets-the-mate-he-thought-had-been-killed-after-d-day-1.377556?referrerPath=home/2.1962

etc.

I know someone who interviewed a fair few US 'DDay veterans' and eventually found few of them had actually been on the beaches 'on the day' despite initial claims.

No problem at all here with people spinning a yarn, but when it begins to feed people like the denialists' little bonfire I have to raise an eyebrow somewhat.
Already some rumblings about this on assorted unpleasant sites.
Bit like the old 'SouthwestPacificVet' incident here, 'Ranger6'/'Mortman' on WW2T (and here), among others. The second you consciously deviate from the truth in personal 'non-fiction' history, whatever the motivations, you destroy any and all credibility for the bits which may be genuine, and potentially piss on a much wider field.

All deeply strange. Though the motivations and rewards for such fictionalising are interesting.

Like Ron says; it ain't hard to find genuine sensational or nasty stories from the War (or any other war for that matter).

 

Now I have a crap memory and getting the wrong day or wrong ship (he claims Rodney and Nelson were at Sword on the 6/6/44) when it's nearly 70 years ago is acceptable but to claim to have rescued Oppenheimer from an Amsterdam concentration camp in '45 when he was in the States is downright careless. The whole 005 thing seems bizarre agents in the SOE weren't numbered like that. The book has only one defender on Amazon, he has only ever commented on this book and appeared after it was critcised.

Spend your £8 on Sven it's probably more truthful.

 

Just to reply in defence of Joe -

I am a Salvation Army officer serving in Carlisle and Joe is a member of my congregation. I cannot in all honesty say for sure whether all the details Joe describes in his book are real or not. Neither can I claim to have a lot of knowledge about WWII beyond what the average person in the street would know.

I can however speak to Joes character. There are some who have been extremely harsh in their comments about Joe recently, with suggestions that he is doing this for financial gain and or to deliberately muddy the waters because of some sinister agenda.

As to financial gain - Joe is now 90 years old - lives in relative comfort with his wife after serving with the ambulance service for many years. I have grave doubts as to whether Joe would want or need the financial rewards a book deal might bring. He wrote this book some time ago with the aim I believe of informing others. It was picked up recently by a publishing company but they approached Joe I believe, not the other way round.

As to any other motives I believe Joe has always wanted to re tell what he believes to be his story, to inform. Indeed he has given talks in local schools in Carlisle about the war. And whilst some may doubt the facts there is no denying that Joe has raised awareness of the war and its atrocities. I have read letters from school children thanking Joe for the talks he has given. The fact that Joe has not only written memoirs but also shared in other ways, such as writing poetry says to me that his only motive has been to raise awareness of the horror and effects of War.

Joe has always been to me a very gracious man with a lovely character, gentle sense of humour and strong faith. If he has misled I would very much doubt if it was intentional. Phenomena such as false memory are now well documented (although I am not claiming that this is the case here). However I am loathe to accept he has deliberately lied on the say so of one historian - as much of what Joe claimed to have done was secret perhaps he will not be able - beyond his own recollections - to prove how accurate they are.

Joe has been very upset with the criticism and since the Daily Mail article has had a stroke - caused in part I believe by the stress the article caused. And he has not had seemed the same when I have seen him recently. Whatever the accuracy of Joes claims please believe that this is not a scheming money grabber aiming to deceive. He is a man who has served his country in more ways than one. He perhaps deserves better treatment than that which he has recently received from those who do not know him as I and many others do.

Captain Mark Sellers - Carlisle Salvation Army

 

Seems to me Joe reached an age where when approached,,,he embellished a story not for personal gain but more for reasons of wanting to communicate...Folk do it all the time but don't get published. Seems to me the onus for the disgrace if any lies with the publishers of this old mans story. Proof reading died when exactly?

Everyone is entitled to one moment in their life whereby they make a mistake..some worse than others.

I would like to see profits if any go somewhere of need..even to the Salvation Army itself. That is the necessary requirement here.

The book should be changed to fiction and republished if there is a need.

I excuse no one, but understand human nature...

I for one would be thrown off this site for all the embelishments I sometimes make. Lies though are a different matter.

But I think Captain Sellers, understands as we should, the lure of a book seller or publisher making an approach and the imagination of an old man which should simply not have gone into print.

Mr. Sellers deserves our ears at least when entering as he has the Lions Den.

 

I know nothing of this gentlemans service, but there was always T Force, which were operating with a Canadian Detatchment in the Netherlands in May 45. Their story is ripe for embellishment.

 

My comments were never a personal attack on a man who has obviously done his country and himself proud. I myself have been known to embelish a story for dramatic, humourous (and in the past) amorous intent but never money. Equally I have spoken to many vets and some of the sories they tell I know contain an element of BS. Every once in a while you hear tales that are so far fetched that they seem unlikely to be true but sometimes are. Occasionally you see a look in their eyes and you don't have to doubt that what they are telling is beyond any doubt true.

 

I don't think anyone on this site has attacked the guy.certainly not you PT.. Maybe others elsewhere...We have as a forum questioned his story. And that is what we do on this forum. Discuss ww2 in depth and also light hearted at times.

I don't think anyone on here has personally attacked the man, but have queried his story, which is the right thing to do.

As a vet he is as welcome on here as a member and vetran if he ever wished to join us.

The truth will always out though...Its what we as forum members do..WW2 is our passion...destroying people is not our way on this group.

 

Thanks for all the replies re Joe. I appreciate very much the need to properly examine all claims - particulalrly those that are going to be published as fact.

My concerns were with the tone of the orginal Daily Mail article that did seem to edge towards questioning Joes character. I had done an internet search to find for myself what the net was saying about Joe after reading the Daily mail article. Thats where I came across this forum, and yes your comments have been measured. I am grateful to the forum for that chance to say something as to Joes character. I have to reluctantly accept that parts of Joes recollections may be inaccurate but he still remains in my mind the kind man I always knew.

Mark Sellers