Fall 2022 Militaria & Collectibles Auction
Lot 119:
Historic lot from WWII Brigadier General (later Major General) Robert A. McClure, the head of Psychological Warfare for SHAEF in the ETO during the War. This group includes some photos of his time as a junior Army Officer in China circa 1917, his signed ETO Ration Card, a propaganda newspaper draft with his notes on it, some original photos, German booklets, a meal card from a meal with the King of Yugoslavia, a 1957 US Troops in Tehran newsletter (he was the Chief of MAAG there at that time), and other items as shown. Interestingly, there is a 1939 hardcover French Atlas of North Africa book hand inscribed to Gen. McClure in Alger 1943 by CBS Broadcaster Charles Collingwood. Collingwood covered [World War II] for [United Press] in London and was soon recruited to [CBS] by Edward R. Murrow in 1941. He established himself as an urbane and spontaneously-eloquent on-air journalist. In 1942, Collingwood was sent to cover the [North African Campaign], where he proved his reporting abilities despite being considered "green" as a broadcast journalist. On D-Day, he landed at Utah Beach hours after the first wave of soldiers had hit the beaches. Of the CBS reporters accompanying the ground invasion, he recorded a report on June 6 that made it to broadcast two days later. The other CBS correspondents on the ground, Bill Downs Larry LeSueur, were not able to deliver reports until days later because of trouble setting up mobile transmitters. When General [Omar Bradley](told Collingwood that the [French Resistance] was about to rise up and [liberate Paris] Collingwood prepared and sent a recording with news of the liberation to CBS in [London] so that it would be ready when the city was actually freed. The recording bore a label that said to hold it back until Paris was actually liberated, but the technician at CBS did not read the label and immediately aired the recording. On that day, August 22, there were still thousands of German troops in Paris, and the Resistance fighters who were fighting and dying did not appreciate that the world was told that Paris had been liberated. The city would not be actually liberated until three days later, on August 25.
Condition: See Description for Condition.
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