Ours to Fight for

Book excerpt: Ours To Fight For relies on oral testimony and allows readers to understand the story of the twentieth centurys greatest conflict in gripping, first-person detail. Soldiers like Bernard Branson wanted those sons of bitches to know that a Jew was bombing them; others, like Jack Scharf, just couldnt face it when they were confronted with the atrocities of the Holocaust. Marine reservist Evelyn Schecter Perlman put aside her career as a legal secretary and warned her older sisters, If youre waiting for me to get married, dont do it. The twelve stories presented here are told in the veterans own words, capturing the immediacy and spontaneity of oral testimony. The volume also contains new essays on the Jewish experience in World War II by scholars Jay M. Eidelman, Bonnie Gurewitsch, and William L. ONeill.