Please Note:
This profile was automatically generated using 2 references found on the Internet. This information has not been verified. Learn more...
This profile was automatically generated using 2 references found on the Internet. This information has not been verified. Learn more...
Web References
-
1. The Union Leader and New Hampshire Sunday News - 12-Nov-02 - View Article
www.theunionleader.com/article - [Cached]Published on: 11/11/2002 Last Visited: 11/12/2002
For war correspondent Orie Yonkers, his weapon of choice throughout World War II was an SC-5, a portable Smith Corona typewriter.
His ammunition?
Words.
EVEN for a veteran war correspondent, the greatest story is the story of victory, and Ori Yonkers got to tell the story from a London radio studio on VE-Day in 1945. (Photo courtesy of Orie Yonkers)
...
"I was sitting next to Jimmy Powers, a columnist for the New York Daily News," Orie said. "He turned to me and said ‘Where do we go from here?' and I turned to him and said, ‘I'm enlisting.'"
He did.
"But I didn't go in as a war correspondent," he said. "They were looking for accountants and that's what I signed up for."
The Army had other ideas. Upon arriving in England in 1943, he was assigned to the chaplain's office on the U.S. base at Taunton in Somerset. He was typing church bulletins and sermons, but as U.S. troops flooded into the country for the invasion of Fortress Europe, more than 600 civilian war correspondents followed.
...
Then came German POWS, and a first for Orie.
"They were the first to be taken on the beach," he said. "We followed them to the POW camp, along with our newsreel and still-camera team. We met PFC Frank Weil of New York City at the camp. Frank spoke fluent German and Italian. With his help, I ‘spoke' to many of the prisoners."
His dispatch, complete with by-line, was carried by newspapers and radio stations all over America.
...
It would be more than two months before the Allies reached Paris (where Orie enjoyed canned, government-issue chili prepared by Michelin four-star chefs) and after a brief assignment in Rheims, he volunteered to cover the Allied invasion of Holland.
He thought it was important then.
He thinks it's more important now.
"I wanted people to know about Operation Market-Garden," he said, "and the paratroopers in Holland - U.S., British and Polish - the 35,000 of them armed with nothing but bazookas, rifles and knives.
"There were more casualties in the airborne invasion of Holland with 35,000 troops than there were at D-Day with 187,00 troops," he added. "One thing about elite troops like the Rangers and paratroopers was very high casualties. Usually, generals are pretty far back, but two Airborne generals - Jim Gavin from the 82nd and Max Taylor from the 101st - these guys jumped from the lead plane.
"The men who served under them weren't just willing to die for their countries. They were willing to die for their leaders and many of them - too many - did."
...
Orie wanted to tell their story, and he did.
He did so by telling his own story.
"In all humility," he said, "I have lived a pretty interesting life but the most interesting part of my career was interviewing wounded soldiers. Most all of them said, ‘Will you please write my Mom for me?' That always intrigued me. It was never ‘Mom and Dad.' Mom's were No. 1.
"When I'd leave the hospitals, I'd write all these letters and bring them back so they could sign them, then I'd mail them off. Some of those boys never made it home, but I know those letters did."
...
So did Orie, obviously.
He came home with a bride, Joan Rosemary Winterton, a lance corporal in the British Army Territorial Service who served in the Anti-Aircraft Command. Together, they share a lifetime of memories and with his book - and with his recorded memoirs at the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans - we too have his memories to cherish on this, a day we dedicate to veterans.
(Copies of "Orie Yonkers - Memories," are available for $29.95, plus $7 postage and handling, from Town & Country Reprographics at 230 N. Main St. in Concord. For more information, call 226-2828 or e-mail www.reprographic.com)
Return to Front Page
SERVICES: Subscriptions · Online Classifieds · Online Personals · NH Calendar · NH Nightlife · Health & Self-Help · Search Archives · Prior Editions · Site Map · Weather · Contact Us · Who's Who · Union Leader Jobs · Newspapers in Education · Home page version 2 · Obituaries -
2. The Union Leader and New Hampshire Sunday News - 11-Nov-02 - View Article
www.theunionleader.com/article - [Cached]Published on: 11/11/2002 Last Visited: 11/11/2002
For war correspondent Orie Yonkers, his weapon of choice throughout World War II was an SC-5, a portable Smith Corona typewriter.
His ammunition?
Words.
EVEN for a veteran war correspondent, the greatest story is the story of victory, and Ori Yonkers got to tell the story from a London radio studio on VE-Day in 1945. (Photo courtesy of Orie Yonkers)
...
"I was sitting next to Jimmy Powers, a columnist for the New York Daily News," Orie said. "He turned to me and said ‘Where do we go from here?' and I turned to him and said, ‘I'm enlisting.'"
He did.
"But I didn't go in as a war correspondent," he said. "They were looking for accountants and that's what I signed up for."
The Army had other ideas. Upon arriving in England in 1943, he was assigned to the chaplain's office on the U.S. base at Taunton in Somerset. He was typing church bulletins and sermons, but as U.S. troops flooded into the country for the invasion of Fortress Europe, more than 600 civilian war correspondents followed.
...
Then came German POWS, and a first for Orie.
"They were the first to be taken on the beach," he said. "We followed them to the POW camp, along with our newsreel and still-camera team. We met PFC Frank Weil of New York City at the camp. Frank spoke fluent German and Italian. With his help, I ‘spoke' to many of the prisoners."
His dispatch, complete with by-line, was carried by newspapers and radio stations all over America.
...
It would be more than two months before the Allies reached Paris (where Orie enjoyed canned, government-issue chili prepared by Michelin four-star chefs) and after a brief assignment in Rheims, he volunteered to cover the Allied invasion of Holland.
He thought it was important then.
He thinks it's more important now.
"I wanted people to know about Operation Market-Garden," he said, "and the paratroopers in Holland - U.S., British and Polish - the 35,000 of them armed with nothing but bazookas, rifles and knives.
"There were more casualties in the airborne invasion of Holland with 35,000 troops than there were at D-Day with 187,00 troops," he added. "One thing about elite troops like the Rangers and paratroopers was very high casualties. Usually, generals are pretty far back, but two Airborne generals - Jim Gavin from the 82nd and Max Taylor from the 101st - these guys jumped from the lead plane.
"The men who served under them weren't just willing to die for their countries. They were willing to die for their leaders and many of them - too many - did."
...
Orie wanted to tell their story, and he did.
He did so by telling his own story.
"In all humility," he said, "I have lived a pretty interesting life but the most interesting part of my career was interviewing wounded soldiers. Most all of them said, ‘Will you please write my Mom for me?' That always intrigued me. It was never ‘Mom and Dad.' Mom's were No. 1.
"When I'd leave the hospitals, I'd write all these letters and bring them back so they could sign them, then I'd mail them off. Some of those boys never made it home, but I know those letters did."
...
So did Orie, obviously.
He came home with a bride, Joan Rosemary Winterton, a lance corporal in the British Army Territorial Service who served in the Anti-Aircraft Command. Together, they share a lifetime of memories and with his book - and with his recorded memoirs at the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans - we too have his memories to cherish on this, a day we dedicate to veterans.
(Copies of "Orie Yonkers - Memories," are available for $29.95, plus $7 postage and handling, from Town & Country Reprographics at 230 N. Main St. in Concord. For more information, call 226-2828 or e-mail www.reprographic.com)
Return to Front Page The information on this site is copyrighted and cannot be reused without the permission of The Union Leader.
