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Title: Ronald MacArthur Hirst papers
Dates: 1929-2004
Collection number: 93044
Creator:
Hirst, Ronald MacArthur, 1923-
Collection Size:
102 manuscript boxes, 4 card files, 2 oversize boxes
(43.2 linear feet)
Repository:
Hoover Institution Archives
Stanford, California 94305-6010
Abstract: The Ronald MacArthur Hirst papers consist largely of material collected and created by Hirst over the course of several decades
of research on topics related to the history of World War II and the Cold War, including the Battle of Stalingrad, the Allied
landing at Normandy on D-Day, American aerial operations, and the Berlin Airlift of 1948-1949, among other topics. Included
are writings, correspondence, biographical data, notes, copies of government documents, printed matter, maps, and photographs.
Physical location: Hoover Institution Archives
Languages:
Languages represented in the collection:
English,
German
Collection is open for research.
The Hoover Institution Archives only allows access to
copiesof audiovisual items. To listen to sound recordings or to view videos or films during your visit, please contact the Archives
at least two working days before your arrival. We will then advise you of the accessibility of the material you wish to see
or hear. Please note that not all audiovisual material is immediately accessible.
For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Archives
[Identification of item], Ronald MacArthur Hirst papers, [Box no.], Hoover Institution Archives
Acquired by the Hoover Institution Archives in increments between 1994 and 2004
Materials may have been added to the collection since this finding aid was prepared. To determine if this has occurred, find
the collection in Stanford University's online catalog Socrates at
http://library.stanford.edu/webcat . Materials have been added to the collection if the number of boxes listed in Socrates is larger than the number of boxes
listed in this finding aid.
| 1923 | Born, Evanston, Illinois |
| 1941 | Graduates, Wausau High School, Wausau, Wisconsin |
| 1944 June 6 | Lands with Allied forces at Omaha Beach, Normandy |
| 1944-1945 | Serves in 60th Infantry Regiment, 9th Division, U.S. Army, in campaigns in France, Belgium, and Germany [?] |
| 1945 March | Participates in battle and is wounded [?] at Ludendorff Bridge, Remagen |
| 1948 | Marries Inge Zindel in Wiesbaden |
| Moves to Detroit, where continues military career with U.S. Air Force, in military intelligence | |
| 1962 | After relocation to Germany, begins research on the Battle of Stalingrad |
| 1992 | Completes work on his history of the Battle of Stalingrad, Three Scenes from Barbarossa |
| 1995 | Completes history of Lindsey Air Base, Wiesbaden, Germany, titled Ninety Years at Lindsey |
Scope and Content of Collection
The Ronald MacArthur Hirst papers consist largely of material collected and created by Hirst over the course of several decades
of research on topics related to the history of World War II and the Cold War, including the Battle of Stalingrad, the Allied
landing at Normandy on D-Day, and the Berlin Airlift of 1948-1949, among other topics.
Hirst, a World War II veteran who landed at Omaha Beach in Normandy on D-Day, began his research while working as a civilian
employee of the U.S. Department of Defense, living alternately in West Germany and the United States in the early 1960s.
His initial interest in the surviving German veterans of the Battle of Stalingrad led him to contact several of them in 1963,
with the intent of collecting enough information from them to assemble a book of biographical vignettes of the various German
commanders at Stalingrad. The project expanded in scope over time, as Hirst ultimately researched the fates of over 700 German
participants in the battle and contacted hundreds of veterans or their families, regularly attending reunions of Stalingrad
survivors and befriending or maintaining extensive contact with several key participants in the battle, such as Colonel Herbert
Selle and Lt. General Arthur Schmidt, as well as family members such as the son of Field Marshal Friedrich von Paulus, among
others. Hirst completed work on his 2,700-plus page manuscript, Three Scenes from Barbarossa, in 1992, placing copies of
this work in the libraries of several military repositories as well as the Hoover Institution.
While employed at Lindsey Air Base in Wiesbaden, West Germany in the 1980s, Hirst became interested in the history of the
Berlin Airlift, and in particular the stories of the 32 U.S. airmen who were killed during the course of that operation in
1948-1949. Hirst had noticed that several of these men were memorialized in streets that were named after them at Lindsey
and the nearby Rhein-Main Air Base in Frankfurt, and his attempts to improve upon these street signs led him to research the
lives of these men and contact surviving family members in the United States, with the goal of providing fitting memorials
for each airman. In addition, Hirst organized trips to Germany for these families during the fiftieth anniversary commemorations
of the airlift in 1998-1999. Following his retirement from government service, Hirst remained in Wiesbaden, and began research
on further projects related to the Allied landing at Normandy in 1944. In particular, Hirst researched the role of the 9th
Air Force in the invasion, documenting the story of its 26 advanced landing grounds in Normandy that were used during the
invasion, and compiling a book titled A Guide to the Ninth Air Force Normandy Air Patches. Hirst also organized several tours
to Normandy for D-Day veterans during the 1990s, including one during the fiftieth anniversary commemoration in 1994.
The Ronald MacArthur Hirst papers are arranged in series according to the projects that Hirst worked on, beginning with the
Battle of Stalingrad. The
Stalingrad series contains a number of different subseries, beginning with the completed version of Three Scenes From Barbarossa as well
as manuscript drafts of the same work. This is followed by
Alphabetic Name Filesof individual Stalingrad veterans. These files contain correspondence and various types of documentation about each veteran,
and consist largely of correspondence with surviving veterans or with family members of veterans who perished at Stalingrad
or in Soviet captivity. These files are arranged alphabetically by the name of the veterans that Hirst was researching, rather
than the names of the people that Hirst contacted (such as family members, etc.), although in some cases this name was one
and the same. An additional section of this subseries contains outgoing correspondence from Hirst to surviving generals or
their families.
The
Stalingradseries also contains a subseries of
Correspondencewith historians, archivists, and others he encountered and shared information with during this project, as well as
Note Cardsthat are alphabetically arranged and that summarize the data that Hirst collected on each veteran. The
Photographssubseries consists largely of reproductions of photographs that were loaned to Hirst by Stalingrad veterans or their families,
and the
Subject Filescontain various types of materials collected by Hirst and arranged by topic. The subseries on
Veterans Associations and Veterans Memoirscontains correspondence, newsletters, documentation of reunions, regimental histories, and first-hand accounts of the battle
by veterans.
The
Berlin Airlift Commemoration Filesdocument Hirst's efforts to provide memorials for each of the American airmen who was killed during the course of "Operation
Vittles," the airlift that provided food and other scarce supplies to the inhabitants of West Berlin during the Soviet blockade
of that city from June 1948 through May 1949. The series is comprised of two parts:
Airmen, consisting of individual files on each of the American airmen who were killed during the airlift, including correspondence
with surviving family members and research material about them, and
Subject Files, which include correspondence from associations of airlift veterans, preparations for the tours that Hirst organized in 1998-1999,
and research about crash sites and the airbases that supported the airlift, among other topics.
The
Normandy Operations Files series, which contains detailed information about each of the Advanced Landing Grounds (ALGs) of the U.S. Army's 9th Air Force,
which comprised landing strips that were quickly built as the Allies gained territory around the initial beachhead in Normandy
following D-Day. This series is comprised of several parts, beginning with the summaries of each ALG (also known as "air
patches"), and then contains individual files on each ALG, made up of background research and correspondence. These are followed
by sub-series containing correspondence files, arranged alphabetically by name of individual or organization, but also containing
a sub-group of files arranged by individual towns in the départements of Manche and Calvados, in the areas near the sites
of the ALGs. In addition, there are subsequent subseries of Subject Files and Veterans Files, with the latter group being
further divided by veterans associations, memoirs and unit histories written by veterans, and newsletters of veterans associations.
The Normandy series concludes with a group of miscellaneous research materials.
The last series,
Other Research Projects Files, contains material pertaining to other areas of military history of interest to Hirst, and these files are arranged alphabetically
by topic. Two areas of special interest to Hirst were the Battle of Remagen (Ludendorff) Bridge, in which Hirst fought in
March 1945, as well as Lindsey Air Base in Wiesbaden, Germany, where Hirst was employed in the 1970s and 1980s. Hirst compiled
a manuscript on the latter topic, documenting the history of the air base from its origins as a German army barracks in the
latter years of the 19th century, up to the years prior to its decommissioning as a U.S. military base.
Oversized Materialsare related to many of the above series, and consisting largely of photographs, maps, and architectural drawings, are shelved
separately and listed in the last two boxes of this register.
The collection is organized into five series, which are in turn arranged largely alphabetically within each subseries.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in
the library's online public access catalog.
World War, 1939-1945--Campaigns--Eastern Front.
Germany. Heer.
Stalingrad, Battle of, 1942-1943.
World War, 1939-1945--Campaigns--France--Normandy.
World War, 1939-1945--Aerial operations.
United States--Armed Forces--Germany.
Berlin (Germany)--History--Blockade, 1948-1949.
Printed Materials have been transferred to the Hoover Institution Library