Notaguru,
Thank you for your response. The issue that I have is that when I hear claims of artifacts being salvaged directly from the Vet (or the Vet's family) it is that when I try to follow this up it is all too often not quite directly from the Vet - that there is some intermediary, or middleman, whatever. And the chain of provenance is seen to be broken, or even non-existant.
Of course it is true to say that there are still viable links to veterans, their families, and their souvenirs. I am not disputing any of this, all I am trying to say is that at this period in time if someone claims a provenance link with the earliest individual associated with any item - then I am inclined to follow it through to the earliest point of source.
We are 60+ years from the end of WWII. It is just a matter of time - a few short years - before all those first hand contacts will be gone.
I might be a pain in the butt for insisting in having all these explanations, but future generations will not have that same opportunity - so we have to do it for them now, and for the future unseen (and possibly un-born) students of this subject.
That is what motivates me, I hope you understand.
FJS
