Preface

---

The further in time you get from an event, the more garbled the facts are. In books, magazine articles, and newspaper stories, some facts get blurred or omitted. Others are replaced with what an author thinks he remembers. Half-memories that have little to do with reality are often set down as history because they seem right. The truth gets shuffled as deadlines loom.

For these reasons, I went to as many primary sources as I could in researching this book. Paramount among the sources were reports contemporary to the times, and people who were there. Occasionally one story or report would conflict with another. In such cases I sought out a third source to verify one or the other.

Hopefully, I have found all the right facts, and organized them clearly without introducing inaccuracies.