Robert E. Irion, Sandy, Utah: an interview by Benjamin Bahlmann, September 20, 2002: Saving the legacy tape no. 537, 538, and 539

Page 72

Robert E. Irion eptemb r 201h, 2002 BEN: Did he have brothers and sisters and everything? ROB: Yeah he had a couple of younger brothers and one sister. BEN: Did that bring some- I don't know, what kind of experience was that to be able to actually go back after? You out of probably most anyone was probably most qualified to tell of his military experience. ROB: The family had- the crew, the rest of the crew members, had made a concerted effort to try to make out things on their own after the War too. They were able to learn that two of these guys did bail out and were okay and through them, then, they were able to get all the story of what happened and why the others couldn't get out because, of course, that plane was going down in a spin that it was not going to get out of. But they had gotten a lot of the details from the other two guys who did survive. And the family grew up- I mean, they were all writing letters back and forth: "Have you heard anything?" "Do you know?" "Is there ... " Because they all were, except the two we reported missing, the two who turned up as P.O.W.'s, and they couldn't get their story for a long, long time -until after they were out of prison camp. BEN: Was that helpful for them or was it helpful for you also? ROB: Yeah it was helpful for me just to get to see, just to get to meet these folks and get a chance to be with them. His brothers, by that time, were gone away from home. They had already gone to school in other places out of the community, but I did meet the mother and the father. BEN: Did that help, from this experience and like you said, losing your friend Jonesy there and others, all these years later, have you ever come to any conclusion why you survived and others don't? 70