Together Annals of an Army Wife Author:Katherine Tupper Marshall FOREWORD — During the past three years there have been many requests for a biography of General Marshall. These he has discouraged, with the explanation that a biography to be an accurate evaluation should be written after the subject is no longer of this world. Also, General Marshall has told me that he will never write his own memoirs, his know... more »ledge of people and events being too intimate for publication.
This decision will be understood by all who know him. It arises out of the thoughtfulness for others and selflessness of the man. And yet, obviously, it leaves the historian merely the official reports from which to paint a biographical portrait.
Therefore, when General Marshall was sent to China as the representative of the President on a mission of indefinite length, I felt that I could perform neither a greater service nor pass the long months more interestingly than by putting into an informal narrative the material I had collected since our marriage in 1930.
I have included trivial events along with the more serious ones. This was done for two reasons: first, it is through these seemingly small happenings that a clearer understanding will be gained of George Marshall's character and why a Brigadier General, far down the list of General officers, was chosen by President Roosevelt to be Chief of Staff of the United States Army at a time when our nation was being drawn rapidly into another World War; second, I hoped that these trivial or amusing events might illumine and make more readable this homespun account of our years together.