Naming and Claiming: Official History as Contemporary History in the Recording of New Zealand 23rd Battalion, Galatas, Crete, 1941

Abstract

While official war histories have been readily criticised for the limitations associated with their government funding and production, the influence of the very contemporary nature of the histories has been less generally acknowledged. In the case of the Second World War, official history programmes were underway in the United Kingdom and across the British Commonwealth by 1946 and often drew on personal documents and recollections in conjunction with the more formal records of war. This article provides an example of the writing of an official history in practice to show ways in which the methodological challenges of producing these volumes could lie as much within their contemporary nature as with their official designation.