Trauma and dissociation are first discussed from the vantage point of the author's personal experience of 9/11 as well as that of patients seen in psychoanalytic therapy. Visual/emotional memories of the author's severe trauma when he was 18 months old emerged consequent to the experience of 9/11. In addition, the experiences of 9/11 reverberated with two patients' childhood traumas. The dynamics of the author's recovery of dissociated memories are discussed. Paranoid anxieties and defensive maneuvers of identifying with a powerful protector were observed in patients and the general population. The author then discusses the trauma and dissociation connected to an Indian family's involvement in a train massacre in Pakistan during Partition in 1947 and how that experience has affected the whole family, in addition to individuals, over three generations.