The Secret Holocaust Diaries: The Untold Story of Nonna Bannister


Nonna Bannister - 2009
    Nonna's writings tell the remarkable tale of how a Russian girl, born into a family that had known wealth and privileges, was exposed to the concentration camps and learned the value of human life and the importance of forgiveness.

Counterfeiter: How a Norwegian Jew survived the Holocaust


Moritz Nachtstern - 1995
    A team of typographers and printers was pulled out of the rows of prisoners on their way to the gas chambers and transferred to the strictly isolated Block 19 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. There they were presented with the enormous task of producing almost perfect counterfeits to the value of hundreds of millions of pounds sterling. These notes were to be dropped from bombers over London, with the aim of causing financial chaos. When the time came the Luftwaffe's resources were fully committed in other campaigns and theaters but some of the currency was successfully used to fund operations in Germany's secret war.Moritz Nachtstern (1902-1969), was a Norwegian-Jewish typographer deported from Oslo in 1942. This is his story, as told to his wife and written down by her, then edited by journalist Ragnar Arntzen. It was originally published in Norwegian in 1949. It covers the three terrible years from his arrest and transportation to Germany, through the horrors of life in Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen to his escape in the last chaotic and terrifying days as the liberating American forces approached. At the center of this personal tale of courage and endurance is Nachtstern's absorbing description of how, in order to survive, he participated in the creation of exquisite forgeries, while working as slowly as possible, both to frustrate the Nazi plan and to ensure that he and his fellow forgers never became expendable.Nachtstern's daughter Sidsel contributes a moving foreword, "It cannot be erased", and essays by Lawrence Malkin and Bjarte Bruland place this sixty-year old document in its historical context.The translator, Margrit Rosenberg Stenge, was born in Germany but spent five years of her childhood in hiding with her parents in Norway and Sweden during World War II. She has lived in Montreal since 1951 and has translated and published a number of Holocaust memoirs.

The Second World War, Vol. 3: The War at Sea (Essential Histories Book 1)


Philip D. Grove - 2003
    The war at sea was a critical contest, as sea-lanes provided the logistical arteries for British and subsequent Allied armies fighting on the three continents of Africa, Asia, and Europe. Land forces ultimately won World War II, but the battles at sea fundamentally altered the balance of military power on the ground.

Hitler and Nazi Germany: A History


Jackson J. Spielvogel - 1988
    Provides a balanced approach in examining Hitler's role in the history of the Third Reich. KEY TOPICS: Coverage ranges from the economic, social, and political forces that made possible the rise and growth of Nazism as well as the institutional, cultural, and social life of the Third Reich, the Second World War, and the Holocaust. Traces the rise of Hitler and the growth of the Nazi party in the context of the political, economic, and social problems of Weimar Germany. Presents Hitler from the perspective of the influences on his early development, character traits, oratorical skills, and his messianic pretensions. provides an analysis of Hitler's ideology based on extensive quotations from his writings and speeches. examines the social composition and membership of the Nazi party and its leaders. New topics include material on: culture and society in Nazi Germany; youth in Germany during World War II; an in-depth look at the Holocaust and anti-Semitism in Germany. MARKET: Appropriate as a reference book for history, political science, and literature professionals.

A Short History of the Korean War


James L. Stokesbury - 1988
    The first third covers the North Korean invasion of June 1950, the Pusan perimeter crisis, MacArthur's master stroke at Inchon and the intervention by Chinese forces that November. At this point, other popular histories of the war reach the three-quarter mark, ending often with a cursory summary of the comparatively undramatic three-and-a-half years required to bring the war to its ambiguous conclusion on July 27, 1953. Stokesbury renders the latter period as interesting as the operational fireworks of the first six months: the Truman-MacArthur controversy; the political limitations on U.S. air power; the need for the Americans to fight the war as cheaply as possible, due to NATO commitments; the prolonged negotiations at Panmunjom over the prisoner-exchange issue; and the effect of the war on the home front. Whether the United States could have/should have stayed out of the war in the first place comes under discussion: "no" on both counts, according to the author.

The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict


Martin Dillon - 2003
    Over three decades he has interviewed and investigated some of the most professional, dangerous and ruthless killers in Ireland. Now Dillon explores their personalities, motivations and bizarre crimes.Many of Ireland's assassins learned their trade in fields and on hillsides in remote parts of Ireland, while others were trained in the Middle East or with Basque separatist terrorists in Spain. Some were one-target-one-shot killers, like the sniper who terrorised the inhabitants of Washington State in the autumn of 2002, while others were bombers skilled in designing the most sophisticated explosive devices and booby traps. Another more powerful group of 'trigger men' were the influential figures in the shadows, who were experts in motivating the killers under their control. All of these men, whether they squeezed the trigger on a high-powered rifle, set the timer on a bomb or used their authority to send others out to commit horrific and unspeakable acts of cruelty, are featured in this book. The Trigger Men takes the reader inside the labyrinthine world of terrorist cells and highly classified counter-terrorism units of British Military Intelligence. The individual stories are described in gripping, unflinching detail and show how the terrorists carried out their ghastly work. Dillon also explores the ideology of the cult of the gunmen and the greed and hatred that motivated assassins in their killing sprees. There are penetrating insights into the mindset of the most infamous assassins: their social and historical conditioning, their callousness......

Dusty Warriors: Modern Soldiers at War


Richard Holmes - 2006
    Embroiled in a conflict often too dangerous for reporters to cover, these soldiers – most of them young, many without any previous experience of warfare – have kept ongoing records of the drudgery, anxiety and horror involved in fighting a violent and increasingly unpopular war against a ruthless and resourceful enemy. All have risked their lives, and many have died. Others have been recognised and awarded for their courage, resourcefulness and gallantry – Private Johnson Beharry recently became the first man to be awarded the Victoria Cross in twenty-three years.With these intimate and revealing glimpses of life in the modern army, Richard Holmes paints a sweeping portrait of a new generation of soldiers – grunts, gallants and heroes – and the sacrifices their decision to fight for their country entails.

The Gestapo: The Myth and Reality of Hitler's Secret Police


Frank McDonough - 2015
    Popularly depicted as a central part of an all-powerful "'Big Brother" Nazi totalitarian police state, its primary aim was to hunt down "the enemies of the people." Drawing on a detailed examination of previously unpublished Gestapo case files, this book relates the fascinating, vivid, and disturbing stories of a cross-section of ordinary and extraordinary people who opposed the Nazi regime. It also tells the equally disturbing stories of their friends, neighbors, and sometimes relatives drawn into the Gestapo's web of intrigue, either as informers or as staff. The book reveals, too, the cold-blooded and efficient methods of the Gestapo officers. This book argues that while it lacked the manpower and resources to spy on everyone, ultimately relying on tip-offs from the general public, the Gestapo was still a strong instrument of Nazi terror. It ruthlessly and efficiently targeted its officers against clearly defined political and racial "enemies of the people."

The Baker's Daughter


Sarah McCoy - 2012
    As their lives become more intertwined, all are forced to confront the uncomfortable truths of the past and seek out the courage to forgive.In 1945, Elsie Schmidt is a naive teenager, as eager for her first sip of champagne as she is for her first kiss. She and her family have been protected from the worst of the terror and desperation overtaking her country by a high-ranking Nazi who wishes to marry her. So when an escaped Jewish boy arrives on Elsie's doorstep in the dead of night on Christmas Eve, Elsie understands that opening the door would put all she loves in danger. Sixty years later, in El Paso, Texas, Reba Adams is trying to file a feel-good Christmas piece for the local magazine. Reba is perpetually on the run from memories of a turbulent childhood, but she's been in El Paso long enough to get a full-time job and a fiancé, Riki Chavez. Riki, an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol, finds comfort in strict rules and regulations, whereas Reba feels that lines are often blurred. Reba's latest assignment has brought her to the shop of an elderly baker across town. The interview should take a few hours at most, but the owner of Elsie's German Bakery is no easy subject. Reba finds herself returning to the bakery again and again, anxious to find the heart of the story. For Elsie, Reba's questions are a stinging reminder of darker times: her life in Germany during that last bleak year of WWII. And as Elsie, Reba, and Riki's lives become more intertwined, all are forced to confront the uncomfortable truths of the past and seek out the courage to forgive.