The Year of Peril: America in 1942


Tracy Campbell - 2020
    In 1942, however, after a series of defeats in the Pacific and the struggle to establish a beachhead on the European front, America seemed to be on the brink of defeat and was beginning to splinter from within.   Exploring this precarious moment, Tracy Campbell paints a portrait of the deep social, economic, and political fault lines that pitted factions of citizens against each other in the post–Pearl Harbor era, even as the nation mobilized, government-aided industrial infrastructure blossomed, and parents sent their sons off to war. This captivating look at how American society responded to the greatest stress experienced since the Civil War reveals the various ways, both good and bad, that the trauma of 1942 forced Americans to redefine their relationship with democracy in ways that continue to affect us today.

We Escaped: A Family's Flight from Holland During WWII


Alexander H. ter Weele - 2015
    seasoned with the terror of war. We Escaped plunges the reader into the extraordinary World War II escapades of an ordinary couple and their children as they first escape from Nazi-occupied Holland; and then deal with the war years by leavening danger and stress with the joy and love of everyday family life. It is the song and dance of The Sound of Music seasoned with the terror of guns and blood. The story begins in the Netherlands, a peaceful nation protected by a treaty of neutrality and kinship with Hitler's Germany. The calm is shattered by the cacophony and confusion of battle as, under the guns of panzers, German troops overrun Holland's lines. The ter Weele family's subsequent exodus from their home is told from the points of view of the father, Lieutenant Carl ter Weele, a Dutch reservist called up to defend the Grebbeberg; his wife Margery, an American citizen raised in Boston, who delivers her third child in a hospital not far from the Grebbeberg as war threatens; their oldest son, six-year-old Jan, whose dark eyes and hair lead Nazis to suspect he is Jewish; and their second son, Alex, a blond and fair-skinned imp, who at the age of two charms a German border guard into allowing the family to cross into Switzerland. Within weeks of Germany's conquest of Holland, the family has to flee the dragnet of the Gestapo, which is arresting all Dutch military officers. As far as Carl can see, the only way out is through Germany, and from there it's a tortuous and terrifying journey through Switzerland, Vichy France, Spain, and Portugal, with the Gestapo a threat at every turn.

Strangler


Corey Mitchell - 2007
    Then he wanted the whole world to know it. After brutally killing a 16-year-old girl, he called the local NBC and told an editor precisely where to find the body.

No Greater Glory: The Four Immortal Chaplains and the Sinking of the Dorchester in World War II


Dan Kurzman - 2004
    It was also the occasion of an astounding feat of heroism—and faith.As water gushed through a hole made by a German torpedo, four chaplains—members of different faiths but linked by bonds of friendship and devotion—moved quietly among the men onboard. Preaching bravery, the chaplains distributed life jackets, including their own. In the end, these four men went down with the ship, their arms linked in spiritual solidarity, their voices raised in prayer. In this spellbinding narrative, award-winning author and journalist Dan Kurzman tells the story of these heroes and the faith—in God and in country—that they shared. They were about as different as four American clergymen could be. George Lansing Fox (Methodist), wounded and decorated in World War I, loved his family and his Vermont congregation—yet he re-enlisted as soon as he heard about Pearl Harbor. Rabbi Alex Goode was an athlete, an intellectual, and an adoring new father—yet he too knew, the day Pearl Harbor was bombed, that he would serve. Clark Poling (Dutch Reformed), the son a famous radio evangelist, left for war begging his father to pray that he would never be a coward. Father John Washington (Catholic), a scrappy Irish street fighter, had dedicated himself to the church after a childhood brush with death. Chance brought the chaplains together at a Massachusetts training camp, but each was convinced that God had a reason for placing them together aboard the Dorchester.Drawing on extensive interviews with the chaplains’ families and the crews of both the Dorchester and the German submarine that fired the fatal torpedo, Kurzman re-creates the intimate circumstances and great historic events that culminated in that terrible night. The final hours unfold with the electrifying clarity of nightmare—the chaplains taking charge of the dwindling supply of life jackets, the panic of the crew, the overcrowded lifeboats, the prayers that ring out over the chaos, and the tight circle that the four chaplains form as the inevitable draws near.In No Greater Glory, Dan Kurzman tells how four extraordinary men left their mark on a single night of war—and forever changed the lives of those they saved. Riveting and inspiring, this is a true story of heroism, of goodness in the face of disaster, and of faith that transfigures even the horror of war.From the Hardcover edition.

Liberating Belsen Concentration Camp


Leonard Berney - 2015
    T.D. is the only book to be published that recounts the events that led up to the British Army’s uncovering of the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp and its 60,000 prisoners, how the Army dealt with the unprecedented horror that existed in the camp, how the surviving prisoners were rescued, how the inmates were evacuated, how the Royal Army Medical Corps established the world’s largest hospital to care for the many thousands of sick and emaciated ex-inmates, how the survivors were rehabilitated and cared for, how they were repatriated to their own countries, why many thousand refused to return ‘home’ and the eventual establishment of the Belsen Displaced Persons camp, the largest DP camp in Germany. The author of this book was a senior British Army officer who participated in the liberation of the Camp, who was in charge of evacuating the ex-prisoners to the vast Rehabilitation Camp that the Army set up, and who was then appointed as the Commandant of that Camp until its management was handed over to the United Nations, and who gave evidence against the SS guards at the Belsen War Crimes Trial. Forewords by Nanette Blitz Konig, Belsen survivor and former classmate of Anne Frank, and Major-General Nicholas Eeles CBE, with the introduction by the Oscar®-nominated film director, Joshua Oppenheimer.

Almost a Family: A Memoir


John Darnton - 2011
    John’s mother, a well-known Times reporter and editor, tried to keep alive the dream of raising her two sons in ideal surroundings. When that proved impossible, she collapsed emotionally and physically. But along the way she created such a powerful myth of the father-hero who gave his life for his family, country, and the fourth estate that John followed his footsteps into the same newsroom. Decades after his father’s death, John and his brother, the historian Robert Darnton, began digging into the past to uncover the truth about their parents. To discover who the real-life Barney Darnton was—and in part who he himself is—John delves into turn-of-the-century farm life in Michigan, the anything-goes Jazz Age in Greenwich Village, the lives of hard-drinking war correspondents in the Pacific theater, and the fearful loneliness of the McCarthy years in Washington, D.C. He ends his quest on a beach in Papua New Guinea, where he learns about his father’s last moments from an aged villager who never forgot what he saw sixty-five years earlier.

If I Survive: Nazi Germany and the Jews: 100-Year Old Lena Goldstein's Miracle Story (Jewish Holocaust World War 11 Biography) (Faces of Eve Book 1)


Barbara Miller - 2019
    Her loved ones were cruelly forced from her arms in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland and perished in Treblinka Death Camp. This is a true story of Holocaust survival. In ww2 books, it is a searing story of human rights abuses and genocide.The story of Nazi Germany and the Jews is a story of anti-Semitism, Nazi concentration camps, gas chambers and World War 11 (wwii). The Warsaw ghetto where the Nazis had imprisoned the Jews was being emptied as Hitler’s Final Solution to murder all of European Jewry was put into action. Lena kept thinking, “It’s my turn next.” As some Jews escaped Treblinka and exposed it as being a death camp not a labour camp, young men and women in the ghetto decided to make a stand.Lena helped in the resistance which became the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising by gathering light bulbs from empty houses which could be used for Molotov cocktails. By a miracle, she escaped the ghetto before it became an inferno. But where could she hide? When it was over and she could walk free, the tears she had held back flooded out because she was all alone and there was no one to care that she had survived and no one to go to.Author Barbara Miller adds to Holocaust history and ww2 German history by skilfully weaving her research with Lena’s diary and interviews to bring her ww2 biography to life. Lena helped her companions in hiding to survive with her humour and compassion. She turned 100 in January 2019 and her miraculous story of survival against the odds will inspire you to not give up no matter how dark the time or difficult the situation or cruel the people around you. Download or order now! What are others saying about this remarkable book? This is a compelling, indeed exemplary work, that merges the history of the Holocaust with the live story of one survivor: Lena Goldstein, aged 100, one of the last living witnesses to the horrors of the Holocaust. Konrad Kwiet, Emeritus Professor and Resident Historian Sydney Jewish Museum This is a truly beautiful collaboration between the author and her subject, who have together produced an invaluable documentation of a unique, moving, life story set against the backdrop of one of the darkest moments in human history.  To read "If I Survive" is to meet a remarkable person and to be touched by her intense humanity in an inhuman world. Jeremy Jones AM, former President of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry and Director, Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council In this book Barbara Miller tells a powerful, must read story of survival - the story of Lena Goldstein, an elegant, articulate centenarian, a victim of one of the most horrific periods in human history, the Holocaust. Josie Lacey OAM, Author of An Inevitable Path, A Memoir, Life Member Executive Council of Australian Jewry, WIZO, and ECC Barbara Miller has given Lena Goldstein’s personal Holocaust journey the validation it so richly deserves; an eye witness account of a truly inspiring and heroic survivor. Viv Parry, Chairperson, Child Survivors of the Holocaust, Melbourne Another important book from the celebrated writer Barbara Miller. Expertly researched and skillfully written. Irene Shaland, author of The Dao of Being Jewish and Other Stories: Seeking Jewish narrative all over the World.” It is not often that you commence a book and feel compelled to continue reading until it is finished.

Erased: Missing Women, Murdered Wives


Marilee Strong - 2008
    A surprising number go on to kill a second or even third wife or girlfriend, often in exactly the same way. In more than fifty chilling case studies, Marilee Strong examines the strange and complex psychology that drives these killers—from the murder a century ago that inspired the novel An American Tragedy to Scott Peterson, Mark Hacking, Jeffrey MacDonald, Ira Einhorn, Charles Stuart, Robert Durst, Michael White, Barton Corbin, and many others. Erased also looks at how these men manipulate the legal system and exploit loopholes in missing persons procedures and death investigation, exposing how easy it can be to get away with murder.

The Lost Brothers: A Family's Decades-Long Search


Jack El-Hai - 2019
    The Klein brothers—Kenneth Jr., 8; David, 6; and Danny, 4—never came home. When two caps turned up on the ice of the Mississippi River, investigators concluded that the boys had drowned and closed the case. The boys’ parents were unconvinced, hoping against hope that their sons would still be found. Sixty long years would pass before two sheriff’s deputies, with new information in hand and the FBI on board, could convince the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to reopen the case.This is the story of that decades-long ordeal, one of the oldest known active missing-child investigations, told by a writer whose own research for an article in 1998 sparked new interest in the boys’ disappearance. Beginning in 2012, when deputies Jessica Miller and Lance Salls took up the Kleins’ cause, author Jack El-Hai returns to the mountain of clues amassed through the years, then follows the trail traced over time by the boys’ indefatigable parents, right back to those critical moments in 1951. Told in brisk, longform journalism style, The Lost Brothers captures the Kleins’ initial terror and confusion but also the unstinting effort, with its underlying faith, that carried them from psychics to reporters to private investigators and TV producers—and ultimately produced results that cast doubt on the drowning verdict and even suggested possible suspects in the boys’ abduction. An intimate portrait of a parent’s worst nightmare and its terrible toll on a family, the book is also a genuine mystery, spinning out suspense at every missed turn or potential lead, along with its hope for resolution in the end.

The Iron Sea: How the Allies Hunted and Destroyed Hitler's Warships


Simon Read - 2020
    Bristling with guns and steeled in heavy armor, these reapers of the waves could outrun and outgun any battleship in the Allied arsenal. The deadly menace kept Winston Churchill awake at night; he deemed them "targets of supreme consequence."The campaign against Hitler's warships would continue into the dying days of the World War II and involve everything from massive battleships engaged in bloody, fire-drenched battle to daring commando raids in German occupied harbors. This is the fast-paced story of the Allied bomber crews, brave sailors and bold commandoes who "sunk the Bismarck" and won a hard-fought victory over Hitler's iron sea.Using official war diaries, combat reports, eyewitness accounts and personal letters, Simon Read brings the action and adventure to vivid life. The result is an enthralling and gripping story of the Allied heroes who fought on a watery battlefield.

The Long Way Home: The Other Great Escape


John McCallum - 2012
    a great tale with a deep message' George Robertson 'a thrilling escapade' Bournemouth Echo At the age of nineteen, Glasgow-born John McCallum signed up as a Supplementary Reservist in the Signal Corps. A little over a year later, he was in France, working frantically to set up communication lines as Europe once more hurtled towards war. Wounded and captured at Boulogne, he was sent to the notorious Stalag VIIIB prison camp, together with his brother, Jimmy, and friend Joe Harkin. Ingenious and resourceful, the three men set about planning their escape. With the help of Traudl, a local girl, they put their plan into action. In an astonishing coincidence, they passed through the town of Sagan, around which the seventy-six airmen of the Great Escape were being pursued and caught. However, unlike most of these other escapees, John, Jimmy and Joe eventually made it to freedom. Now, due to the declassification of documents under the Official Secrets Act, John McCallum is finally able to tell the thrilling story of his adventure, in which he recaptures all the danger, audacity and romance of one of the most daring escapes of the Second World War.

The Russian Countess: Escaping Revolutionary Russia


Edith Sollohub - 2010
    Petersburg for accompanying her husband Alexander on shooting and riding trips and for being outstandingly accurate with her gun. She was the daughter of a high-ranking Russian diplomat, and the mother of three young sons, destined to join the social and intellectual elite of imperial Russia. The Revolution of 1917 changed the course of these lives. By December 1918 her husband was dead, her children separated from her by the closing of the frontiers, and her own life was in danger. This is her account of how she faced these traumatic events, revealing the courage and determination she had shown in earlier times that helped her endure hunger, imprisonment, and loneliness. Her reunion with her sons in 1921 makes the months of danger and deprivation worthwhile. Illustrated with original family photographs this account will interest the serious academic and general reader alike.

Inga: Kennedy's Great Love, Hitler's Perfect Beauty, and J. Edgar Hoover's Prime Suspect


Scott Farris - 2016
    Kennedy's life, and also Adolf Hitler's special guest at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. She was an actress, a foreign correspondent, a popular Washington columnist, an explorer who lived among a tribe of headhunters, one of Hollywood's most influential gossip columnists, and a suspected Nazi spy. The latter nearly got Kennedy cashiered out of the Navy, but instead set in motion the chain of events that led to him becoming a war hero. Inga lived where gossip intersects with history, and her story, as told by author Scott Farris in Inga, is a rollicking story that demonstrates how private lives influence public events. It is also a Hitchcockian tale of how difficult it can be to prove innocence when unjustly accused, and how, as Inga phrased it, what was once a halo can slip down and become a hangman's noose. In addition to her romance with Kennedy and the attention of Hitler, Arvad married three times -- to an Egyptian diplomat who insisted they never had divorced, the brilliant filmmaker Paul Fejos whom Charlie Chaplin considered a genius, and the famed cowboy movie star Tim McCoy. She also had affairs with noted surgeon Dr. William Cahan, the prolific writer John Gunther, and Winston's Churchill's right hand man, Baron Robert Boothby. She was pursued by Wall Street financier Bernard Baruch, and Swedish industrialist Axel Wenner-Gren, reputedly the richest man in the world at the time, offered her $1 million to have his child. Inga was Miss Denmark of 1931, but by all accounts her admirers among the European and American elite loved Inga not for her physical beauty alone, but for her joie de vivre. She was a genius with people, she was daring and adventurous, and she was their equal in intellect. Like Isak Dinesen and Clare Boothe Luce, Inga Arvad led a life that both sheds light on and defies the stereotypes of women of her time.

Breakout and Pursuit: The United States Army in World War II, The European Theater of Operations


Martin Blumenson - 2012
     Yet, although D-Day had been a monumental success, their journey was far from over. How did the Allied forces drive back the Nazi’s from their strongly entrenched positions in northern France all the way to the German border? This is the main question that is answered with Martin Blumenson’s brilliant study, Breakout and Pursuit, which covers the period from 1st July to 11th September 1944. The allied forces had to work together to overcome tremendous difficulties as they fought against battle-hardened troops. Virtually every sort of major operation involving co-ordinated action of the combined arms is found: the grueling positional warfare of the battle of the hedgerows, the breakthrough of the main enemy position, exploitation, encirclement, and pursuit, as well as a number of actions falling under the general heading of special operations — an assault river crossing, the siege of a fortress, and night combat, among others. Blumenson states that he wished this book would be of interest to the general reader “who may be motivated by curiosity and the hope of learning in some detail about the conduct of the campaign, the expenditure of men and materiel, and the problems that face military leaders engaged in war.” Martin Blumenson was an American military historian who had been the historical officer of both the Third and Seventh Armies in World War Two. He wrote a number of prominent books on World War Two, including a biography of Patton and a number of campaign histories. He was awarded the Samuel Eliot Morison Prize for lifetime achievement from the Society of Military History in 1995. His book Breakout and Pursuit was first published in 1960 and he passed away in 2005.

Iron Spy: The True Story of the Greatest Double Agent in World War II (Espionage)


Ethan Quinn - 2019
    While his early life was rife with petty crime, gang activity and a dishonourable discharge from the British military, Chapman’s unique skills were eventually sought out by Nazi Germany, and after convincing them he could use his criminal contacts to sabotage the English forces, he was quickly recruited. But Chapman’s loyalty to his country knew no limits. A talented, handsome, and reckless Englishman, Chapman was a traitor on the surface but a fearless patriot on the inside. After cracking Germany’s military code, the British sought Chapman for their own affairs, and Chapman was happy to oblige. Eventually being awarded the prestigious Nazi Iron Cross for services to Germany while acting as a double agent for Britain, Chapman’s espionage efforts involved masterful deceit and feats which few men alive could ever boast of. Eddie Chapman’s life story is an unbelievable journey of crime, jail-breaks, treachery, and love. He was responsible for saving countless lives during his career, cementing himself as the ultimate double agent during World War II.