Contains previously unpublished letters and photographs from the Rommel family.

     Attu was the westernmost island in the Aleutian chain, located one thousand miles from Alaska, and subject to brutal weather all year round. Prior to the war it had been home to two Americans and forty-five Aleut hunters and their families, but in June 1942 the Japanese had seized the island and now had over two-thousand troops on the barren island threatening the security of the U.S. mainland. The Battle of the Komandorski Islands in the Bering Sea on March 26, 1943, cleared the way for attempt to retake the island of Attu. Code-named Operation Landgrab, the U.S. military planned for the invasion to take place in May. Army planners had initially thought this would be a quick operation, but instead of being a short invasion it dragged on for over two weeks. The Japanese had realized that their options were limited and so launched a last-ditch banzai charge against the American frontline that was suffering from brutal Arctic conditions, equipment failures and food shortages. Although the U.S. military was able to recapture the island it had cost the lives of over five hundred American soldiers. Robert J. Mitchell, Sewell T. Tyng and Nelson Drummond’s book The Capture of Attu provides fascinating insight into this ferocious conflict. Part One of the book provides an overview of the military campaign while Part Two provides personal narratives of the soldiers who fought. This book attempts to put the reader on the battlefield with the ground soldier. Men who fought on Attu, officers and enlisted men, told their stories to Lieutenant Robert J. Mitchell of the 32d Infantry, one of the regiments engaged. These stories tell of the discomforts and perils, the failures and successes, the fear and courage, the many fights between small groups and the occasional humor, of which battle consists. Robert J. Mitchell served as a lieutenant in the US Army's 7th Infantry Division in World War II, being stationed on Attu Island off of Alaska as well as other areas of the Pacific. He was shot in the chest while on Attu and carried the bullet for the rest of his life. While recuperating, he wrote the stories of the other men in his hospital tent. For this he was made an aide to the general in charge of media for the rest of the war. He passed away in 1992. His co-authors Sewell T. Tyng and Nelson Drummond also served on Attu and passed away in 1946 and 1999 respectively. Their book The Capture of Attu was first published in 1944.

    Kay Connolly, once an actress, now a young English Intelligence officer, ships out for Belgium to locate the launch sites and neutralize the threat. But when rumors of a defector circulate through the German ranks, Graf becomes a suspect. Unknown to each other, Graf and Connolly find themselves on opposite sides of the hunt for the saboteur. Their twin stories play out against the background of the German missile campaign, one of the most epic and modern but least explored episodes of the Second World War. Their destinies are on a collision course.

    Navy fighter/attack pilot from 1956 to 1980. (What it was like to fly jets off aircraft carriers in the days before smart bombs, GPS, and automated carrier landing systems.) After two years at the University of Arizona, the author entered the Naval Aviation Cadet Program in Pensacola, Florida, and became a carrier-qualified jet pilot at age twenty. As a naval aviator, he flew 3,669 hours in thirteen different types of aircraft, made 652 carrier landings (163 of them at night), and flew 183 combat missions during the Vietnam War. He was awarded the Silver Star, the Distinguished Flying Cross, and thirteen Air Medals. He went on to command Attack Squadron 35 aboard USS Nimitz.This is the story.

    An essential book for readers of Peter Hart, Tim Cook and Nick Lloyd.The men of the 46th Canadian Infantry Battalion were some of the most effective shock troops of the Allied forces in the Great War. They drove back German forces wherever they met and refused ever to surrender. Such tactics struck fear in their enemies, yet, it came at a tremendous cost. Of the 5374 officers and men who passed through the unit, a total of 4917, or 91 per cent, were either killed or wounded.J.L. McWilliams and R. James Steel chart the history of this battalion from when it was formed on 7th November 1914 through all of its major battles, including the Somme, Vimy Ridge, Hill 70, Passchendaele, Amiens, the Hundred Days Offensive and breaking through the Hindenburg Line, to when it was finally disbanded at the end of the war. Rather than focus simply on the grand strategies of generals, McWilliams and Steel use numerous personal accounts, both written at the time and afterwards, to depict what life was like for the regular soldier of the 46th Battalion during these treacherous years spent in muddy trenches in France and Belgium.

    5. Yet behind the public persona is a complicated woman of intrigue, shadowed by mysterious rumors. The Queen of Paris, the new novel from award-winning author Pamela Binnings Ewen, vividly imagines the hidden life of Chanel during the four years of Nazi occupation in Paris in the midst of WWII--as discovered in recently unearthed wartime files.Coco Chanel could be cheerful, lighthearted, and generous; she also could be ruthless, manipulative, even cruel. Against the winds of war, with the Wehrmacht marching down the Champs-Élysées, Chanel finds herself residing alongside the Reich's High Command in the Hotel Ritz. Surrounded by the enemy, Chanel wages a private war of her own to wrestle full control of her perfume company from the hands of her Jewish business partner, Pierre Wertheimer. With anti-Semitism on the rise, he has escaped to the United States with the confidential formula for Chanel No. 5. Distrustful of his intentions to set up production on the outskirts of New York City, Chanel fights to seize ownership. The House of Chanel shall not fall.While Chanel struggles to keep her livelihood intact, Paris sinks under the iron fist of German rule. Chanel--a woman made of sparkling granite--will do anything to survive. She will even agree to collaborate with the Nazis in order to protect her darkest secrets. When she is covertly recruited by Germany to spy for the Reich, she becomes Agent F-7124, code name: Westminster. But why? And to what lengths will she go to keep her stormy past from haunting her future?

    Threatened by the draft in the late sixties, he enlisted in the Army to avoid becoming a grunt, yet ended up one anyway. He endured a grueling war in Vietnam and then returned to a country too angry to care. While his journey took unexpected turns, his choices got him there, so he did his best to react positively and keep moving forward.Udden delivers his story in a comfortable, friendly style. He conveys the experiences of basic training, advanced infantry training, and what it was like to live, work, guard, patrol, and fight in the jungle. The reader will feel the adrenalin rush of a firefight, the thrill of a wild ride dangling below a helicopter, and the humor in celebrating his 21st birthday on a firebase.Through his words and personal photographs, you will live through his journey exactly as he experienced it.

    At Mons, Le Cateau, the Marne, on the Aisne and at the Battle of First Ypres, they shot the Kaiser's legions to pieces. This is the dramatic story of how those men, regular soldiers from every walk of life, plunged into this new and terrible war, held their muddy trenches against impossible odds and gave the Empire time to muster its forces and ready itself for the long struggle ahead. 'The Old Contemptibles' brings those battles vividly to life in all their terror and glory. But Robin Neillands does more than explain the role of the BEF in the early months of the First World War. He also tells the story of why they were sent to France and of that wily officer, General Henry Wilson, whose years of secret intrigue with the French High Command first committed the British Army to this global war.'Excellent' - Literary Review'Informed and explicit, this is military history at its best' - Western Daily Press'Brings to life the horrific experiences of the British Expeditionary Force' - SoldierRobin Neillands is the author of several acclaimed works on the First World War including ‘The Great War Generals on the Western Front’, ‘Attrition: The Great War on the Western Front, 1916’ and ‘The Death of Glory’.Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent publisher of digital books.

    Hailed as "unsinkable, " the "Kursk" was on maneuvers when mysterious explosions rocked the sub, causing it to sink to the bottom of the sea with its 118-man crew. This in-depth look at the disaster reveals previously unreleased information from family members of the deceased as well as from government officials.

    Navy history. In only 76 days of combat, Blackburn's Jolly Rogers downed a record 154 enemy warplanes, and Blackburn himself emerged as one of VF-17’s leading aces with eleven aerial combat victories to his credit. A complete history of the squadron from its commissioning in January 1943 to its disbanding in April 1944—including a harrowing account of the squadron’s intense, winning campaign against the Japanese over the northern Solomon Islands and Fortress Rabaul—this book offers a fascinating look at Blackburn’s approach to organizing, training, and leading his pilots—thirteen of whom, the author included, became air aces.

    "A masterful book—masterful in its portrayal of its protagonists, masterful in its overall understanding of the death-struggle in which they engaged, masterful, above all, in its vivid, suspenseful chronicling of the most momentous eighty days in the history of this century." —Geoffrey Ward "This is a marvelous book. John Lukacs has lucid, unsentimental insight into the mind and character of both Churchill and Hitler." —Conor Cruise O’Brien "A wonderful story wonderfully told." —George F. Will "It is salutary to be reminded in this powerful study how close Hitler came to winning in 1940. . . . An impressive study . . . [written] with elegance and panache." —Peter Stansky, New York Times "A master of narrative history on a par with Barbara Tuchman and Garrett Mattingly." —Kirkus Reviews

    But to the women locked up there it was something else. A Living Hell. More than 4,000 internees were held there from January 1942 until February 1945.'Living Hell' is their harrowing story. The book is based on the diaries of Isla Corfield. An Englishwoman whose comfortable life in Shanghai was suddenly disrupted by the outbreak of World War Two, she fled with her daughter Gill on an evacuee ship.But the ship was captured by the Japanese -- and Isla and Gill would have to struggle to survive as prisoners of war in both Santo Tomas and Los Banos internment camps.In the communities of the camps, Isla and her daughter experienced the extremes of both friendship and loss. Cut-off from information about the war and with no end to their internment in sight, the pair experience starvation, disease and desperation.Finally liberated by the Americans after four years, Isla's story is both humbling and life-affirming - the story of one brave Englishwomen's battle to survive against terrible odds.It is one of the great untold stories of World War Two. "An incredible story of bravery and will-power." - Robert Foster, best-selling author of 'The Lunar Code'. Celia Lucas is a writer of children’s fiction and biography. She is a journalist, feature writer and public relations consultant. Winner of Tir na Nog Prize 1988 she has also collaborated on a TV series with husband Ian Skidmore. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading independent digital publisher.

    Nearly three million people endured it; just under half of them died. For twenty-five years the distinguished journalist and historian Harrison Salisbury pieced together this remarkable narrative of villainy and survival, in which the city had much to fear-from both Hitler and Stalin.

    From Hitler's postponement of the invasion of Britain, to ineptitude in the Western desert, from errors in the Battle of the Atlantic to the Japanese mistakes in the Pacific, see how an entire army's downfall can hinge on one momentous decision. A telling account of poor judgment--and of greed, arrogance, complacency, and misused manpower, even by those who tasted victory elsewhere.

    While I was doing that work I used to think that it didn't matter if I died, because without freedom there was no point in living'.Nancy WakeIn the early 1930's, Nancy Wake was a young woman enjoying a bohemian life in Paris. By the end of the Second World War she was the Gestapo's most wanted person.As a naive, young journalist, Nancy Wake witnessed a horrific scene of Nazi violence in a Viennese street. From that moment, she declared that she would do everything in her power to rid Europe of the Nazi presence. What began as a courier job here and there, became a highly successful escape network for Allied soldiers, perfectly camouflaged by Nancy's high-society life in Marseille. Her network was soon so successful - and so notorious - that he had to flee France to escape the Gestapo who had dubbed her 'the white mouse' for her knack of slipping through its traps.But Nancy was a passionate enemy of the Nazis and refused to stay away. She trained with the British Special Operations Executive and parachuted back into France behind enemy lines. Again, this singular woman rallied to the cause, helping to lead a powerful underground fighting force, the Maquis. Supplying weapons and training the civilian Maquis, organising Allied parachute drops, cycling four hundred kilometres across a mountain range to find a new transmitting radio - nothing seemed too difficult in her fight against the Nazis.Peter FitzSimons reveals Nancy Wake's compelling story, a tale of an ordinary woman doing extraordinary things.