B. Cates, General, U. S. Marine Corps. Saipan was the last barrier that the prevented the Allied forces from launching their entire military might against the Japanese homeland. Victory at Saipan was the key which opened the door to the soft underbelly of the Japanese Empire. Yet, because the Japanese were aware of this vulnerability, they were willing to throw everything they had against the ever-encroaching American forces and fight to the death to defend this island. Fifteen battleships began their bombardment of Japanese positions on 13 June 1944, they would fire over 165,000 shells onto the island. Then at 0700 on 15 June 8000 marines travelled in 300 LVTs to land on the west coast of Saipan to begin their assault. The Japanese high command realized that without resupply the island would be impossible to hold, but they and their soldiers were to fight until the last man. To make things as difficult as possible for the U. S. marines the Japanese used guerilla tactics to disrupt the offensive and dug themselves in in the mountainous terrain of central Saipan. Carl Hoffman’s brilliant account of this ferocious battle takes the reader through the course of its duration, from the initial discussion of plans and preparations right through to the eventual victory. This book is essential for anyone interested in the Pacific theater of war during World War Two and for the huge impact that the marine corps made in some of the bloodiest battles ever to have taken place. Carl W. Hoffman was a Major General in the United States Marines Corps. He served in World War Two, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. During World War Two he earned the Silver Star and two Purple Heart Medals while participating in operations on Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan and Tinian. His book Saipan: The Beginning of the End was first published in 1950 and he passed away in 2016.

    . . within seconds, flaming gasoline was pouring out, burning white and orange . . .”“We shot at the Russian tanks when they came out of the dust cloud . . . the T34 exploded like a rotten fruit . . . engine, turret and deck all going in different directions, with the crew torn apart likewise . . .”Told by the men who fought in the tanks, with all the searing aggression and violence that they experienced . . . these are the shocking first-hand stories of the SS panzer troops themselves. The crews of the Panzer IV, the Stug, the Panther, Jagdtiger, Tiger and King Tiger . . . the authentic voices of the gunners, commanders and drivers who fought some of the deadliest battles in human history.In 1962, German researchers conducted a series of interviews with former members of the Waffen SS panzer troops who had fought in World War 2. The intention was to probe the SS veterans' motivations and psychology, but the men were unwilling to discuss these matters in depth. They were prepared, however, to describe their combat experiences - and they gave astonishing accounts of tank battles in Operation Barbarossa, Normandy, Italy, the Russian Front, the massive conflict at Kursk, the Ardennes and during the final apocalyptic battles against the Soviets within the Reich and for Berlin itself. These were men whose memories of battle were still vivid, and they were ready to relate the physical details of combat – the violent sights, sounds, and sensations of tank fighting, the weapons and tactics that they used, their triumphs and humiliations. Told in ice-cold, clinical detail, with phenomenal drama and sense of crisis, these first-hand accounts stand out today as one of the most remarkable testimonies to the experience of tank warfare in WW2. They will fascinate anyone interested in tank combat, the Waffen SS and the use of armor from 1941 to 1945.This book has the complete set of interviews from Books 1 and 2, with accounts of tank battles in:Operation Barbarossa (Panzer IV) Onslaught in the East (Stug III) Kursk (Tiger I)Italy (Elefant and Panther)Normandy (Panther)The Ardennes (Jagdtiger)Prussia (Stug IV)Berlin (King Tiger and Wirbelwind)A unique and shocking insight into panzer warfare in all its horrors.

    After being held for five days in appalling conditions in the Vélodrome d'Hiver stadium, Joseph and his family were transported by cattle car to the Beaune-la-Rolande internment camp and brutally separated: all the adults and most of the children were transported on to Auschwitz and certain death, but 1,000 children were left behind to wait for a later train. The French guards told the children left behind that they would soon be reunited with their parents, but Joseph and his new friend, Joe Kogan, chose to risk everything in a daring escape attempt. After eluding the guards and crawling under razor-sharp barbed wire, Joseph found freedom. But how would he survive the rest of the war in Nazi-occupied France and build a life for himself? His problems had just begun.Until he was 80, Joseph Weismann kept his story to himself, giving only the slightest hints of it to his wife and three children. Simone Veil, lawyer, politician, President of the European Parliament, and member of the Constitutional Council of France—herself a survivor of Auschwitz—urged him to tell his story. In the original French version of this book and in Roselyne Bosch’s 2010 film La Rafle, Joseph shares his compelling and terrifying story of the Roundup of the Vél’ d’Hiv and his escape. Now, for the first time in English, Joseph tells the rest of his dramatic story in After the Roundup.

    Audrey Coltrane has always wanted to fly. It's why she implored her father to teach her at the little airfield back home in Texas. It's why she signed up to train military pilots in Hawaii when the war in Europe began. And it's why she insists she is not interested in any dream-derailing romantic involvements, even with the disarming Lieutenant James Hart, who fast becomes a friend as treasured as the women she flies with. Then one fateful day, she gets caught in the air over Pearl Harbor just as the bombs begin to fall, and suddenly, nowhere feels safe.To make everything she's lost count for something, Audrey joins the Women Airforce Service Pilots program. The bonds she forms with her fellow pilots reignite a spark of hope in the face war, and--when James goes missing in action--give Audrey the strength to cross the front lines and fight not only for her country, but for the love she holds so dear.Shining a light on a little-known piece of history, The Flight Girls is a sweeping portrayal of women's fearlessness, love, and the power of friendship to make us soar.

    General”— humble, self-effacing, hard-working, reflecting the small-town virtues of the America whose uniform he wore. But those very virtues have led historians to neglect General Omar Bradley—until now. Bestselling author Jim DeFelice, in this, the first-ever in-depth biography of America’s last five-star general, tells Bradley’s full story, and argues that the neglected G.I. General did more than any other to defeat Hitler in World War II.While General George S. Patton has garnered much of the glory, General Dwight David Eisenhower has claimed much of the world’s respect, and British General Bernard Montgomery has kept the Union Jack flying, as DeFelice proves, it was the unassuming Bradley who actually developed the strategy and the tactics that won the war in Europe. Meticulously researched, using previously untapped documents and unpublished diaries and notes, Omar Bradley: General at War reveals:Why Bradley, not Patton, deserves most of the credit for America’s victories in North AfricaHow Bradley—first Patton’s subordinate, then his superior—was one of Patton’s great defenders, while also recognizing his weaknesses, and tried to cover up the infamous slapping incidentHow Eisenhower panicked—when Bradley didn’t—during the early stages of the Battle of the Bulge, delaying an American counterattack that could have saved thousands of livesWhy Bradley was a radical innovator in the use of combined air, armor, and infantry powerHow Bradley, contrary to those who like to portray him as a staid counterpart to Patton, was one of the most ardent practitioners of fast-moving offensivesWhy Bradley expected the Germans might use radiological weapons at NormandyProvocative, thorough, original, Jim DeFelice’s Omar Bradley: General at War deserves a place on the shelf of every reader of World War II history.

    The resulting account is a treasure trove of first-hand material, from personal memories, diary entries and letters to leave passes, wartime newspaper cuttings, Wehrmacht bulletins and more than 160 photographs.The account follows the unit from its formation in 1943 and the catastrophic events on the Eastern Front, through battles on the Western Front and engagements against the American 3rd Armoured Division to the confusion of retreat, panic-stricken flight and Soviet captivity in the closing stages of the war. Honest and unflinching, this remarkable collection of autobiographies offers a glimpse into life in Hitler's panzer division and is a stark testimony of a generation that sacrificed its best years to the war.This is the first English-language translation of the work.

    Marshall Zhukov said "We have found no corpse that could be Hitler's." This book not only tells of the escape of Adolf Hitler, Eva Braun and others of the Third Reich; it includes photographs, files from the FBI, CIA and OSS that show the US knew they escaped, interviews and much more. You will also read the reason that no government went after Hitler even though they knew where he was. This book will change the history you were taught in 5th grade.

    Here is the dramatic story of that climatic battle and the men who planned and fought in it. The Normandy invasion altered the course of World War II and led to the defeat of Nazi Germany and the end of the Third Reich. It is a story of courage and fear, tragedy and determination.

    As a commentary on the texts, Fitchett inserts his own criticism and analysis of parts of four biographies.Each of these men were eyewitnesses to the major events of Wellington’s Peninsula Campaign, and write critically about their own experiences in vivid prose that takes us directly back to the battlefields of Europe.They are the “actual human documents, with the salt of truth, of sincerity, and of reality in every syllable,” as Fitchett writes.‘Wellington’s Men’ is a fascinating history of the Napoleonic Wars as told by the men who saw it.W.H. Fitchett (1841-1928) was a minister, educator and writer, who wrote a column for the Spectator magazine. He published works of fiction and non-fiction, including a four-volume collection How England Saved Europe in 1909.Albion Press is an imprint of Endeavour Press, the UK's leading independent digital publisher. For more information on our titles please sign up to our newsletter at www.endeavourpress.com. Each week you will receive updates on free and discounted ebooks. Follow us on Twitter: @EndeavourPress and on Facebook via http://on.fb.me/1HweQV7. We are always interested in hearing from our readers. Endeavour Press believes that the future is now.

    He wrote the classic on which George C. Scott based his film portrayal.

    Mano Ziegler was involved from its inception and contributed to the design, testing, training and even served in it operationally. Could the ME 262 have broken the Allied supremacy in the air? Why did it take so long to come into service and why were hundreds of German pilots sacrificed in developing it? Why did the ME 262 prove not to be the unparalleled success claimed by Goering and why were German cities left dangerously exposed against Allied bombing campaigns? These are only some the important questions this new book answers. Mano Ziegler, born 7 June 1908, had a lifetime fascination with flight. At the age of eight, he wrote to Manfred Freiherr von Richthofen, the famous "Red Baron", asking to be allowed to fly with him. Richthofen even replied, telling him, "Yes, we'll fly together!". At the age of 21, he took up glider flying. He also pursued his sport of diving and was a core member of Germany's Olympic high-diving team. In 1932 and 1934 he was student world high-diving champion at the world championships in Darmstadt and Turin. When war broke out in 1939 he became a pilot in the Luftwaffe, and from 1943 until the war's end he flew the Me 163 with Erprobungskommando 16 (Operational Test Unit 16) and Jagdgeschwader 400 (Fighter Group 400). After the war he escaped from Russian captivity and - having returned to Berlin - continued to fly and write newspaper articles. In Berlin he guested as a high-wire walker with the Camilla Mayer circus troupe, walking the 24-metre high wire - without any prior training - for a newspaper article. He eventually became editor-in-chief of the Flug-Revue aviation monthly in Stuttgart and, as such, made his first supersonic flight in an English fighter aircraft in the spring of 1960. Hitler's Jet Plane fills an important gap in the history of the Luftwaffe and of aviation in general with new research which dicloses how the first ever military jet plane failed to make its mark on World War II.

    This was exciting enough but only a taste of what was to come. The Japanese advance into Burma threatened India and, along with many thousands of British and Colonial troops, Lowry found himself fighting in the Arakan region, where he earned a further Mention in Despatches. Conditions were appalling and the fighting was bitter by any standards. At one point his Battalion was cut off by the Japs for three weeks but surrender was never an option. Yet even worse was to come as the Battalion was thrown into the thick of the action at Kohima which is rated as the most desperate defensive action for the campaign. In one week 173 members of his Battalion were lost. All this is vividly described in this fascinating and inspiring memoir which will enthrall its readers.

    Army Pathfinders. The vanguard of the Allied forces in World War II Europe. Countless times they preceded invasions and battles vital to bringing the enemy to its knees.Because before the front lines could move forward, the Pathfinders had to move behind enemy lines . . .The first into combat, and the last out, their advance jumps into enemy territory were considered suicide missions by those who sent them into action. World War Two’s special operations commandos, they relied on their stealth, expert prowess, and matchless courage and audacity to set the stage for airborne drops and glider landings throughout Europe.They were born of hard necessity. After the invasion of Sicily almost ended in disaster, General Jim Gavin was determined to form an all-new unit of specialized soldiers who would jump ahead of the airborne forces—including the now legendary Easy Company—without any additional support, stealing across enemy terrain to scout and mark out drop zones with a unique array of homing equipment.Sporting Mohawk haircuts, war paint, and an attitude of brash confidence, they were the best of the best. Their heroic feats behind the lines were critical to nearly all of the Allies’ major victories from Normandy to snowy Bastogne—where they saved the day for thousands of besieged American troops in an operation almost forgotten by history—to the attack on the Ruhr River in Germany.This is the story of the U.S. Army Pathfinders—their training, bonding, and battlefield exploits—told from the perspectives of the daring men who jumped and the equally bold transport crews who risked everything to fly them into action.INCLUDES PHOTOS

    Odette Sansom decides to follow in her war hero father’s footsteps by becoming an SOE agent to aid Britain and her beloved homeland, France. Five failed attempts and one plane crash later, she finally lands in occupied France to begin her mission. It is here that she meets her commanding officer Captain Peter Churchill.As they successfully complete mission after mission, Peter and Odette fall in love. All the while, they are being hunted by the cunning German secret police sergeant, Hugo Bleicher, who finally succeeds in capturing them. They are sent to Paris’s Fresnes prison, and from there to concentration camps in Germany where they are starved, beaten, and tortured. But in the face of despair, they never give up hope, their love for each other, or the whereabouts of their colleagues.In Code Name: Lise, Larry Loftis paints a portrait of true courage, patriotism, and love—of two incredibly heroic people who endured unimaginable horrors and degradations. He seamlessly weaves together the touching romance between Odette and Peter and the thrilling cat and mouse game between them and Sergeant Bleicher.

    This book reveals how author Roald Dahl was a member of Churchill's infamous dirty tricks squad.