To the Victor the Spoils: D-Day to VE Day, the Reality Behind the Heroism

History

Longden, Sean

Military

Arris Pub

This is a controversial study of the Second World War, covering the period between D-Day and VE Day and focus-ing on the day-to-day experiences of the British and Canadian troops involved in the campaign to liberate Europe. It is not an orthodox history of strategy, pivotal battles and the grand sweep of troop movements; instead the author looks at everyday life, seeing soldiers as individuals and illustrating their behaviour and experiences in a way that is both honest and shocking. It is the first time many issues -such as soldiers' sex lives -have been fully examined from a British perspective.This is history written from an alternative, challenging perspective. The author has not been afraid to confront controversial issues. Coverage includes chapters dealing with:* The crime wave unleashed on Europe by British and Canadian soldiers.* The prevalence of indiscipline including the murder of unpopular officers.* Revenge and the widespread killing of German prisoners by Commonwealth troops.* The VD epidemic, the use of brothels and fraternization with German women.* The looting of property from both the enemy and liberated civilians together with widespread vandalism.

To the Victor the Spoils: D-Day to VE-Day, The Reality Behind the Heroism

Arris

Between 1939 and 1945 almost 200,000 British and Commonwealth servicemen were held as prisoners of war in Germany. Here are the details of what sort of work they undertook, their living conditions, their relationships with civilian workers, foreign labourers and concentration camp inmates.

Hitler's British Slaves: British & Commonwealth Pow's in German Industry 1939-1945

ARRIS BOOKS

To the Victor the Spoils

Constable Robinson

This is the untold story of life in the allied camps under the Nazi's. Sean Londgen has conducted numerous interviews and reveals a new perspective on life under the Nazis that has long been forgotten and replaced by the myth of Colditz and 'The Great Escape'. Between 1939 and 1945 almost 200,000 British and Commonwealth Servicemen were held as Prisoners of War in Germany. Every Allied soldier under the rank of Sergeant was forced to work 12 hour shifts, six days a week, cutting timber, quarrying stone, carving ice from frozen rivers and clearing bombsites. It drove the soldiers to the brink, in which survival was a daily trial. Many starved to death or died from disease, others were killed in accidents or at the hands of their guards.

Hitler's British Slaves

Europe

Constable Non-Fiction

At 2am on the morning of the 3rd of June 1940, General Harold Alexander searched along the quayside, holding onto his megaphone and called “Is anyone there? Is anyone there?” before turning his boat back towards England. Tradition tells us that the dramatic events of the evacuation of Dunkirk, in which 300,000 BEF servicemen escaped the Nazis, was a victory gained from the jaws of defeat. For the first time, rather than telling the tale of the 300,000 who escaped, Sean Longden reveals the story of the 40,000 men sacrificed in the rearguard battles. On the beaches and sand dunes, besides the roads and amidst the ruins lay the corpses of hundreds who had not reached the boats. Elsewhere, hospitals full of the sick and wounded who had been left behind to receive treatment from the enemy’s doctors. And further afield – still fighting hard alongside their French allies - was the entire 51st Highland Division, whose war had not finished as the last boats slipped away. Also scattered across the countryside were hundreds of lost and lonely soldiers. These ‘evaders’ had also missed the boats and were now desperately trying to make their own way home, either by walking across France or rowing across the channel. The majority, however, were now prisoners of war who were forced to walk on the death marches all the way to the camps in Germany and Poland, where they were forgotten until 1945.

Dunkirk: The Men They Left Behind

Constable

When Ian Fleming wrote Moonraker, he was not working solely from his imagination. In 1945 he had been involved in the formation of T Force, a secret unit of British soldiers who were thrown into a deadly race to uncover Nazi Secrets before they fell in to the hands of Stalin's advancing troops. The force included infantrymen, many of them only just recovered from the ordeal of D-Day, engineers, bomb disposal experts, commandos and teams of expert scientists.
In a breakneck pursuit - often entering locations before other allied troops - they uncovered underground factories and nuclear testing sites, as well as defying the ceasefire and carrying out the final advance of the war to capture the Nazi submarine research facilities at Kiel, overpowering 12,000 fully-armed Germans with only 500 men and a handful of jeeps. In the aftermath of war, T-Force were also involved in the treacherous transportation of scientists out of the the Soviet zone. With exclusive access to previously unseen documents and extensive interviews with the key figures, Sean Longden reveals the story of T Force for the first time - and uncovers Ian Fleming's last Second World War Secret.

T-Force: The Forgotten Heroes of 1945

From the dangers of London streets during the Blitz to working on the high seas in the Merchant Navy during the Atlantic Convoy, children were on the frontline of battle during the Second World War. In Sean Longden's gripping retelling of the conflict, he explores how the war impacted upon a whole generation who lost their innocence at home and abroad, on the battlefield and the home front. Through extensive interviews and research, Longden uncovers previously untold stories of heroism and courage: the eleven year old boy who was sunk on the SSBenaresand left in frozen water for two days; the teenage Girl Guide awarded the George Medal for bravery; the merchant seaman sunk three times by the age of seventeen; the fourteen year old who signed up for the army three times before finally seeing action in the Normandy campaign; the fourteen year old 'Boy Buglers' of the Royal Marines on active service onboard battleships; as well as the harrowing experiences of the boy who was survived the Bethnal Green Tube Disaster; the horrors of being a child captive in the German PoW camps. Blitz Kidswill change forever the way one sees the relationship between the Second World War and the generation - our grandparents and great grandparents- who bravely faced the challenge of Nazism. Allowing them to tell their stories in their own words, Sean Longden brings both the horrors and the humour of young lives lived in troubled times. The book includes stories of: The seventeen year old boy who signed up 4 times before he made it onto the beaches at Normandy. The Girl Guide who saved a family during the blitz. The teenage merchant seaman who was sunk three times. What it was like to be a teenage POW after the disasters of Dunkirk. Praise for Sean Longden: "A rising name in military history ... able to uncover the missing stories of the Second World War."The Guardian 'A tenacious sleuth of Second World War secrets.' Andrew Roberts. 'At times you have to stop and remind yourself that you're reading history and not an 007 thriller."The Soldier. 'First class history from a first class historian'Military Illustrated. 'Fascinating'.Financial Times.

Blitz Kids: The Children's War Against Hitler

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