"It is impossible to reproduce the state of mind of the men who waged war in 1917 and 1918," Edward Coffman wrote in "The War to End All Wars." In "Doughboys on the Great War" the voices of thousands of servicemen say otherwise. The majority of soldiers from the American Expeditionary Forces returned from Europe in 1919. Where many were simply asked for basic data, veterans from four states--Utah, Minnesota, Connecticut, and Virginia--were given questionnaires soliciting additional information and "remarks." Drawing on these questionnaires, completed while memories were still fresh, this book presents a chorus of soldiers' voices speaking directly of the expectations, motivations, and experiences as infantrymen on the Western Front in World War I.

What was it like to kill or maim German soldiers? To see friends killed or maimed by the enemy? To return home after experiencing such violence? Again and again, soldiers wrestle with questions like these, putting into words what only they can tell. They also reflect on why they volunteered, why they fought, what their training was, and how ill-prepared they were for what they found overseas. They describe how they interacted with the civilian populations in England and France, how they saw the rewards and frustrations of occupation duty when they desperately wanted to go home, and--perhaps most significantly--what it all added up to in the end. Together their responses create a vivid and nuanced group portrait of the soldiers who fought with the American Expeditionary Forces on the battlefields of Aisne-Marne, Argonne Forest, Belleau Wood, Chateau-Thierry, the Marne, Metz, Meuse-Argonne, St. Mihiel, Sedan, and Verdun during the First World War.

The picture that emerges is often at odds with the popular notion of the disillusioned doughboy. Though hardened and harrowed by combat, the veteran heard here is for the most part proud of his service, service undertaken for duty, honor, and country. In short, a hundred years later, the doughboy once more speaks in his own true voice.

This extraordinary book tells the story of a remarkable family caught in Japan at the outbreak of the Second World War in the Pacific. With letters, journal extracts and notes from Hamish Brown's parents, as well as his own recollections, it brings the era to life: not only life in the dying days of the British Empire, but also the terrible reality of the invasion of Singapore into which they escaped.

In central Brussels stands a statue of a young woman. Built in 1923, it is the first monument to a working-class woman in European history. Her name was Gabrielle Petit. History has forgotten Petit, an ambitious and patriotic Belgian, executed by firing squad in 1916 for her role as an intelligence agent for the British Army. After the First World War she was celebrated as an example of stern endeavour, but a hundred years later her memory has faded. In the first part of this historical biography Sophie De Schaepdrijver uses Petit's life to explore gender, class and heroism in the context of occupied Europe. Petit's experiences reveal the reality of civilian engagement under military occupation and the emergence of modern espionage. The second part of the book focuses on the legacy and cultural memory of Petit and the First World War. By analysing Petit's representation in ceremony, discourse and popular culture De Schaepdrijver expands our understanding of remembrance across the 20th century.

Possibly there is nothing more conducive to thoughts of the Eternal, than having one's face slammed into red, wet muck, with explosions so close your body arcs and bounces off the ground, hot shards burn in your flesh, and concussions are bright flashes of dirty fire beating a tattoo on the light receptors in the backs of your eyes. Your head aches; throbbing from visual shock waves.

Time has come to an end; there is no right, no wrong, only whatever follows a life that is now over. The dark reaper is here. What's it going to be like on the other side? Is there an "other side"?

The old timers use the maxim, "There are no atheists in a fox-hole." Possibly so; I can only give my own experience, and I never had the opportunity to be in one. Combat aviators crash and sometimes burn instead. But close calls almost always give rise to interminable questions; especially when the survived experience is seared into the human psyche.

For some, satisfactory answers never seem to come. For myself, may I pro-offer both scorching experience, and incredible life-lessons learned? Then, should you ever fall into similar adventure; you man go into it better prepared than I was.
JWV

The First World War at sea by Americans who fought in it
It's easy to understand why this book was originally published under the jingoistic title of 'Over the Seas for Uncle Sam'-perhaps edited by rather than 'written' by Elaine Sterne-for when it was written the subject was nothing less than reportage. The passage of time provides new perspectives on works such as this, and for that reason we have changed the title to alert readers to the unique nature of the content. Sterne's book contains fifteen first hand accounts by those serving in the United States Navy in the first American conflict of the modern age on a global stage. The United States entry into the First World War in April, 1917, (particularly in terms of it's immediately engaged naval contribution) was pivotal, if not essential. The Allied war effort was being strangled for want of materials as a result of the German U-Boat successes against merchant shipping, especially in the Atlantic Ocean. These accounts by serving men and women in the U. S Navy-including contributions by marines-are mainly from the enlisted ranks, with a few from officers. They are told in 'their own words, ' and enable the modern student of the period to read of the experiences of those service men and women whose voices-in the absence of a work such as this-would have been forever lost to posterity.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their spines and fabric head and tail bands.

The string of military defeats during 1942 marked the end of British hegemony in Southeast Asia, finally destroying the myth of British imperial invincibility. The Japanese attack on Burma led to a hurried and often poorly organized evacuation of Indian and European civilians from the country. The evacuation was a public humiliation for the British and marked the end of their role in Burma."The Evacuation of Civilians from Burma" investigates the social and political background to the evacuation, and the consequences of its failure. Utilizing unpublished letters, diaries, memoirs and official reports, Michael Leigh provides the first comprehensive account of the evacuation, analyzing its source in the structures of colonial society, fractured race relations and in the turbulent politics of colonial Burma.

United States Army Center of Military History publication, CMH Pub 12-3-1. 2nd edition.Photographs selected and text written by Kenneth E. Hunter. Mary Ann Bacon, editor. This book deals with the European Theater of Operations, covering the period from build up in Britain through V-E Day.

In 2003, Major William Edwards and Lt. Colonel Robert P. Walters of the 165th Military Intelligence Battalion were given the near-impossible task of improving the U.S. Army's security posture at Abu Ghraib prison under unfathomable conditions. With input from officers who served with them, their candid firsthand accounts of life at the notorious prison reveal unpublished details of the human devastation that took place there, along with unexpected glimpses of humanity.

In a remote village, high in the snow-capped mountains of southern Poland, during the worst winter of World War II, a beautiful polish woman presiding over the village peasants, a brute of a partisan leader, and an outlaw priest with a mysterious past, are hiding a ragtag band of Jewish children escaped from an accidental death train wreck. During a Bible lesson, the priest, who is actually a Jewish doctor disguised as a man of the cloth, tells the children the Old Testament story of Elisha. "God sent His special 'War Angels' to protect the children of Israel from the attacking Syrian army" he said. The children ask the priest to pray with them for 'War Angels', like in the Bible story, to protect them from the relentless Nazi madman searching for their capture. Miraculously, an American B-17 bomber carrying a tough crew of battered flyers from a deep penetration raid over Germany, crash lands directly next to the village. The children and villagers renew their faith in God, believing the Americans to be; the answer to prayer, and...'The War Angels'. In the end, most realized, only the hand of God could have brought all these people, and seemingly unrelated threads of circumstance into that perilously precise moment in time. Together, through their heroic faith, they persevere against the onslaught of evil Satanic forces