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Books > Humanities > History > World history > From 1900
This is a rare chance to re-discover a contemporary account of a
military conflict which took place a Century ago. The Agony of
Belgium, written in 1914 by Frank Fox, a war correspondent,
recounts events that the modern European mind would probably wish
to forget. The bravery and resilience of the relatively new and
untested Belgian Army, following the rejection of the German
Ultimatum by the King, deserves a wider audience. Throughout this
account the courageous and noble qualities of King Albert in the
dark days come to the fore. Whether at the Front as an active
Commander-in-Chief; with his people during Zeppelin raids and
artillery bombardments at Antwerp; declining refuge in France after
the retreat from Ostend; or rallying his troops for rearguard
actions his conduct was of the finest. His account of the
"frightfulness" of the events in Louvain against the civilian
population- including women and children- and the sacking of
cultural treasures was not at first believed by Officials in
Antwerp. However his reporting of Zeppelin raid shelped to arouse
public opinion in the United States.Fox provides vivid descriptions
of a terrible, and little known, conflict.
This is the second volume, but the last to be published of a
trilogy - the other volumes being Smashing the Atlantic Wall and
The Battle of the Bulge. Monty's Rhine Adventure begins immediately
after the Normandy invasion with the euphoria surrounding the
belief that the war would soon be won. However, it was not to be as
easy Monty hoped. The book covers the difficult next few months as
the Allies slogged through France and Belgium fighting stern and
skilled Nazi resistance. However, the centrepiece of Monty's Rhine
Adventure is Operation Market garden - Monty's bold plan to cut
through the German defences via the eight bridges which spanned the
Dutch/German border. The book deals with the plan, its execution
and its aftermath in rigorous detail. Had Market Garden gone to
plan, it might have led to the overall defeat of the Third Reich
before the end of 1944. As it was, it was the Russians that entered
Berlin first in May 1945. Nonetheless, this period remains one of
the boldest and most exciting of the Second World War.
‘Brave, compassionate and inspiring – it left me in floods of tears’ Adam Kay, author of This Is Going to Hurt
For more than twenty-five years, David Nott has taken unpaid leave from his job as a general and vascular surgeon with the NHS to volunteer in some of the world’s most dangerous war zones. From Sarajevo under siege in 1993, to clandestine hospitals in rebel-held eastern Aleppo, he has carried out life-saving operations and field surgery in the most challenging conditions, and with none of the resources of a major London teaching hospital.
The conflicts he has worked in form a chronology of twenty-first-century combat: Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Darfur, Congo, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Gaza and Syria. But he has also volunteered in areas blighted by natural disasters, such as the earthquakes in Haiti and Nepal.
Driven both by compassion and passion, the desire to help others and the thrill of extreme personal danger, he is now widely acknowledged to be the most experienced trauma surgeon in the world. But as time went on, David Nott began to realize that flying into a catastrophe – whether war or natural disaster – was not enough. Doctors on the ground needed to learn how to treat the appalling injuries that war inflicts upon its victims. Since 2015, the foundation he set up with his wife, Elly, has disseminated the knowledge he has gained, training other doctors in the art of saving lives threatened by bombs and bullets.
War Doctor is his extraordinary story
Key title in the new Uniform Legends series. Up close and personal
accounts of pilots who were there, first written in the 1960's when
many of the surviving British and German airmen were in or entering
their middle years
Wonderful account of one of the top Battle of Britain fighter
pilots. Written by one of the foremost military aviation authors
who was an RAF Officer himself and personally knew Lacey.
Unshackled Spirit was a unique 'Spitfire' fighter aircraft
purchased by allied prisoners of war whilst imprisoned in Germany;
the book explains how this remarkable achievement was possible
using previously restricted and secret material. In addition,
accounts are compiled from a collection of original YMCA personal
wartime logs as issued to RAF prisoners of war in 1944. 'Unshackled
Spirit' draws out the story of each aviator, how they became a
prisoner of war and life in the various camps across occupied
Europe. Extensive and amazingly detailed pieces of artwork are
taken from the logs and illustrated in the book. The balance of
fact and inspired drawings makes for an impressive collection from
a number of incarcerated aviators. The hardship of POW's and the
extraordinary means adopted to escape are touched upon, but more
importantly the aspect of how agencies helped by supplying all
manner of equipment to the thousands of men behind barbed wire. The
role of MI9 is revealed and how it participated in those agencies
exploring the efforts taken to smuggle escape material into the
prisoner of war camps without breeching the Geneva Convention and
finally the extraordinary measures taken to secure intelligence
during the process of prisoner repatriation.
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