This riveting book follows a small group of Australian front-line soldiers from their enlistment in the dark days of 1940 to the end of World War II. No ordinary soldiers, they were members of Don Company of the Second 43rd Battalion, part of the famous 9th Australian Division, which during campaigns in Tobruk, El Alamein, New Guinea and Borneo sustained more casualties and won more medals than any other Australian division. It is an evocative and detailed account of the dayto-day war of three infantry soldiers whose experiences included night patrols at Tobruk, advancing steadily through German barrages at Alamein, charging enemy machine guns in New Guinea, and repelling Japanese charges on Borneo. Inspired by American historian Stephen Ambrose's landmark book, Band of Brothers, about the US Army's Easy Company of the 506th Regiment, Mark Johnston, one of our best military historians, here gives an Australian company the same treatment. Using the frank and detailed personal letters, diaries and memoirs of three Australian soldiers, he brings to life their campaigns, battles and interactions with their comrades and enemies. His book is a unique and powerful account of the everyday experiences of a small unit of soldiers on the front line.

The Royal Flying Corps, later the Royal Air Force, was formed in 1912 and went to war in 1914 where it played a vital role in reconnaissance, supporting the British Expeditionary Force as 'air cavalry' and also in combat, establishing air superiority over the Imperial German Air Force. Edward Bujak here combines the history of the air war, including details of strategy, tactics, technical issues and combat, with a social and cultural history. The RFC was originally dominated by the landed elite, in Lloyd George's phrase 'from the stateliest houses in England', and its pilots were regarded as 'knights of the air'. Harlaxton Manor in Lincolnshire, seat of landed gentry, became their major training base. Bujak shows how, within the circle of the RFC, the class divide and unconscious superiority of Edwardian Britain disappeared - absorbed by common purpose, technical expertise and by an influx of pilots from Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. He thus provides an original and unusual take on the air war in World War I, combining military, social and cultural history.

The origin of the Western military tradition in Greece 750-362 BC is fraught with controversies, such as the date and nature of the phalanx, the role of agricultural destruction and the existence of rules and ritualistic practices. This volume collects papers significant for specific points in debates or theoretical value in shaping and critiquing controversial viewpoints. An introduction offers a critical analysis of recent trends in ancient military history and provides a bibliographical essay contextualizing the papers within the framework of debates with a guide to further reading.

Considered by many to be the finest American combat memoir of the First World War, Hervey Allen’s Toward the Flame vividly chronicles the experiences of the Twenty-eighth Division in the summer of 1918. Made up primarily of Pennsylvania National Guardsmen, the Twenty-eighth Division saw extensive action on the Western Front. The story begins with Lieutenant Allen and his men marching inland from the French coast and ends with their participation in the disastrous battle for the village of Fismette. Allen was a talented observer, and the men with whom he served emerge as well-rounded characters against the horrific backdrop of the war. As a historical document, Toward the Flame is significant for its highly detailed account of the controversial military action at Fismette. At the same time, it easily stands as a work of literature. Clear-eyed and unsentimental, Allen employs the novelist’s powers of description to create a harrowing portrait of coalition war at its worst.

A masterly work of military history, Dunkirk: Retreat to Victory is also a tribute to the soldiers whose courage and self belief sustained them through their darkest hours. The evacuation of British forces from Dunkirk is one of the pivotal moments in the Second World War - an astonishing endeavour that snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. Sent to help the Belgians and French hold back the German army, the small British Expeditionary Force was ill-equipped and under-trained. When Hitler attacked on 10 May 1940 and the French and Belgian armies collapsed in the face of Germany's swift and brutal advance, the British soldiers found themselves in mortal danger. In Dunkirk: Retreat to Victory, Major General Julian Thompson recreates the action as the British fought hard for three desperate weeks, conducting a successful fighting withdrawal in the face of a formidable foe. He describes the individual acts of bravery and sacrifice and analyses the decisions of the commanders who made the choice to evacuate. He also takes us to Dunkirk harbour and onto the beaches, where the British army was trapped and under attack, while the Royal Navy and the 'little ships' raced against time to rescue them.

Commanded by the controversial Major-General Ivo Thomas, the 43rd (Wessex) Division was branded the Fighting Yellow Devils' out of respect by its Wehrmacht and Waffen SS opponents. The 43rd's distinctive divisional badge of a golden Wyvern - half-serpent half-dragon - was to be seen in all the ferocious battles in Normandy, the Low Countries and Germany between June 1944 and May 1945. They suffered 12,500 casualties including 3,000 killed in action. The 43rd had its roots firmly in the West of England, drawing its infantry battalions from the county regiments of Cornwall, Dorset, Hampshire, Somerset, Wiltshire and Worcester, with occasional reinforcements during the Normandy campaign by 'foreign' regiments from Berkshire, Essex and other counties. This book tells the story of the division's campaign in Northwest Europe, from Normandy to Bremerhaven, in the words of the soldiers who actually fought with it: privates, sergeants and young company commanders, all have their individual tales to tell. Here are first-hand accounts of the landings on the shores of Normandy; the battles for the River Odon, Hill 112, Maltot and Mont Pincon; the break-out to the River Seine and the forcing of the vital bridgehead at Vernon; the only infantry division to make a single-handed attempt to relieve Arnhem - a gallant and costly failure; the clearance of the Roer triangle (Operation Blackcock) and the Reichswald (Operation Veritable); the crossing of the River Rhine and the advance northwards to take the port of Bremen; and the final triumphant advance to the Cuxhaven peninsula northwest of Hamburg.