In 1942, the United States War Department distributed a handbook to American servicemen that advised them on the peculiarities of the "British, their country, and their ways."

Over sixty years later, this newly published reproduction from the rich archives of the Bodleian Library offers a fascinating glimpse into American military preparations for World War II. The guide was intended to alleviate the culture shock for soldiers taking their first trip to Great Britain, or, for that matter, abroad. The handbook is punctuated with endearingly nostalgic advice and refreshingly candid quips such as: "The British don't know how to make a good cup of coffee. You don't know how to make a good cup of tea. It's an even swap."

By turns hilarious and poignant, many observations featured in the handbook remain relevant even today. Reproduced in a style reminiscent of the era, "Instructions for American Servicemen in Britain" is a powerfully evocative war-time memento that offers a unique perspective on the longstanding American-British relationship and reveals amusingly incisive American perceptions of the British character and country.

Americans wrote fiercely during the Civil War. War surprised, devastated, and opened up imagination, taking hold of Americans' words as well as their homes and families. The personal diary-wildly ragged yet rooted in day following day-was one place Americans wrote their war. Diaries, then, have become one of the best-known, most-used sources for exploring the life of the mind in a war-torn place and time. Delving into several familiar wartime diaries kept by women of the southern slave-owning class, Steven Stowe recaptures their motivations to keep the days close even as war tore apart the brutal system of slavery that had benefited them. Whether the diarists recorded thoughts about themselves, their opinions about men, or their observations about slavery, race, and warfare, Stowe shows how these women, by writing the immediate moment, found meaning in a changing world. In studying the inner lives of these unsympathetic characters, Stowe also explores the importance-and the limits-of historical empathy as a condition for knowing the past, demonstrating how these plain, first-draft texts can offer new ways to make sense of the world in which these Confederate women lived.

During World War II, thousands of Axis prisoners of war were held throughout Nebraska in base camps that included Fort Robinson, Camp Scottsbluff and Camp Atlanta. Many Nebraskans did not view the POWs as "evil Nazis." To them, they were ordinary men and very human. And while their stay was not entirely free from conflict, many former captives returned to the Cornhusker State to begin new lives after the cessation of hostilities. Drawing on first-person accounts from soldiers, former POWs and Nebraska residents, as well as archival research, Melissa Marsh delves into the neglected history of Nebraska's POW camps.

Colonel John Hart Caughey, a US Army war plans officer stationed in the Chinese Nationalist capital of Chungking, was an eyewitness to the battle for China in the final months of the war (1944-45) and beyond, when he rose to become head of the Theater Planning Section. In frequent letters to his wife as well as in several diaries, he chronicled the US military's role in wartime China, especially his life as an American planner (when he was subject to military censorship). Previous accounts of the China Theater have largely neglected the role of the War Department planners stationed in Chungking, many of whom were Caughey's colleagues and friends. He also penned colorful descriptions of life in wartime China, which vividly remind the reader how far China has come in a mere seventy-odd years. In addition, his letters and diaries deepen our understanding of several of the American leaders in this Asian war, including China Theater commander Albert C. Wedemeyer; Fourteenth Air Force chief Claire L. Chennault (former commander of the "Flying Tigers"); US ambassador to wartime China, Patrick J. Hurley; famed Time-Life reporter Theodore White; OSS director William ("Wild Bill") Donovan; Louis Mountbatten, Supreme Commander of the Southeast Asia Command; and Jonathan Wainwright, who was in command when the American forces in the Philippines surrendered in 1942, and who stayed for a few days at Caughey's Chungking residence on his way home after several years as a Japanese POW in Manchuria. In his writings, Caughey also revealed a more appealing side of Wedemeyer, whose extreme political opinions in the postwar era probably cost him the post of US Army chief of staff. By making Caughey a member of his planning staff, Wedemeyer made possible an extraordinary experience for the young colonel during the war. Caughey also rubbed shoulders with Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek and traveled to the battlefields in Southeast China with the commander in chief of the Nationalist Army, He Yingqin, along with a number of other Chinese and American soldiers. Following the Japanese surrender, Caughey chronicled the resumption of the power struggle between the Chinese Nationalists and the Chinese Communists, largely postponed during the conflict. Shortly after the war, he had a brief encounter with the number two Communist leader, Zhou Enlai, whom he was to get to know much better during the Marshall Mission to China.