*Highly Commended by the British Records Association for the 2019 Janette Harley Prize* In September 1943, at the height of World War II, the Aegean island of Leros became the site of the most pivotal battle of the Dodecanese campaign as the British tried, in vain, to retain control of the island. Over the course of two short months - from 15 September 1943 to 17 November 1943 - almost 1500 men lost their lives and hundreds more ended up in Prisoner-of-War camps. In this book, Julie Peakman, a modern-day resident of Leros, brings to life the story of the men caught up in the battle based on first-hand interviews and written accounts including diaries, letters and journals. She tells of the preparations of the soldiers leading up to the battle, the desperate hand-to-hand fighting, and the suffering endured from continual bombings. She also shows the extent of the men's despair at the allied surrender, the many subsequent daring escapes as well as the terrible years of incarceration for those who were captured and imprisoned. Many of the heart-rending accounts of the battle are told here for the first time, providing a unique eyewitness take on this forgotten corner of World War II.

Osprey's study of the Walcheren campaign of World War II (1939-1945). Walcheren is a saucer-shaped island in the estuary of the river Scheldt, commanding maritime access to Antwerp, the largest port in Western Europe. The Allies captured Antwerp intact on September 4, 1944, but their eyes were on the Rhine crossings at Arnhem, not the lower Scheldt. The failure of Operation Market-Garden later that month brought home the Allies' logistical weakness. As autumn gales drew near, every shell and petrol tin had still to be landed at Cherbourg or across the Normandy beaches. Complete US Army divisions were immobilized for lack of transport. It was vital to re-open Antwerp. The continued German presence on Walcheren, however, prevented Allied shipping from entering the Scheldt. In the fall of 1944, Walcheren had the most heavily fortified coastline in the world. Its seaward defences consisted of 30 coastal and field batteries, mounting 50-60 guns from 75mm to 220mm in caliber, manned by high quality naval personnel behind massive concrete emplacements. Supporting strongpoints had anti-aircraft guns, flame-throwers rocket-launchers and Goliath remote controlled demolition vehicles. The sand dunes protecting the low-lying island from the North Sea were laced with barbed wire, mines and dragon's teeth. Defending infantry came from Generalleutnant Wilhelm Daser's 70.Infanterie-Division, a 'white bread division' consisting of men with gastric problems. Allied intelligence estimated the total garrison at 4,000, but 8,000 eventually surrendered. On November 1, 1944, in a double-pronged attack, the men of 52nd (Lowland) Division plus No. 4 Army Commando seized Flushing (Infatuate I) while in the west 4th Special Service Brigade with three Royal Marine Commandos and No. 10 Inter-Allied Commando would take Westkapelle, and fight their way north and south along the dunes, taking the coastal batteries as they went (Infatuate II). All this was to be supported with HMS Warspite and two 15-inch gun monitors; the Support Squadron Eastern Flank (SSEF) with 25 specialized Landing Craft with guns and rockets; 350 Army guns south of the Scheldt, most of them heavier than 25-pounders; and the Typhoon and Spitfire fighter bombers of 84 Group RAF. In fighting described by one survivor as 'worse than Dieppe and D-Day put together' the Army and Royal Marines forced their way ashore, supported by specialized armour and tracked vehicles, and over the next eight days cleared the positions of their German defenders in bitter street fighting. The first Liberty ships unloaded at Antwerp on December 1, just over a fortnight before the Ardennes offensive began. If Walcheren had not fallen when it did, opening Antwerp just in time, the Allies would have been hard pressed to withstand the German attack, or replace the fuel stocks lost in its opening days, let alone cross the Rhine in the following spring, and meet the Russians on the Elbe. The Walcheren campaign was not merely a dramatic combined operation pulled off against the odds; it helped determine the course of the war and the shape of the post-war world.

Filled with revelations and replete with telling detail, this riveting book lifts the curtain on the United States' secret intelligence operations in the war against Nazi Germany.

In the final days of World War II in Europe, Georgians serving in the Wehrmacht on Texel island off the Dutch coast rose up and slaughtered their German masters. Hitler ordered the island to be retaken and fighting continued for weeks, well after the war's end. The uprising had it origins in the bloody history of Georgia in the twentieth century, a history that saw the country move from German occupation, to three short years of independence, to Soviet rule after it was conquered by the Red Army in 1921. A bloody rebellion against the Soviets took place in 1924, but it remained under Russian Soviet rule. Thousands of Georgians served in the Soviet forces during World War II and among those who were captured, given the choice of “starve or fight”, some took up the German offer to don Wehrmacht uniforms. The loyalty of the Georgians was always in doubt, as Hitler himself suspected, and once deployed to the Netherlands, the Georgian soldiers made contact with the local Communist resistance. When the opportunity arose, the Georgians took the decision to rise up and slaughter the Germans, seizing control of the island. In just a few hours, they massacred some 400 German officers using knives and bayonets to avoid raising the alarm. An enraged Hitler learned about the mutiny and ordered the Germans to fight back, showing no mercy to either the Georgians or the Dutch civilians who hid them. It was not until 20 May, 12 days after the war had ended, that Canadian forces landed on the island and finally put an end to the slaughter. Eric Lee explores this fascinating but little known last battle of the Second World War: its origins, the incredible details of the battle and its ongoing legacy.

Stalingrad was one of the largest, bloodiest, and most famous battles in history as well as one of the major turning points of World War II. For four winter months during the battle, German and Soviet forces fought over a single factory inside the city of Stalingrad. Lavishly illustrated with photos and maps, Island of Fire presents a day-by-day—at times hour-by-hour—chronicle of that pitiless struggle as seen by both sides. The book is unparalleled and exhaustive in its research, meticulous in its reconstruction of the action, and vivid in its retelling of the street-by-street, hand-to-hand fighting near the gun factory.

Now with a brand new epilogue! Please update your eBook to get the new version and find out what happens after the war...

‘Adolf Island’ offers new forensic, archaeological and spatial perspectives on the Nazi forced and slave labour programme that was initiated on the Channel Island of Alderney during its occupation in the Second World War. Drawing on extensive archival research and the results of the first in-field investigations of the ‘crime scenes’ since 1945, the book identifies and characterises the network of concentration and labour camps, fortifications, burial sites and other material traces connected to the occupation, providing new insights into the identities and experiences of the men and women who lived, worked and died within this landscape. Moving beyond previous studies focused on military aspects of occupation, the book argues that Alderney was intrinsically linked to wider systems of Nazi forced and slave labour.

True-life recollections from the Channel Islanders who were the only British subjects to live under Nazi rule in WWII.

German soldiers assigned to guard the tiny Channel Island of Sark described it as a ‘little Paradise’ and, because it was never bombed by the RAF, the best air-raid shelter in all of Europe. But paradise for them came to a bloody end in October 1942 when a small group of British Commandos raided the island, capturing one German soldier and killing several others. Operation Basalt would have been a footnote in history but for the reaction of Hitler, who believed that British soldiers executed several Germans who had already surrendered and whose hands were bound. Days after the raid, he issued the infamous ‘Commando Order’, a death sentence for those Allied commandos who fell into German hands.Drawing on extensive archival research and interviews with survivors of the period, Eric Lee has written the definitive account of the raid, putting it into the context of the German occupation of British lands during the war.

Where previous histories of Ireland in the war years have focused on high politics, That Neutral Island mines deeper layers of experience. Stories, letters, and diaries illuminate this small country as it suffered rationing, censorship, the threat of invasion, and a strange detachment from the war.