Volume 5 of the Official History of Intelligence in the Second World War, Strategic Deception, brings the series to an end. Strategic deception depends for its success on the availability of good security and good intelligence. The first three volumes of the series described the intelligence channels that gave the Allies their incomparable insight into enemy capabilities and intentions.

On June 18, 1812, the United States formally declared war for the first time. President James Madison’s call to arms against Great Britain provoked outpourings of patriotic fervor and vigorous—some said treasonous—domestic opposition. Over the next three years the War of 1812 would prove as divisive as it was rich in nationalist myth-making: We have met the enemy, and he is ours . . . Don’t give up the ship! . . . Oh, say can you see . . . . Now, on the bicentennial of a conflict that shaped the future of a continent, here is the first comprehensive collection of eyewitness accounts in over a century. Reflecting several generations of scholarly discoveries, it covers all the theaters of war, from frontier battles in Canada, Michigan, and New York to naval confrontations on the high seas and Great Lakes, from the burning of Washington to the defense of New Orleans. Here are 140 letters, memoirs, poems, songs, editorials, journal entries, and proclamations by more than 100 participants, both famous—Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Tecumseh, Dolley Madison, and the Duke of Wellington, among others—and less well known, such as Laura Secord, the Canadian Paul Revere, and William B. Northcutt, whose remarkable diary provides a common soldier’s view. Features helpful notes, a chronology of the war, and full color endpaper maps.

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The shocking story of a WWII shootout between black and white GIs in a quiet Cornish town that put the British-US “special relationship” on trial. On September 26, 1943, racial tensions between American soldiers stationed in Cornwall erupted in gunfire. Labelled a ‘wild west’ mutiny by the tabloids, it became front page news in Great Britain and the USA. For Americans, it bolstered a fast-accelerating civil rights movement, while in the UK, it exposed unsettling truths about Anglo-American relations. With new archival research, journalist Kate Werran pieces together the shocking drama that authorities tried to hush up. Her narrative examines everything from the controversy of American segregation on British soil to the shocking event itself and the resulting court martial. Extracted from wartime cabinet documents, secret government surveys, opinion polls, diaries, letters and newspapers as well as testimony from those who remember it, this story offers a rare window into a little-known dark side of the ‘American Invasion.’

Winner of the George Washington Prize Winner of the Barbara and David Zalaznick Book Prize in American History Winner of the Excellence in American History Book Award Winner of the Fraunces Tavern Museum Book Award From the bestselling author of the Liberation Trilogy comes the extraordinary first volume of his new trilogy about the American Revolution Rick Atkinson, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning An Army at Dawn and two other superb books about World War II, has long been admired for his deeply researched, stunningly vivid narrative histories. Now he turns his attention to a new war, and in the initial volume of the Revolution Trilogy he recounts the first twenty-one months of America’s violent war for independence. From the battles at Lexington and Concord in spring 1775 to those at Trenton and Princeton in winter 1777, American militiamen and then the ragged Continental Army take on the world’s most formidable fighting force. It is a gripping saga alive with astonishing characters: Henry Knox, the former bookseller with an uncanny understanding of artillery; Nathanael Greene, the blue-eyed bumpkin who becomes a brilliant battle captain; Benjamin Franklin, the self-made man who proves to be the wiliest of diplomats; George Washington, the commander in chief who learns the difficult art of leadership when the war seems all but lost. The story is also told from the British perspective, making the mortal conflict between the redcoats and the rebels all the more compelling. Full of riveting details and untold stories, The British Are Coming is a tale of heroes and knaves, of sacrifice and blunder, of redemption and profound suffering. Rick Atkinson has given stirring new life to the first act of our country’s creation drama.

The first one-volume history, based on the Vatican archives, of Pope Pius XII and his dealings with the contesting powers and with the Jews during World War II.

The familiar image of the British in the Second World War is that of the plucky underdog taking on German might. David Edgerton's bold, compelling new history shows the conflict in a new light, with Britain as a very wealthy country, formidable in arms, ruthless in pursuit of its interests, and in command of a global production system. Rather than belittled by a Nazi behemoth, Britain arguably had the world's most advanced mechanized forces. It had not only a great empire, but allies large and small. Edgerton shows that Britain fought on many fronts and its many home fronts kept it exceptionally well supplied with weapons, food and oil, allowing it to mobilize to an extraordinary extent. It created and deployed a vast empire of machines, from the humble tramp steamer to the battleship, from the rifle to the tank, made in colossal factories the world over. Scientists and engineers invented new weapons, encouraged by a government and prime minister enthusiastic about the latest technologies. The British, indeed Churchillian, vision of war and modernity was challenged by repeated defeat at the hands of less well-equipped enemies. Yet the end result was a vindication of this vision. Like the United States, a powerful Britain won a cheap victory, while others paid a great price. Putting resources, machines and experts at the heart of a global rather than merely imperial story, Britain's War Machine demolishes timeworn myths about wartime Britain and gives us a groundbreaking and often unsettling picture of a great power in action.

An account of the aircraft, pilots, tactics, and results of the three-month Battle of Britain in 1940.