Bomber Command Churchill’s Greatest Triumph

Bomber Command Churchill’s Greatest Triumph written by Roddy MacKenzie

and published by Air World Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 368

Roddy MacKenzie’s father served in Bomber Command during the Second World War,

but like so many brave veterans who had survived the war, he spoke little of his exploits.

So, when Roddy started on his personal journey to discover something of what his father

had achieved, he uncovered a great deal about the devastating effectiveness of Bomber

Command and the vital role it played in the defeat of Third Reich. He realised that the true

story of Bomber Command’s achievements has never been told nor fully acknowledged.

Roddy became a man on a mission, and this startlingly revealing, and often personal study, is the result. Bomber Command: Churchill's Greatest Triumph takes the reader through the early days of the Second World War and introduces all the key individuals who turned the Command into the war-winning weapon it eventually became, as well as detailing the men and machines which flew night after night into the heart of Hitler’s Germany.

The main focus of his book is the destruction and dislocation wrought by the bombing to reduce, and ultimately destroy, Germany’s ability to make war. In his analysis, Roddy dug deep into German archival material to uncover facts rarely presented to either German or English language readers. These demonstrate that Bomber Command’s continual efforts, at appalling cost in aircrew casualties and aircraft losses, did far more damage to the Reich than the Allies knew.

Roddy’s father served with the Royal Canadian Air Force and Roddy naturally highlights its contribution to Bomber Command’s successes, another aspect of this fascinating story which the author believes has not been duly recognised.

Bomber Command: Churchill's Greatest Triumph will certainly raise the debate on the controversial strategy adopted by ‘Bomber’ Harris and how he was perceived by many to have over-stepped his remit. But most of all, this book will revise people’s understanding of just how important the endeavours were of those men who flew through the dark and through the searchlights, the flak, and the enemy night fighters, to bring the Second World War in Europe to its crushing conclusion.

This book is a fascinating book by a man whose father served for Bomber Command during the war, the book looks at a number of things from the role of Bomber Command, the men involved, the men who flew the planes and bombed Germany to how the men in control were perceived. It’s quite an honest book and tries to tell the story of what went on within Bomber Command, but actually what people thought of those in control. I can actually agree with this point in that my father too was in the RAF, although after WW2. The image of those outside of an organisation will always have a rosier picture, it’s often only when your within it that you know the truth or certainly here more of the going ons. It was nice to read about how the German records saw the bombing and the results of how their public were suffering under the constant bombing campaigns. This book is a very well researched book and credit should go to the author who has written a great book. Being from an RAF family I would happily recommend this book which had a bit extra and was well worth the read.

Hitler’s Last Chance Kolberg: The Propaganda Movie and the Rise and Fall of a German City

Hitler’s Last Chance Kolberg: The Propaganda Movie and the Rise and

Fall of a German City written by Kevin Prenger and published by Frontline

Books - £22 - Hardback - Pages 192

Apologies but I couldn't get the book description to format properly on this post

but you can read it at the Pen & Sword Website.

Hitler’s Last Chance is a book/story of the city of Kolberg in Poland that was attempted to be

taken by Germany during the Second World War. The story can be split into three like most

wartime cities, you went from the city just being Kolberg, to be taken or attempted, to be taken

by Germany during the war and then the city fell to the Russians. But during this process, or at

least the part about Kolberg being taken over by Germany Goebbels saw this as a chance to

sell this story to Germany as a good or a ‘saviour’ type event as a propaganda film. Eventually,

this film would not see general publication due to the events. But the fascinating thing I

found about this story was the fact that you could see parallels with the conflict currently

going on in the Russia/Ukraine conflict, in which you have one country trying to take one city

because they believe they are doing the right thing or making the citizens free. The book is a

really nice look at propaganda, how it could be done or put into place and the reasons for it.

I think the book is more for those interested in how propaganda works and how it can be used

to influence rather than those into the wider story of the war. A book that made me think, and

one I would happily recommend to others.

Britain’s Industrial Revolution in 100 Objects

Britain’s Industrial Revolution in 100 Objects written by John Broom and

published by Pen & Sword Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 320

The period of Britain’s Industrial Revolution was perhaps the most transformative

era in the nation’s history. Between about 1750 and 1914, life and work, home and

school, church and community changed irreversibly for Britain’s rapidly expanding

population. Lives were transformed, some for the better, but many endured abysmal

domestic and workplace conditions. Eventually improvements were made to

Britain’s social fabric which led to the prospect of richer and more fulfilled lives for

working men, women and even children. Focusing on 100 objects that either directly

influenced, or arose from, these changes, John Broom offers a distinctive insight into

this fascinating age. With plentiful illustrations and suggestions for visits to hundreds

of places of historical interest, this book makes an ideal companion for a journey into

Britain’s industrial past.

A brilliant subject matter, a fascinating and very interesting book, but then I do love this period of history and changes so maybe I’m slightly biased. We all very much learn about the industrial revolution from our days at school and this book is a bit like a throwback to those days, where we are introduced again to elements, items, people and changes that happened and might have forgotten about in a period of great change and upheaval. The book charts political upheaval through laws and events and the movement of people from the country into the cities.

A knowledgeable book with a lot of good effort by the author, I also enjoyed the links to places

and further reading after each object, which added an extra dynamic to the book. Certainly, a

book I enjoyed very much as I do all the ‘100 object’ books, but also a good book if you want to

learn more about the industrial revolution and what it bought. Highly recommended. 

The Plot of Shame Us Military Executions in Europe During WW2

The Plot of Shame Us Military Executions in Europe During WW2 written

by Paul Johnson and published by Frontline Books - £20 - Hardback - Pages 224

The Oise-Aisne American Cemetery is the last resting place of 6,012 American

soldiers who died fighting in a small portion of Northern France during the First

World War. The impressive cemetery is divided into four plots marked A to D.

However, few visitors are aware that across the road, behind the immaculate façade of the superintendent’s office, unmarked and completely surrounded by impassable shrubbery, is Plot E, a semi-secret fifth plot that contains the bodies of ninety-six American soldiers. These were men who were executed for crimes committed in the European Theatre of Operations during and just after the Second World War.

Originally, the men whose death sentences were carried out were buried near the sites of their executions in locations as far afield as England, France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, and Algeria. A number of the men were executed in the grounds of Shepton Mallet prison in Somerset – the majority of whom were hanged in the execution block, with two being shot by a firing squad in the prison yard. The executioner at most of the hangings was Thomas William Pierrepoint, assisted mainly by his more-famous nephew Albert Pierrepoint.

Then, in 1949, under a veil of secrecy, the ‘plot of shame’, as it has become known, was established in France. The site does not exist on maps of the cemetery and it is not mentioned on the American Battle Monuments Commission’s website. Visits to Plot E are not encouraged. Indeed, public access is difficult because the area is concealed, surrounded by bushes, and is closed to visitors.

No US flag is permitted to fly over the plot and the graves themselves have no names, just small, simple stones the size of index cards that are differentiated only by reference numbers. Even underground the dishonoured are set apart, with each body being positioned with its back to the main cemetery.

In The Plot of Shame, the historian Paul Johnson uncovers the history of Plot E and the terrible stories of wartime crime linked to it.

A really fascinating book that tells the tales of a group of American men, you would very rarely her about as these are the tales of US servicemen sentenced to death for crimes at the time were seen as heinous even during a time of war. The book is good in that it starts out with the Articles of War, the executioners and the plot where the majority of these men were buried in uncelebrated graves. The book then goes through the various stories on a year-by-year basis. The stories are explained in great detail and a really good amount of research has gone into this book, a very well informed book. Certainly a great book for those true crime fans.

The Berlin Blitz By Those Who Were There

The Berlin Blitz By Those Who Were There written by Martin W. Bowman

and published by Pen & Sword Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 236

The Allied bombing of Berlin was the longest and most sustained bombing offensive

against one target in the Second World War. The Berlin Blitz By Those Who Were

There is a compelling, gripping and thought-provoking story of the Allied bombing

forces and the ordinary people on the ground, told in their own tongue and with

meticulous attention to detail. The result is a coherent, single story which unfolds

in a straightforward and incisive narrative.

This work draws attention in some detail to the major raids on the Reich capital by RAF Bomber Command from the late summer of 1940 to September 1943. It begins with the reliable but largely ineffective twin-engined Blenheims, Hampdens, Wellingtons and Whitleys, through to the introduction into front-line service of the four-engined ‘heavies’ - the Stirling, Manchester and Halifax, which bore the brunt of the bomber offensive until the advent of the incomparable Avro Lancaster in 1942 and the superlative Mosquito. On 30 January 1943, on the tenth anniversary of Hitler’s usurpation of power, two formations (each of three Mosquitoes) appeared over Berlin in daylight and interrupted large rallies being addressed by Goering and Goebbels.

Sir Arthur Harris, Commander-in-Chief, RAF Bomber Command, hoped to ‘wreck Berlin from end to end’ and ‘produce a state of devastation in which German surrender is inevitable’. But the ‘Big City’, as it was known to his faithful ‘old lags’, was never completely destroyed.

This book is very much how the title explains, in that it is about the people who were there rather than specifics about flights, bombings and airforces. The book is very much a collection of ideas and opinions of people that were involved in the various raids and bombing run with the build up to the events and the thoughts and feelings when they were in progress. Concentrating on the mid war period, the book relies heavily on what Bomber Command specialised in, that of the heavy bombers like the Stirlings, Lancasters and so on.

Like previous Martin W. Bowman books, he is clearly a leading WW2 historian and this shines through in the book and the writing. He has the ability to include technical details, opinions and story timeline all together to produce and easy to read book of a high standard. A thoroughly good read involving the Berlin Biltz, and one that certainly deserves recommendation.

Wars of the Roses - The People, Places and Battlefields of the Yorkists and Lancastrians

Wars of the Roses The People, Places and Battlefields of the Yorkists and Lancastrians written by Paul Kendell and published by Frontline Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 224

The Wars of the Roses, which saw England and Wales ravaged by warfare for three decades and dynasties rise and fall, decimated the nobility of an entire generation, and saw the rise of the merchant class, the decline of medieval feudalism and opened the country to the enlightened ideals of the Renaissance. Such has been its lasting effects the red and white rose of the Tudors is still a national symbol.

This book is an exploration of the buildings, monuments, towns and battlefields of that turbulent era across both England and Wales – places that can still be visited and experienced today. The stories of the great battles of St Albans, Stoke Field, Wakefield, Towton, Barnet, Tewksbury and, of course, Bosworth, are told along with beautiful photographs to help guide the reader round these important sites, as well as the dozens of smaller engagements where the supporters of the Houses of York and Lancaster fought and died.

Here are castles and manor houses galore, all of which played their part in this protracted struggle for the throne of England, such as Richard of York’s imposing powerbase of Ludlow Castle and the magnificent Tudor stronghold of Bamburg. These are compared with the scant remains of Fotheringhay Castle, the birthplace of Richard III – the man whose remains were so dramatically uncovered in Leicester – and Micklegate Bar, York, was where Richard’s head was placed on a spike.

We see the Clocktower of St Albans and ‘Gabriel’ the bell that was rung in 1455 alerting of the Yorkist advance, as well as the Tower of London where Henry VI met his death and the possible burial place of the two princes.

These, and scores of other places, monuments, plaques, buildings and battlegrounds, represent not only a journey across England and Wales, but a journey back in time to the bloody conflict that was the War of the Roses.

A fascinating book in which the author Paul Kendall introduces us to another layer of the story of the War of the Roses, now most of us have read or have been told about the War of the Roses, but what happens here is that we are being lead and shown to the relevant places and people involved. This I believe helps us to better understand the story and those involved because we are being given the pictures and photos that help us understand what went on better. I found the book similar in style to the History in 100 Objects type books, but this was a little more focused. A great book and I’ve learnt so much from it. I would highly recommend this book to anyone.

Winston Churchill as Home Secretary

Churchill as Home Secretary Suffragettes, Strikes and Social Reform 1910-1911

written by Charles Stephenson and published by Pen & Sword Books - £25 -

Hardback - Pages 280

There can be few statesmen whose lives and careers have received as much investigation and literary attention as Winston Churchill. Relatively little however has appeared which deals specifically or holistically with his first senior ministerial role; that of Secretary of State for the Home Office. This may be due to the fact that, of the three Great Offices of State which he was to occupy over the course of his long political life, his tenure as Home Secretary was the briefest.

The Liberal Government, of which he was a senior figure, had been elected in 1906 to put in place social and political reform. Though Churchill was at the forefront of these matters, his responsibility for domestic affairs led to him facing other, major, challenges departmentally; this was a time of substantial commotion on the social front, with widespread industrial and civil strife. Even given that ‘Home Secretaries never do have an easy time’, his period in office was thus marked by a huge degree of political and social turbulence. The terms ‘Tonypandy’ and ‘Peter the Painter’ perhaps spring most readily to mind. Rather less known is his involvement in one of the burning issues of the time, female suffrage, and his portrayal as ‘the prisoners’ friend’ in terms of penal reform.

Aged 33 on appointment, and the youngest Home Secretary since 1830, he became empowered to wield the considerable executive authority inherent in the role of one of His Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, and he certainly did not shrink from doing so. There were of course commensurate responsibilities, and how he shouldered them is worth examination.

This book looks at the year or so Winston Churchill was Home Secretary and his

involvement in a number of issues such as Feminism, Strikes, Suffragettes, Welsh

Miners and more. This was such a nice book to read purely from the fact that it

wasn’t about Churchill during WW2, which is usually the case. It was nice to read

about him during other points of his political career. Actually, I learned quite a bit

from this book in seeing how much social politics he was having to deal and the

way he went about things. Now he was obviously a young man then so I think he

actually improved with age because I found the way he acted sometimes or his

views were maybe a little of their age shall we say. A really good book I would

definitely recommend to others, especially if you want to read about Churchill in

periods other than WW2.