Audiobooks by Bruce Henderson

Midnight Flyboys: The American Bomber Crews and Allied Secret Agents Who Aided the French Resistance

"The untold history of a top-secret operation in the run-up to D-Day in which American flyers and Allied spies carried out some of the most daring cloak-and-dagger operations of World War II. In 1943, the OSS—precursor to the CIA—came up with a plan to increase its support to the French resistance forces that were fighting the Nazis. To start, the OSS recruited some of the best American bomber pilots and crews to a secret airfield twenty miles west of London and briefed them on the intended mission. Given a choice to stay or leave, every airman volunteered for what became known as Operation Carpetbagger. Their dangerous plan called for a new kind of flying: taking their B-24 Liberator bombers in the middle of the night across the English Channel and down to extremely low altitudes in Nazi-occupied France to find drop zones in dark fields. On the ground, resistance members waited to receive steel containers filled with everything from rifles and hand grenades to medicine and bicycle tires. Some nights, the flyers also dropped Allied secret agents by parachute to assist the French partisans. Though their story remained classified for more than fifty years, the Carpetbaggers ultimately received a Presidential Unit Citation from the US military, which declared: "it is safe to say that no group of this size has made a greater contribution to the war effort." Along with other members of the wartime OSS, they were also awarded the Congressional Gold Medal. Based on exclusive research and interviews, the definitive story of these heroic flyers—and of the brave secret agents and resistance leaders they aided—can now be told. Written in Bruce Henderson's "spellbinding" (USA TODAY) prose, Midnight Flyboys is an astonishing tale of patriotism, courage, and sacrifice."

Bruce Henderson (Author), Gary Tiedemann (Narrator)

Audiobook

Bridge to the Sun: The Secret Role of the Japanese Americans Who Fought in the Pacific in World WarI

"One of the last, great untold stories of World War II-kept hidden for decades-even after most of the World War II records were declassified in 1972, many of the files remained untouched in various archives-a gripping true tale of courage and adventure from Bruce Henderson, master storyteller, historian, and New York Times best-selling author of Sons and Soldiers-the saga of the Japanese American U.S. Army soldiers who fought in the Pacific theater, in Burma, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, with their families back home in America, under U.S. Executive Order 9066, held behind barbed wire in government internment camps. After Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. military was desperate to find Americans who spoke Japanese to serve in the Pacific war. They soon turned to the Nisei-first-generation U.S. citizens whose parents were immigrants from Japan. Eager to prove their loyalty to America, several thousand Nisei-many of them volunteering from the internment camps where they were being held behind barbed wire-were selected by the Army for top-secret training, then were rushed to the Pacific theater. Highly valued as expert translators and interrogators, these Japanese American soldiers operated in elite intelligence teams alongside Army infantrymen and Marines on the front lines of the Pacific war, from Iwo Jima to Burma, from the Solomons to Okinawa. Henderson reveals, in riveting detail, the harrowing untold story of the Nisei and their major contributions in the war of the Pacific, through six Japanese American soldiers. After the war, these soldiers became translators and interrogators for war crime trials, and later helped to rebuild Japan as a modern democracy and a pivotal U.S. ally."

Bruce Henderson (Author), Brian Nishii (Narrator)

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Down to the Sea: An Epic Story of Naval Disaster and Heroism in World War II

"This epic story opens at the hour the Greatest Generation went to war on December 7, 1941, and follows four US Navy ships and their crews in the Pacific until their day of reckoning three years later with a far different enemy: a deadly typhoon. In December 1944, while supporting General MacArthur's invasion of the Philippines, Admiral William 'Bull' Halsey neglected the Law of Storms, placing the mighty US Third Fleet in harm's way. Drawing on extensive interviews with nearly every living survivor and rescuer, as well as many families of lost sailors, transcripts and other records from naval courts of inquiry, ships' logs, personal letters, and diaries, Bruce Henderson finds some of the story's truest heroes exhibiting selflessness, courage, and even defiance."

Bruce Henderson (Author), Jon Waters (Narrator)

Audiobook

Trace Evidence: The Hunt for the I-5 Serial Killer

"For ten years, the California Interstate 5 highway was haunted by a dangerous serial killer. Incredibly skilled at staying ahead of the investigators as the bodies started to pile up, there wasn't enough evidence to charge the culprit with murder even once he'd been identified. Instead, they had to build a first-degree murder case in a few months while the killer was locked up on an assault conviction. Key to this was a cast of four: Vito Bertocchini, the burly ex–street cop who took the killing of a beautiful young woman personally; Kay Maulsby, the rookie homicide detective who helped unmask the killer; Ray Biondi, who fought severe budget cuts that threatened to derail the investigation; and criminalist Faye Springer, who attempted to tie the suspect to his victims through subtle but persuasive microscopic evidence. Drawing on hundreds of hours of exclusive interviews with these investigators, as well as other important figures such as the killer's reclusive wife, #1 New York Times bestselling author Bruce Henderson builds a fascinating portrait of this unrepentant murderer."

Bruce Henderson (Author), David Colacci (Narrator)

Audiobook

Sons and Soldiers: The Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned for Retribution

"‘The last great, untold story of WWII… highly compelling’ Daily Mail Fleeing Nazi persecution for America in the 1930s, the young German-born Jews who would come to be known as The Ritchie Boys were labelled ‘enemy aliens’ when war broke out. Although of the age to be inducted into the U.S. military, their German accents made them distrusted. Until one day in 1942, when the Pentagon woke up to the incredible asset they had in their ranks, and sent these young recruits to a secret military intelligence training centre at Camp Ritchie, Maryland. These men knew the language, culture and psychology of the enemy better than anyone, and had the greatest motivation to fight Hitler’s anti-Semitic regime. And so they were trained and sent back into the belly of the beast, Jews returning to the frontlines of battlefields across Nazi-occupied Europe to defeat the enemy that persecuted them and their families. In an epic story of heroism, courage, and patriotism, bestselling author Bruce Henderson draws on personal interviews with many surviving veterans and extensive archival research to finally bring this never-before-told chapter of the Second World War to light. Previously published as Sons and Soldiers"

Bruce Henderson (Author), Brett Barry (Narrator)

Audiobook

Fatal North: Murder and Survival on the First North Pole Expedition

"It began as President Ulysses S. Grant's bid for international glory after the Civil War—America's first attempt to reach the North Pole. It ended with Captain Charles Hall's death under suspicious circumstances, dissension among sailors, scientists, and explorers, and the ship's evacuation and eventual sinking. Then came a brutal struggle for survival by thirty-three men, women, and children, stranded on the polar ice. When news of the disastrous expedition and accusations of murder reached Washington D.C., it led to a nationwide scandal, an official investigation, and a government cover-up. The mystery of the captain's death remained unsolved for nearly 100 years. But when Charles Hall's frozen grave in northern Greenland was opened, forensic scientists were finally able to reach a shocking conclusion. Now, telling the complete story for the first time, bestselling author Bruce Henderson has researched original transcripts of the U.S. Navy inquests, personal papers of Captain Hall, autopsy and forensic reports relating to the century-old crime, the ship's original log, and personal journals kept by crewmen to bring to life one of the most mysterious tragedies of American exploration."

Bruce Henderson (Author), John Pruden (Narrator)

Audiobook

Rescue at Los Banos: The Most Daring Prison Camp Raid of World War II

"From the bestselling author of Hero Found comes the incredible true story of one of the greatest military rescues of all time, the 1945 World War II prison camp raid at Los Baños in the Philippines—a tale of daring, courage, and heroism that joins the ranks of Ghost Soldiers, Unbroken, and The Boys of Pointe du Hoc. In February 1945, as the U.S. victory in the Pacific drew nearer, the Japanese army grew desperate, and its soldiers guarding U.S. and Allied POWs more sadistic. Starved, shot and beaten, many of the 2,146 prisoners of the Los Baños prison camp in the Philippines—most of them American men, women and children—would not survive much longer unless rescued soon. Deeply concerned about the half-starved and ill-treated prisoners, General Douglas MacArthur assigned to the 11th Airborne Division a dangerous rescue mission deep behind enemy lines that became a deadly race against the clock. The Los Baños raid would become one of the greatest triumphs of that war or any war; hailed years later by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Colin Powell: “I doubt that any airborne unit in the world will ever be able to rival the Los Baños prison raid. It is the textbook operation for all ages and all armies.” Combining personal interviews, diaries, correspondence, memoirs, and archival research, Rescue at Los Baños tells the story of a remarkable group of prisoners—whose courage and fortitude helped them overcome hardship, deprivation, and cruelty—and of the young American soldiers and Filipino guerrillas who risked their lives to save them."

Bruce Henderson (Author), Brett Barry (Narrator)

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