From the acclaimed military history author, this action-packed World War II history describes the Allies' brutal naval engagements and daring harbor raids to destroy the backbone of Hitler's surface fleet.
The sea had become a mass grave by 1941 as Hitler's four capital warships -- Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Tirpitz, and Bismarck, the largest warship on the ocean -- roamed the wind-swept waves, threatening the Allied war effort and sending thousands of men to the icy depths of the North Atlantic. Bristling with guns and steeled in heavy armor, these reapers of the sea could outrun and outgun any battleship in the Allied arsenal. The deadly menace kept Winston Churchill awake at night; he deemed them 'targets of supreme consequence.'
The campaign against Hitler's surface fleet would continue into the dying days of World War II and involve everything from massive warships engaged in bloody, fire-drenched battle to daring commando raids in German occupied harbors. This is the fast-paced story of the Allied bomber crews, brave sailors, and bold commandoes who 'sunk the Bismarck' and won a hard-fought victory over Hitler's iron sea.
Using official war diaries, combat reports, eyewitness accounts and personal letters, Simon Read brings the action and adventure to vivid life. The result is an enthralling and gripping story of the Allied heroes who fought on a watery battlefield.
Before Winston Churchill's finest hour as Britain's wartime leader, he was a young man determined to make a name for himself. When his regiment was stationed in India, far from any action, Churchill sought other avenues, and his writing abilities opened the way. He became a war correspondent reporting from the front lines in Cuba, India, the Sudan, and South Africa.
Churchill mastered his celebrated command of the English language while reporting from far-flung corners of the world between 1895 and 1900. He also developed strong opinions about war. Aided by a tremendous amount of courage and an unshakeable belief in his own destiney, he thought little of his own safety and jumped at any chance to be where bullets flew and canons roared: "I have faith in my star - that I am intended to do something in the world," he wrote to his mother before heading into battle at the age of twenty-three.
Based on Winston's private letters and war reportage, Winston Churchill Reporting intertwines his daring exploits in combat, adventures in distant corners of the globe, and rise as a major literary talent - experiences that shaped the world leader he woulda become.
