Finding the Lost Battalion: Beyond the Rumors, Myths and Legends of America's Famous WW1 Epic - Hardcover

Download Finding the Lost Battalion: Beyond the Rumors, Myths and Legends of America's Famous WW1 Epic - Hardcover PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Lulu.com
ISBN 13 : 1365673367
Total Pages : 726 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (656 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Finding the Lost Battalion: Beyond the Rumors, Myths and Legends of America's Famous WW1 Epic - Hardcover by : Robert Laplander

Download or read book Finding the Lost Battalion: Beyond the Rumors, Myths and Legends of America's Famous WW1 Epic - Hardcover written by Robert Laplander and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2017-01-13 with total page 726 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since its release in 2006, 'Finding the Lost Battalion' by Robert J. Laplander has become the benchmark work against which all things Lost Battalion related have been measured. Now, in this updated 3rd edition released to coincide with the centennial of America's entry into WW1, Mr. Laplander again takes us to the Charlevaux Ravine to delve deeper into the story than ever before! Meticulously chronicling what would become arguably the most famous event of America's part in the war, we find the truths behind the legend. Spanning twenty years of research and hundreds of sources (most never before seen), the reader is led through the Argonne Forest during September and October, 1918 virtually hour by hour. The result is the single most factual accounting of the Lost Battalion story and their leader, Charles W. Whittlesey, to date. Told in an entertaining, fast moving style, the book has become a favorite the world over! With new Forward by Major-General William Terpeluk, US Army (Ret).

Finding the Lost Battalion

Download Finding the Lost Battalion PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780974414331
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (143 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Finding the Lost Battalion by : Robert Laplander

Download or read book Finding the Lost Battalion written by Robert Laplander and published by . This book was released on 2005-11 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

The Lost Battalion

Download The Lost Battalion PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781716503337
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (33 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Lost Battalion by : Robert J Laplander

Download or read book The Lost Battalion written by Robert J Laplander and published by . This book was released on 2020-10-21 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Much has been written about the famous 'Lost Battalion' of WW1, but few personal stories by the men who were there have ever been widely distributed. Now, Lost Battalion and 77th Division historian and author Robert J. Laplander changes all that in 'The Lost Battalion: As They Saw It'. Drawing on his 25+ years' worth of research into the event, the world's leading authority on the subject presents 31 stories by those who were there, told in their own words. From high ranking officers on down to the lowliest private, it's all here described in their own way; what they saw, what they heard, how they felt - and what it did to some of them afterwards. Often moving and occasionally terrifying, these stories paint a broad mosaic of their experiences, colored by their own backgrounds and personalities. For those seeking to understand the Lost Battalion event in a more direct way, as the men themselves understood it, this volume with be a welcome addition to their library. However, for all it is a wonderful and interesting peek into one of the most famous events of World War One!

The Lost Battalion

Download The Lost Battalion PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Lulu.com
ISBN 13 : 9780615139203
Total Pages : 160 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (392 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Lost Battalion by : Robert Laplander

Download or read book The Lost Battalion written by Robert Laplander and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2007-01-30 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Once again, Lost Battalion historian and author Robert J. Laplander takes his readers back to France in September and October of 1918...into the famous 'Pocket' of the Charlevaux Ravine, deep in the heart of the Argonne Forest, where the 'Lost Battalion' made its historic stand. Meant as a companion volume to his tremendously successful book 'Finding the Lost Battalion: Beyond the Rumors, Myths and Legends of America's Famous WW1 Epic', Mr Laplander again dips into his decade long research into the events surrounding this heroic story in order to present another view of what is arguably the most important episode to come from America's involvement in WW1. Told mostly in the words of the men involved (most of which have never been seen by the general public), 'The Lost Battalion: Return to the Charlevaux' brings even more depth to a story which has facinated readers for nearly 90 years now, and will definitely earn an honored spot on your shelf next to Mr. Laplander's first volume!

Blood in the Argonne

Download Blood in the Argonne PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN 13 : 9780806136967
Total Pages : 380 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (369 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Blood in the Argonne by : Alan D. Gaff

Download or read book Blood in the Argonne written by Alan D. Gaff and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this unique history of the “Lost Battalion” of World War I, Alan D. Gaff tells for the first time the story of the 77th Division from the perspective of the soldiers in the ranks. On October 2, 1918, Maj. Charles W. Whittlesey led the 77th Division in a successful attack on German defenses in the Argonne Forest of northeastern France. His unit, comprised of men of a wide mix of ethnic backgrounds from New York City and the western states, was not a battalion nor was it ever “lost,” but once a newspaper editor applied the term “lost battalion” to the episode, it stuck. Gaff draws from new, unimpeachable sources—such as sworn testimony by soldiers who survived the ordeal—to correct the myths and legends and to reveal what really happened in the Argonne Forest during early October 1918.

The True Story of the Wooden Horse

Download The True Story of the Wooden Horse PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Pen and Sword
ISBN 13 : 1473835143
Total Pages : 360 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (738 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The True Story of the Wooden Horse by : Robert J. Laplander

Download or read book The True Story of the Wooden Horse written by Robert J. Laplander and published by Pen and Sword. This book was released on 2014-04-30 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This in-depth historical study reveals fascinating new insight into the famous Wooden Horse escape of three Allied POWs from a Nazi prison camp. In 1943, three British prisoners of war plotted a daring and ingenious escape from Stalag Luft III by making use of a hollowed-out gymnastic vaulting horse. A year before the events of The Great Escape—which would take place at the same camp—Lieutenants Michael Codner, Eric Williams, and Oliver Philpot executed the plan that Williams later recounted in his classic memoir The Wooden Horse. Now Robert Laplander presents a revealing new account in this comprehensive study of Stalag Luft III and the many attempts at escape that occurred there during the Second World War. As Laplander explains, Williams' memoir was impeded by both a lack of necessary historical scope and regulations of the Crown. In The True Story of the Wooden Horse, Laplander makes use of newly released official documents and eye-witnesses reports. Supplemented by illustrations, including shots of a full-scale replica of the vaulting horse, this volume presents an exhaustive account of the escape in its entirety, set in the context of the camp’s history.

Never in Finer Company

Download Never in Finer Company PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Da Capo Press
ISBN 13 : 0306825694
Total Pages : 330 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (68 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Never in Finer Company by : Edward G. Lengel

Download or read book Never in Finer Company written by Edward G. Lengel and published by Da Capo Press. This book was released on 2018-09-18 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Uncover the larger-than-life story of World War I's "Lost Battalion" and the men who survived the ordeal, triumphed in battle, and fought the demons that lingered. In the first week of October, 1918, six hundred men attacked into Europe's forbidding Argonne Forest. Against all odds, they surged through enemy lines—alone. They were soon surrounded and besieged. As they ran out of ammunition, water, and food, the doughboys withstood constant bombardment and relentless enemy assaults. Seven days later, only 194 soldiers from the original unit walked out of the forest. The stand of the US Army's "Lost Battalion" remains an unprecedented display of heroism under fire. Never in Finer Company tells the stories of four men whose lives were forever changed by the ordeal: Major Charles Whittlesey, a lawyer dedicated to serving his men at any cost; Captain George McMurtry, a New York stockbroker who becomes a tower of strength under fire; Corporal Alvin York, a country farmer whose famous exploits help rescue his beleaguered comrades; and Damon Runyon, an intrepid newspaper man who interviews the survivors and weaves their experiences into the American epic. Emerging from the patriotic frenzy that sent young men "over there," each of these four men trod a unique path to the October days that engulfed them—and continued to haunt them as they struggled to find peace. Uplifting and compelling, Never in Finer Company is a deeply moving and dramatic story on an epic scale.

Ship of Ghosts

Download Ship of Ghosts PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Bantam
ISBN 13 : 0307490882
Total Pages : 577 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (74 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Ship of Ghosts by : James D. Hornfischer

Download or read book Ship of Ghosts written by James D. Hornfischer and published by Bantam. This book was released on 2009-03-25 with total page 577 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "Son, we’re going to Hell." The navigator of the USS Houston confided these prophetic words to a young officer as he and his captain charted a course into U.S. naval legend. Renowned as FDR’s favorite warship, the cruiser USS Houston was a prize target trapped in the far Pacific after Pearl Harbor. Without hope of reinforcement, her crew faced a superior Japanese force ruthlessly committed to total conquest. It wasn’t a fair fight, but the men of the Houston would wage it to the death. Hornfischer brings to life the awesome terror of nighttime naval battles that turned decks into strobe-lit slaughterhouses, the deadly rain of fire from Japanese bombers, and the almost superhuman effort of the crew as they miraculously escaped disaster again and again–until their luck ran out during a daring action in Sunda Strait. There, hopelessly outnumbered, the Houston was finally sunk and its survivors taken prisoner. For more than three years their fate would be a mystery to families waiting at home. In the brutal privation of jungle POW camps dubiously immortalized in such films as The Bridge on the River Kwai, the war continued for the men of the Houston—a life-and-death struggle to survive forced labor, starvation, disease, and psychological torture. Here is the gritty, unvarnished story of the infamous Burma–Thailand Death Railway glamorized by Hollywood, but which in reality mercilessly reduced men to little more than animals, who fought back against their dehumanization with dignity, ingenuity, sabotage, will–power—and the undying faith that their country would prevail. Using journals and letters, rare historical documents, including testimony from postwar Japanese war crimes tribunals, and the eyewitness accounts of Houston’s survivors, James Hornfischer has crafted an account of human valor so riveting and awe-inspiring, it’s easy to forget that every single word is true. BONUS: This edition contains an excerpt from James D. Hornfischer's Neptune's Inferno.

Harlem’s Hell Fighters

Download Harlem’s Hell Fighters PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Potomac Books, Inc.
ISBN 13 : 159797448X
Total Pages : 414 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (979 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Harlem’s Hell Fighters by : Stephen L. Harris

Download or read book Harlem’s Hell Fighters written by Stephen L. Harris and published by Potomac Books, Inc.. This book was released on 2003-06-30 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the United States entered World War I in 1917, thousands of African-American men volunteered to fight for a country that granted them only limited civil rights. Many from New York City joined the 15th N.Y. Infantry, a National Guard regiment later designated the 369th U.S. Infantry. Led by mostly inexperienced white and black officers, these men not only received little instruction at their training camp in South Carolina but were frequent victims of racial harassment from both civilians and their white comrades. Once in France, they initially served as laborers, all while chafing to prove their worth as American soldiers. Then they got their chance. The 369th became one of the few U.S. units that American commanding general John J. Pershing agreed to let serve under French command. Donning French uniforms and taking up French rifles, the men of the 369th fought valiantly alongside French Moroccans and held one of the widest sectors on the Western Front. The entire regiment was awarded the Croix de Guerre, the French government s highest military honor. Stephen L. Harris s accounts of the valor of a number of individual soldiers make for exciting reading, especially that of Henry Johnson, who defended himself against an entire German squad with a large knife. After reading this book, you will know why the Germans feared the black men of the 369th and why the French called them hell fighters. "

Unbroken

Download Unbroken PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Random House Trade Paperbacks
ISBN 13 : 0812974492
Total Pages : 530 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (129 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Unbroken by : Laura Hillenbrand

Download or read book Unbroken written by Laura Hillenbrand and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2014-07-29 with total page 530 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE • Look for special features inside. Join the Random House Reader’s Circle for author chats and more. In boyhood, Louis Zamperini was an incorrigible delinquent. As a teenager, he channeled his defiance into running, discovering a prodigious talent that had carried him to the Berlin Olympics. But when World War II began, the athlete became an airman, embarking on a journey that led to a doomed flight on a May afternoon in 1943. When his Army Air Forces bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean, against all odds, Zamperini survived, adrift on a foundering life raft. Ahead of Zamperini lay thousands of miles of open ocean, leaping sharks, thirst and starvation, enemy aircraft, and, beyond, a trial even greater. Driven to the limits of endurance, Zamperini would answer desperation with ingenuity; suffering with hope, resolve, and humor; brutality with rebellion. His fate, whether triumph or tragedy, would be suspended on the fraying wire of his will. Appearing in paperback for the first time—with twenty arresting new photos and an extensive Q&A with the author—Unbroken is an unforgettable testament to the resilience of the human mind, body, and spirit, brought vividly to life by Seabiscuit author Laura Hillenbrand. Hailed as the top nonfiction book of the year by Time magazine • Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for biography and the Indies Choice Adult Nonfiction Book of the Year award “Extraordinarily moving . . . a powerfully drawn survival epic.”—The Wall Street Journal “[A] one-in-a-billion story . . . designed to wrench from self-respecting critics all the blurby adjectives we normally try to avoid: It is amazing, unforgettable, gripping, harrowing, chilling, and inspiring.”—New York “Staggering . . . mesmerizing . . . Hillenbrand’s writing is so ferociously cinematic, the events she describes so incredible, you don’t dare take your eyes off the page.”—People “A meticulous, soaring and beautifully written account of an extraordinary life.”—The Washington Post “Ambitious and powerful . . . a startling narrative and an inspirational book.”—The New York Times Book Review “Magnificent . . . incredible . . . [Hillenbrand] has crafted another masterful blend of sports, history and overcoming terrific odds; this is biography taken to the nth degree, a chronicle of a remarkable life lived through extraordinary times.”—The Dallas Morning News “An astonishing testament to the superhuman power of tenacity.”—Entertainment Weekly “A tale of triumph and redemption . . . astonishingly detailed.”—O: The Oprah Magazine “[A] masterfully told true story . . . nothing less than a marvel.”—Washingtonian “[Hillenbrand tells this] story with cool elegance but at a thrilling sprinter’s pace.”—Time “Hillenbrand [is] one of our best writers of narrative history. You don’t have to be a sports fan or a war-history buff to devour this book—you just have to love great storytelling.”—Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

The Lost Battalion

Download The Lost Battalion PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 9780803276130
Total Pages : 376 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (761 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Lost Battalion by : Thomas Marvin Johnson

Download or read book The Lost Battalion written by Thomas Marvin Johnson and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2000-01-01 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originaly publishied: 1st edition Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Co., c1938.

The Kissing Sailor

Download The Kissing Sailor PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Naval Institute Press
ISBN 13 : 1612511279
Total Pages : 210 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (125 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Kissing Sailor by : Lawrence Verria

Download or read book The Kissing Sailor written by Lawrence Verria and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2012-05-15 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On August 14, 1945, Alfred Eisenstaedt took a picture of a sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square, minutes after they heard of Japan’s surrender to the United States. Two weeks later LIFE magazine published that image. It became one of the most famous WWII photographs in history (and the most celebrated photograph ever published in the world’s dominant photo-journal), a cherished reminder of what it felt like for the war to finally be over. Everyone who saw the picture wanted to know more about the nurse and sailor, but Eisenstaedt had no information and a search for the mysterious couple’s identity took on a dimension of its own. In 1979 Eisenstaedt thought he had found the long lost nurse. And as far as almost everyone could determine, he had. For the next thirty years Edith Shain was known as the woman in the photo of V-J Day, 1945, Times Square. In 1980 LIFE attempted to determine the sailor’s identity. Many aging warriors stepped forward with claims, and experts weighed in to support one candidate over another. Chaos ensued. For almost two decades Lawrence Verria and George Galdorisi were intrigued by the controversy surrounding the identity of the two principals in Eisenstaedt’s most famous photograph and collected evidence that began to shed light on this mystery. Unraveling years of misinformation and controversy, their findings propelled one claimant’s case far ahead of the others and, at the same time, dethroned the supposed kissed nurse when another candidate’s claim proved more credible. With this book, the authors solve the 67-year-old mystery by providing irrefutable proof to identify the couple in Eisenstaedt’s photo. It is the first time the whole truth behind the celebrated picture has been revealed. The authors also bring to light the couple’s and the photographer’s brushes with death that nearly prevented their famous spontaneous Times Square meeting in the first place. The sailor, part of Bull Halsey’s famous task force, survived the deadly typhoon that took the lives of hundreds of other sailors. The nurse, an Austrian Jew who lost her mother and father in the Holocaust, barely managed to escape to the United States. Eisenstaedt, a World War I German soldier, was nearly killed at Flanders.

American Military History Volume 1

Download American Military History Volume 1 PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781944961404
Total Pages : 436 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (614 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis American Military History Volume 1 by : Army Center of Military History

Download or read book American Military History Volume 1 written by Army Center of Military History and published by . This book was released on 2016-06-05 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American Military History provides the United States Army-in particular, its young officers, NCOs, and cadets-with a comprehensive but brief account of its past. The Center of Military History first published this work in 1956 as a textbook for senior ROTC courses. Since then it has gone through a number of updates and revisions, but the primary intent has remained the same. Support for military history education has always been a principal mission of the Center, and this new edition of an invaluable history furthers that purpose. The history of an active organization tends to expand rapidly as the organization grows larger and more complex. The period since the Vietnam War, at which point the most recent edition ended, has been a significant one for the Army, a busy period of expanding roles and missions and of fundamental organizational changes. In particular, the explosion of missions and deployments since 11 September 2001 has necessitated the creation of additional, open-ended chapters in the story of the U.S. Army in action. This first volume covers the Army's history from its birth in 1775 to the eve of World War I. By 1917, the United States was already a world power. The Army had sent large expeditionary forces beyond the American hemisphere, and at the beginning of the new century Secretary of War Elihu Root had proposed changes and reforms that within a generation would shape the Army of the future. But world war-global war-was still to come. The second volume of this new edition will take up that story and extend it into the twenty-first century and the early years of the war on terrorism and includes an analysis of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq up to January 2009.

Rowdy

Download Rowdy PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : eBook Partnership
ISBN 13 : 0996026010
Total Pages : 554 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (96 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Rowdy by : Christopher Madsen

Download or read book Rowdy written by Christopher Madsen and published by eBook Partnership. This book was released on 2015-08-15 with total page 554 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Christopher Madsen made the snap decision-perhaps a rash decision-to buy and renovate the famous 1916 racing yacht for which this story is named, he could scarcely have imagined the consequences that were to follow. During the renovation Madsen's investigation of the original owner, New York senator Holland Sackett Duell, uncovered a remarkable true life 1920s adventure and love story; one which fully brings to life the era and flair of Gatsby and Hemmingway yet, by contrast, Rowdy is completely true, historically significant and meticulously documented in support of the authenticity. The reader first walks in Duell's footsteps as he departs New York in 1918 to participate in the Great War (the most detailed accounting ever written on New York's 306th Field Artillery, 77th Division). Highly decorated upon return, the adventure continues as Duell is immersed in politics at the highest level, the birth of Hollywood, sailing competitions with some of the richest men in America, fortunes and mansions and love affairs as well as scandalous affairs. A newly unearthed gem in American history, Rowdy will enjoyably transport the reader back in time to the Golden Age of Yachting-AND EVER SO MUCH MORE!A multi-award winning story and a beautiful coffee table book; 8 A1/2 X 11 hardcover with the look of worn, vintage leather, gold leaf stamping, rounded spine woven burgundy book mark. Full reviews, sample pages, awards etc., at http://www.rowdystory.com

Hitler's First War

Download Hitler's First War PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0199233209
Total Pages : 467 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (992 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Hitler's First War by : Thomas Weber

Download or read book Hitler's First War written by Thomas Weber and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2010-09-16 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of Hitler's formative experiences as a soldier on the Western Front - now told in full for the first time, presenting a radical revision of Hitler's own account of this time in Mein Kampf.

A History of American Literature and Culture of the First World War

Download A History of American Literature and Culture of the First World War PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1108593879
Total Pages : 749 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (85 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis A History of American Literature and Culture of the First World War by : Tim Dayton

Download or read book A History of American Literature and Culture of the First World War written by Tim Dayton and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-02-04 with total page 749 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the years of and around the First World War, American poets, fiction writers, and dramatists came to the forefront of the international movement we call Modernism. At the same time a vast amount of non- and anti-Modernist culture was produced, mostly supporting, but also critical of, the US war effort. A History of American Literature and Culture of the First World War explores this fraught cultural moment, teasing out the multiple and intricate relationships between an insurgent Modernism, a still-powerful traditional culture, and a variety of cultural and social forces that interacted with and influenced them. Including genre studies, focused analyses of important wartime movements and groups, and broad historical assessments of the significance of the war as prosecuted by the United States on the world stage, this book presents original essays defining the state of scholarship on the American culture of the First World War.

Tolkien and the Great War

Download Tolkien and the Great War PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : HMH
ISBN 13 : 0544263723
Total Pages : 419 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (442 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Tolkien and the Great War by : John Garth

Download or read book Tolkien and the Great War written by John Garth and published by HMH. This book was released on 2013-06-11 with total page 419 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the First World War influenced the author of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy: “Very much the best book about J.R.R. Tolkien that has yet been written.” —A. N. Wilson As Europe plunged into World War I, J. R. R. Tolkien was a student at Oxford and part of a cohort of literary-minded friends who had wide-ranging conversations in their Tea Club and Barrovian Society. After finishing his degree, Tolkien experienced the horrors of the Great War as a signal officer in the Battle of the Somme, where two of those school friends died. All the while, he was hard at work on an original mythology that would become the basis of his literary masterpiece, the Lord of the Rings trilogy. In this biographical study, drawn in part from Tolkien’s personal wartime papers, John Garth traces the development of the author’s work during this critical period. He shows how the deaths of two comrades compelled Tolkien to pursue the dream they had shared, and argues that the young man used his imagination not to escape from reality—but to transform the cataclysm of his generation. While Tolkien’s contemporaries surrendered to disillusionment, he kept enchantment alive, reshaping an entire literary tradition into a form that resonates to this day. “Garth’s fine study should have a major audience among serious students of Tolkien.” —Publishers Weekly “A highly intelligent book . . . Garth displays impressive skills both as researcher and writer.” —Max Hastings, author of The Secret War “Somewhere, I think, Tolkien is nodding in appreciation.” —San Jose Mercury News “A labour of love in which journalist Garth combines a newsman’s nose for a good story with a scholar’s scrupulous attention to detail . . . Brilliantly argued.” —Daily Mail (UK) “Gripping from start to finish and offers important new insights.” —Library Journal “Insight into how a writer turned academia into art, how deeply friendship supports and wounds us, and how the death and disillusionment that characterized World War I inspired Tolkien’s lush saga.” —Detroit Free Press