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Field Marshal Claude Auchinleck is a study not only of the individual but also of how the British Army, Indian Army and the Empire were transformed during his long military career. Auchinleck was commissioned into the Indian Army from 1904 and served with distinction against the Turks in Egypt and the Mesopotamian campaign, earning a DSO. Between the wars he was involved in the pacification of the Northwest Frontier (now Pakistan). In the Second World War he briefly led a division in the ill-fated Norway campaign before being appointed Commander-in-Chief, India. He is best remembered for his controversial stint in command in North Africa, where he replaced Wavell in July 1941. He halted Rommel at the First Battle of El Alamein but was then replaced by Montgomery and resumed as C-in-C India, where his logistical support for Fourteenth Army was vital to success in Burma. Post-war he planned and oversaw Partition and British withdrawal from India. Here, as in North Africa, interference from his political masters added to the burdens of command. Evan McGilvray appraises Auchinlecks long and varied career in its entirety.
“If the Polish armed forces are of interest to you this title covering their distinguished service during World War II should appeal to many.” —Armorama The First Polish Armored Division was formed in Scotland in February 1942 from Polish exiles who had escaped first Poland and then France. Its commander, Stanislaw Maczek, and many of its men had previously served in Polish 10th Motorized Cavalry Brigade (10 BKS), which had taken part in the Polish invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and given a good account of itself in the defense of Poland against German and Soviet invasion of 1939. Under Maczek’s leadership the division was trained and equipped along British lines in preparation f...
A detailed chronicle of Poland’s efforts during World War II from beginning to end, by the author of Narvik and the Allies. The invasion of Poland by German forces (quickly joined by their then-allies the Soviets) ignited the Second World War. Despite determined resistance, Poland was quickly conquered but Poles continued the struggle to the very last day of the war against Germany, resisting the occupier within their homeland and fighting in exile with the Allied forces. Evan McGilvray, drawing on intensive research in Polish sources, gives a comprehensive account of Poland’s war. He reveals the complexities of Poland’s relationship with the Allies (forced to accept their Soviet enemi...
Along with thousands of his compatriots, Wladyslaw Anders was imprisoned by the Soviets when they attacked Poland with their German allies in 1939. They endured terrible treatment until the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 suddenly put Stalin in the Allied camp, after which they were evacuated to Iran and formed into the Polish Second Corps under Anders command.Once equipped and trained, the corps was eventually committed to the Italian campaign, notably at Monte Cassino. The author assesses Anders performance as a military commander, finding him merely adequate, but his political role was more significant and caused friction in the Allied camp. From the start he often opposed Sikorski, the Polish Prime Minister in exile and Commander in Chief of Polish armed forces in the West. Indeed, Anders was suspected of collusion in Sikorskis death in July 1943 and of later sending Polish death squads into Poland to eliminate opponents, charges that Evan McGilvray investigates. Furthermore, Anders voiced his deep mistrust of Stalin and urged a war against the Soviets after the defeat of Hitler.
This work examines the nature of the relationship between the British Government and the Polish Government-in-Exile, 1939-1945. The relationship was extremely difficult owing to the extremity of the time and the situations of the two governments. Before 1939 there had been little contact between Poland and Britain, however between 1939 and 1945 the two countries were joined in a common desire for the military defeat of Germany: this was virtually the only common goal that the two governments shared. Polish ambitions to see Poland restored to its pre-war frontiers were not shared with the major allies (Britain, the USA and the Soviet Union) after 1941. The question of differing objectives cau...
The Black Devils' March is an account of how the 1st (and only) Polish Armored Division in the West under the leadership of General Stanislaw Maczek, arose out of the ashes of defeat and while attempting to avoid the internal politics of the Polish Government in Exile, was able to return to Europe in August 1944 on the side of the Western Allies. In Europe the Division achieved glory, honor and victory but was unable to liberate Poland owing to the politics of the postwar settlement in Europe. The account of the formation and combat service of the Division is fully researched from Polish, English and German sources, and includes training in Scotland, the unit's sharp introduction to warfare ...
For almost 43 years three school notebooks lay in obscurity in the County Armagh home of sixty two-year old James McRoberts. The closely filled pages recorded just over two years in his life in uniform as he played his part in what was then known as the Great War. During the Home Rule crisis of 1914, one of several in Ireland's history, James McRoberts, like many other men, joined the Young Citizen Volunteers, an organization that eventually became the 14th Royal Irish Rifles, a battalion of the 36th (Ulster) Division. These notebooks, written at the time and with footnotes added some forty years later, record his Army service between 8 January 1915 and 3 April 1917. They tell, with remarkab...
Stachura provides an important, original analysis of the Polish community in the United Kingdom, adding up to a provocative interpretation of the Pole's position in British society. The chapters add to our understanding of the significant Polish military effort alongside the Allies in defeating Nazi Germany, while the appalling price the Poles paid at the end of the war at the Yalta Conference is accentuated. This crass and wholly unjustified betrayal of the cause of a free Poland by the Allies resulted directly in the formation of a large Polish community in Britain.
In Case is a murder story set in north Wales. The narrator is an English lawyer who is invited by the Professor, an old friend, to help launch the law department at a new university being established near Llandudno. He is to be a part-time lecturer for the opening term before returning to his practice in Reading. Whilst at Llandudno he becomes actively involved, not altogether reluctantly, in two murders, one on the train that takes him to Wales and the other of a student of his at the College. During his stay he is introduced to some aspects of Welsh life, and visits a number of famous historical sites and beauty spots from each of which he draws impressions which guide his actions as he informally co-operates with the officer leading the murder investigations. The Case in the title refers to a bag that he always carries with him, containing items vital to him in case of emergency. It plays a part in the events that unfold at the new university.