Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 100 i History of War

My grandma was a fire watcher in Manchester during the 1940 Blitz. She recalled long nights poised with a bucket of sand, waiting to snuff out blazes as the bombs dropped. One morning she found the shop she worked at was a pile of rubble. Horrific experiences of conflict like this were common for millions – and for many are still a reality. War has always produced great heroism, and it is these heroes that we wanted to celebrate in our hundredth issue. I’d also like to say thank-you to all our readers for your support over the years – here’s to the next hundred! CONTRIBUTORS ALEC BORRIE Tom Garner spoke with the veteran of 1st SAS Squadron about his memories serving behind enemy lines in France, 1944-45. PAGE 36…

The General, ever desirous to cherish a virtuous ambition in his soldiers, as well as to foster and encourage every species of military merit, “The directs that whenever any singularly meritorious action is performed, the author of it shall be permitted to wear on his facings, over his left breast, the figure of a heart in purple cloth, or silk, edged with a narrow lace or binding.” So read the order from General George Washington, which established the Badge of Military Merit, forerunner of the Purple Heart, in the spring of 1782 as Britain’s North American colonies neared their long-sought independence from the mother country. At the time, Washington’s troops were nevertheless weary, disgruntled and on the verge of mutiny after suffering the privations of war for some years, and…

To mark History of War’s 100th issue, we asked our expert contributors to share the story of the person who has inspired them most as military historians. Whether for actions on the battlefield, bravery on the homefront, or tenacity as a leader, there are many different ways people have left their mark on conflicts of the past. They are inspiring examples of human potential, achievement and personal sacrifice, born in the horrific environments that armed conflict creates. Their stories continue to inspire across the centuries.…

When I was a child, I often talked about the war with my grandfather, lieutenant-colonel Armand Ghiot, who fought in the Belgian army during World War II, and was captured in June 1940. His stories were fascinating, but I was immediately captivated when he told me about his own father, my great-grandfather, Gustave Ghiot. Gustave Ghiot was born on 4 June 1893 in Couture-Saint-Germain, a few miles from the battlefield of Waterloo. A conscript in the Belgian army in 1913, he was serving in the 4th company, 3rd battalion, 13th regiment of line infantry when World War I broke out. Fighting since the first days of the conflict, he was evacuated for illness on 1 March 1915. He was transferred to the 19th regiment of line infantry on 25 December…

Harriet Tubman is an iconic figure in the American abolitionist movement, having escaped enslavement in 1849 before becoming a ‘conductor’ in the Underground Railroad. Her role in transporting at least 70 Black people from the South and, ultimately, out of bondage, is in itself worthy of her likeness soon appearing on U.S. currency. Less known, perhaps, is her outstanding performance of duty during the American Civil War, first as a cook and nurse, then as a scout and spy, prior to being the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the United States, guiding the 1863 raid at Combahee Ferry. Born into a world of unquestionable cruelty and overt racism, Tubman – formerly named Araminta Ross while still enslaved – was no stranger to conflict. As a child, a…

Sextus Julius Frontinus is not a name many people would associate with military heroes. To me, however, he more than qualifies. If he is known to readers at all, it is as the author of a collection of stratagems (the Stratagemata) and a handbook on the Roman aqueducts. These literary works came at the end of Frontinus’ career, at the close of the 1st century AD. Prior to that, Frontinus had served as a soldier and commander probably since the reign of the emperor Claudius in the 50s A.D. The first mention of Frontinus in the surviving sources is on 1 January AD 70, but he must have shown he was a man of great potential prior to that, because his rise from that New Year’s Day onwards was meteoric.…

On 11 November 1920, the second anniversary of the armistice that ended the violence of the First World War, Britain and France both buried the remains of unknown soldiers, recognising the huge sacrifice made by the men who had fought in the war as well as acknowledging the tragic fact that so many could never hope to be identified. Fallen soldiers have traditionally had to be satisfied with a hastily dug grave, often shared with comrades and usually close to the place where they died. Bringing bodies home was a luxury available to a select few, and with advances in weapons technology came new problems – it was often simply impossible to identify a soldier killed in action. It is a sad fact, therefore, that the majority of soldiers who…

The Taxi Charity for Military Veterans aims to help military veterans of all conflicts by providing entertainment, outings and specialised equipment. They offer international trips to the Netherlands, Belgium and France, day trips to concerts, museums and catch-up events with friends and comrades. The veterans are transported by volunteer London taxi drivers who willingly provide their time and vehicles to provide free transportation. To fund and facilitate these endeavours, the charity is wholly reliant on donations from members of the public, businesses and trusts. On 2 June 2021, the Taxi Charity was awarded the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service (QAVS), which is the MBE for volunteer groups and is awarded for life. Alec Borrie is one veteran the charity has been able to help by assisting his own volunteer work…

On the morning of 17 February 1934, Albert was driven to Marches-les-Darmes in Ardennes by his valet. The king wanted to tackle a cliff there in preparation for a climbing expedition in the Alps he had planned for later that year. The car was stopped and the valet told to wait as the king set off in the direction of the cliff face. It was the last time anyone would see him alive. The valet waited all day for the king to return, but when it started to get dark and there was still no sign of him, he called on a nearby aristocrat Baron Edmond Carton de Wiart for assistance, and a search was mounted by local police. At around 2.00am, one of the searchers got his foot caught…

At 101, Christian Lamb shares her memories and experiences of serving as a Wren on the home front during World War II When war was declared in 1939, Christian Lamb knew immediately she would join the Royal Navy. “As my father was now an admiral in that historic service, it seemed destined that I should become a member,” she says. “The advertisement which suggested a Wren might free a sailor to go to sea made some sense and the thought of doing something really useful was very attractive.” The Women’s Royal Naval Service (WRNS) had been founded in 1917. The leading ladies behind the organisation were Dame Katharine Furse and Dame Vera Laughton Mathews; by 1919 it had successfully recruited 7,000 Wrens including cooks and stewards, despatch riders, sail makers…

Author: Kate Clements, Paul Cornish, Vikki Hawkins Publisher: Thames & Hudson Price: £35 On sale: Out now What is total war? This is the first question the book attempts to tackle. As you might expect there is no simple answer. Nevertheless, total war can be characterised by its complete mobilisation of economies and societies to wage war. Civilians become equally as important as combatants, and as the authors chillingly remind us here, in WWII more non-combatants died than those fighting in uniform. The authors also rightly point out that for many the Second World War began before 1939. Ethiopia had been occupied by the Italians since 1935 and China and Japan had already been fighting for three years by the time hostilities broke out in Europe. Similarly, they point out…

Prior to the Crimean War, the British Army had no formal way of recognising bravery on the battlefield. Individuals could receive a promotion, or perhaps a mention in dispatches, but little else. This prompted the creation of a new award: the Victoria Cross for the most conspicuous acts of gallantry. However, it was soon felt that an additional award was needed to recognise courage that was still highly esteemed, but did not in itself justify a Victoria Cross. This prompted the creation of the Distinguished Service Order, on 6 September 1886. The first recipients of the new medal were announced – as has become a tradition – in the pages of the London Gazette. Here, the names of the very first 16 recipients were published on Friday 26 November 1886.…

When Vice-Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson was killed during his greatest triumph at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 he was wearing a splendid uniform coat. Made of colourful and high-quality material, the coat still bears the bullet hole that pierced Nelson’s left shoulder, fatally wounding him. It has been suggested that the admiral made himself a highly visible target by wearing four replica embroidered insignias of chivalric orders. In an age when military decorations for gallantry were in their infancy, Nelson was awarded three ‘Naval Gold Medals’ by the Royal Navy. Granted to senior British naval officers for specific actions, Nelson was awarded the medals for the battles of Cape St. Vincent, the Nile and (posthumously) Trafalgar. He therefore viewed being inducted into prestigious chivalric orders as a much greater…

During the course of a long and illustrious military career, General Dwight D. Eisenhower came to intimately understand the deep responsibility – the heavy burden – of command. On the eve of Operation Overlord, the Allied invasion of Normandy during World War II, he carried the proverbial weight of the world on his shoulders. Outwardly, Eisenhower was an optimist, but he knew that the D-Day landings could end in abject failure. Should the outcome be a reversal, he was prepared to shoulder the responsibility for a defeat that carried with it catastrophic consequences. Just in case, he scribbled a succinct statement for release to the media. “Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops,” he wrote on the eve…

The full horror of modern warfare, in which defenceless civilians were targeted by the full range of industrialised killing power for the first time – from high-flying bombers, to rockets and artillery – was brilliantly captured by the American journalist Julien Bryan in Warsaw between 7-21 September 1939. Bryan’s films and photographs provided the world with a shocking window into the horror of the militarisation of hatred unleashed by the Wehrmacht against a hapless Poland that acted as the curtain-opener for a war that would eventually see up to 85 million people lose their lives. A series of photographs of one terrible incident on 13 September captured the shock and incredulity on the face of a Polish girl, Kazimiera Mika, as she stood over the dead body of her elder…

It’s very hard to choose just one hero when I have so many. I’m a massive fan of Field Marshal Alexander, for example, a brilliant man who, I think, has been rather under-appreciated in recent times. So too has General Sir Francis Tuker, perhaps the greatest army commander Britain never had (for a variety of complex but regrettable reasons). Or how about that fearless American fighter pilot, Don Blakeslee, commander of the outstanding 4th Fighter Group? Or so many others? It’s an impossible task. But I’m going to choose someone barely known at all: Lieutenant-Colonel Stanley Christopherson, who commanded the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry during the last eleven months of the war against Nazi Germany, and brilliantly so too, despite some 43 per cent of those serving in the regiment’s tanks…

Of the many World War II veterans I’ve had the privilege to meet, few if any have been as remarkable as Charles Shay. A Native American of the Penobscot tribe, Charles was born in 1924, the year that Congress enacted the Indian Citizenship Act, granting all Native Americans born in the USA the right to vote. Some states complied with the Act, but others didn’t, including Maine, where Charles lived with his parents and three brothers. They were raised in poverty on a reservation, and yet when the U.S. entered the war in 1941, Charles and his brothers all served their country, despite the fact that they were considered ‘second class citizens’; allowed to die for their country, but not to vote. Charles trained as a medic, and on arriving…

KING ALBERT I OF BELGIUM 1875-1934 Resolutely defending Belgium throughout WWI after it was invaded by Germany, Albert led his troops bravely while continually searching for a peaceful solution to the war. He also helped to reform Belgium socially and politically throughout his reign. On the morning of 2 August 1914, Claus von Below-Saleske, the German Ambassador in Brussels, delivered the following ultimatum to the Belgian government… VERY CONFIDENTIAL Reliable information has been received by the German Government that French forces intend to march through Belgian territory against Germany. It is essential for the self-defence of Germany that she should anticipate any such hostile attack and Germany [therefore must], for her own protection, enter Belgian territory. This is no act of hostility against Belgium. In the event of Belgium being…

Knights Hospitaller Grand Master Pierre d’Aubusson stood proudly in his new suit of gold damascene-decorated armour atop the battlements of the citadel of Rhodes on 24 May 1480. He watched intently as the Ottoman host prepared a great battery a short distance north of the stronghold. The Turkish soldiers busied themselves preparing a battery of three giant basilisks that they aimed at the Tower of St Nicholas, which stood like a lonely sentinel on the far end of a quarter-mile long mole on the east side of the port’s narrow galley harbour. The heavy set, round-faced 57-year-old commander had prepared for this moment, and so had his predecessors. He was fearless in the face of the Turkish assault. Ever since Constantinople fell to Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II in 1453, the…

In January 2016, I drove to a small bungalow in rural Hampshire, England. Having only joined History of War the previous November, I was still new to the job, and on that particular day I was about to conduct my first ever interview. Although prepared, I was also nervous – I already knew that this was no ordinary interviewee. When I knocked on the bungalow door, it opened to reveal a 96-year old man with a broad Cockney accent. It was Victor Gregg, a former rifleman and an extremely outspoken WWII veteran who had joined the British Army in 1936. A formidable character, Victor gruffly welcomed me into his home, and then spent hours regaling me with astonishing stories of his wartime service. A regular soldier, Victor had fought extensively…

In September 2021, a 1796 Pattern British infantry officer’s sword was discovered among items at Weston Hall, the seat of the famous Sitwell family in Northamptonshire, England. The sword, which is inscribed “Tatham to his Majesty” was made by Henry Tatham, a gun-maker and sword-cutler who worked in Charing Cross, London. The bill for this sword cannot be identified but it is believed to be associated with King George IV. George ruled the United Kingdom and Hanover as king during 1820-30 but acted as ‘Prince Regent’ for his mentally ill father King George III from 1811. Before that he had a prolonged period as Prince of Wales and led a highly extravagant lifestyle. “GEORGE WAS AN INFAMOUS SPENDTHRIFT WITH HIS ROYAL WALLET EXTENDING TO BUYING VARIOUS MILITARY ITEMS” George was…

Known in Polish as the ‘Order Wojenny Virtuti Militari’ (‘War Order of Virtuti Militari’), Poland’s highest decoration is literally awarded “For Military Virtue”. Established on 22 June 1792, Virtuti Militari was founded by Stanisław II August, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania. The last monarch of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Stanisław established the Order to commemorate Prince Józef Poniatowski’s victory over the Russians at the Battle of Zielence. It initially consisted of two classes: an oval golden medal for officers, and a silver one for NCOs and privates. In the first year of its existence, it was awarded to 63 officers (including Poniatowski, who was its first recipient) and 290 NCOs and ordinary soldiers. The medal was abolished in 1795 upon the dissolution of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, but was…

During a very long career that lasted from the 1890s until the 1960s, Winston Churchill was the recipient of 37 orders, decorations and medals. This included the Nobel Prize for Literature and honorary citizenship of the United States, but Churchill always had a fascination and yearning for military recognition. Although the majority of Churchill’s awards recognised his service as a British government minister, particularly during WWII, several medals were for his active service as a British Army officer during his early life. His intermittent military career during 1893-1924 as a regular and Territorial soldier saw him fight across the globe during the Cuban War of Independence, the Northwest Frontier, Mahdist War, Second Boer War and WWI. ORDER OF MILITARY MERIT Churchill first saw action when he acted as a military…

Inside the period of just one week during May 1940, 21-year-old Flying Officer Derek Hurlstone Allen of Leicester went from inexperienced combat pilot to an ‘ace’ with five victories and a gallantry decoration while serving with the Hurricane-equipped 85 Squadron at Lille-Seclin. The unit’s Operations Record Book set the scene for the start of the ‘Blitzkrieg’ on 10 May: “…Intermittently, throughout the day, as each section and flight landed, the pilots and aircraft were on the ground only long enough to allow re-arming and re-fuelling and so it went on from dawn to dusk; by the end of the day, the squadron had a total bag of seventeen aircraft to their credit with the loss of two of our aircraft.” In one of those actions, Allen experienced his first taste…

Wilfred Owen was aged 25 when he died, just one week before the signing of the Armistice that would end World War I. He was killed in action by enemy fire while leading his men of the 2nd Manchester Regiment across the Sambre-Oise Canal in northern France. His mother Susan received the fated telegram as Shrewsbury bells rang in celebration on 11 November 1918. While just five of Owen’s poems were published during his short lifetime, his legacy in literature today is remarkable, and he is widely regarded as the finest war poet of the Great War. Owen was first sent to France in 1916 as a second lieutenant, before he returned with shell-shock and spent time recuperating at Edinburgh’s Craiglockhart War Hospital. As his philosophy on the futility of…

The 1st Battalion of the Royal Anglian Regiment – the Vikings – is one of the highly professional county infantry regiments, and the mainstay of the British Army. In Afghanistan in 2007, they went through hell. On 8 April 2007, the Vikings arrived in Helmand province, Afghanistan, as part of the British Herrick 6 deployment. The six months that followed would be described by their commanding officer, Stuart Carver DSO, as “the most demanding tour conducted by this Battalion in living memory.” At its end, the soldiers from the wide flat lands of East Anglia had fired a staggering 1,067,150 bullets and killed over 1,000 Taliban fighters, but the cost was high. From a roll call of some 715 men, the battalion suffered 155 casualties, of which nine were killed…

By late 1943, General George Marshall was one of the most prominent and respected soldiers in the world. As Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army during World War II, he was the linchpin of the American war effort, directing millions of servicemen in multiple theatres in the global struggle against the Axis Powers. He would have been a natural choice of Supreme Commander for the Allied forces that were slated to mount a cross-Channel invasion of France – Operation Overlord – in 1944. In December 1943, the time for a decision concerning the filling of the paramount position for Overlord had arrived. It was going to be given to an American, so the choice fell to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. On his way back from the Tehran Conference, where…

An athletic sportsman from Newtownards, County Down in Northern Ireland, Mayne had represented Ireland and the British Lions at rugby during the late 1930s and was also a trained solicitor. Initially an artillery and infantry officer from 1939, Mayne became a commando and was Mentioned in Despatches for fighting in the Syria-Lebanon Campaign before he joined the newly created SAS in 1941. During 1941-42, Mayne earned a formidable reputation in North Africa by commanding audacious raids against German airfields. He recorded a personal tally of over 100 enemy aircraft destroyed before he took over command of 1st SAS Regiment in January 1943 after SAS founder, David Stirling, was captured. Mayne led the unit through Sicily, Italy, France and Germany and won a plethora of medals. This included the Distinguished Service…

When German forces overran Belgium at the start of World War I they conquered the entire country save for a strip of land in the country’s south west known as Flanders. It was to become a cauldron of slaughter, as shellfire and poison gas were poured into it by both the Germans and the Allies on an unprecedented scale. It was here that Albert would spend most of the war, frequently visiting his troops on the front line, experiencing many of the same dangers that they were subjected to. But Albert wasn’t the only member of his family who’d do his bit during the Great War. His wife, Elisabeth – despite being German herself – would also make morale-boosting visits to the Front, handing out cigarettes and chocolates. Her biggest…

Author: Rupert Wieloch Publisher: Casemate Price: £25 On sale: Out now Rupert Wieloch draws on his extensive knowledge of Libya to unveil the drama of Britain’s long involvement with the country and illustrate the roles national security and defence have played in the UK’s policy towards it. The book also illustrates the lack of awareness that to a large extent has surrounded the relationship between the two countries. The author cites as an example the role played by Libyans in the Second World War. It is widely accepted that many Libyans were in the pay of the Italian army, but we learn that in Cyrenaica the majority of the population supported the Allies and, where they could, helped special forces to raid Rommel’s supply lines. Likewise, many Libyans living in…