Showing titles in World War I

The men and women who won World War II for the Allies have been called "the greatest generation," and rightfully so, for they saved the Western world from destruction and domination by totalitarian dictators. As Winston Churchill so eloquently put it, "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few." However, even within this glorious group, there was another, perhaps even more superlative generation made up of men and women who fought not only in World War II, but also World War I, which at the time was the deadliest and most destructive war in history.

In Balloon Ace: The Life of an Early Airpower Visionary, historian Charles Dusch reconstructs Louis Bennett Jr.'s lost legacy. Advocating for a national aviation reserve years before the writings of "Billy" Mitchell, Bennett created a state aerial militia in 1917, complete with supporting airbases and an airplane factory. When the US Army refused to accept his unit, a frustrated Bennett joined the Royal Air Force to fight on the Western Front, destroying nine German balloons and three aircraft in a matter of days before he himself was shot down.

Charles Edward Wells deployed to France, and we join him there in the summer of 1918, following a vicious attack wherein he lost his first diary. We then see the full scale of war through his eyes. Not only the mortal danger of combat, but also a good bit of what happens to a soldier when he's not on the front line.

How the US Army developed historical programs since World War I―sending combat historians into the fray to interview soldiers and collect documents for the benefit of history.

Parker Hitt's proactive mentorship of Army cryptology during World War I laid the groundwork for the modern American cryptologic system. Though he considered himself an infantryman, Hitt is best known as the "father of American military cryptology".

Amazing! An astonishing find! - AMITAV GHOSH Nariman Karkaria, a young Parsi from Gujarat, had always wanted to see the world. So he left home as a teenager with fifty rupees in his pocket to do just that. After working in Hong Kong and Peking for a few years, in 1914, when war was in the air...

In this one-hour history book, discover the main events that led to World War I and how this first global conflict unfold from the Western front, to Africa, the Middle East, and Asia as it became one of the bloodiest war of all time. It was dubbed “the war to end all wars,” but as anyone alive today can clearly attest, this was most certainly not the case. World War I was indeed an ending point in world history, but rather than ending wars, it could be said to be the war that ended the “fraternity of wars.”

Neal Bascomb, a New York Times best-selling author, delivers the spellbinding story of the downed Allied airmen who masterminded the remarkably courageous - and ingenious - breakout from Germany's most devilish POW camp.

Corporal Lee A. Horton found his destiny serving on three warfronts: the Philippines, the Mexican Border and the maelstrom of World War I. The story is filled with the true-life military experiences of a young American coming of age between 1908 and 1919, passed down through his family for generations. Some creative liberty has been taken to fill in the blanks, as many family members and contemporaries have passed on; but the primary narrative is based firmly in extensive and thorough local research.

World War I is difficult to grasp for many Americans. Most WWI soldiers didn't keep a diary, and few spoke of what they saw and experienced. Through Courage, listeners will understand what pulled the world into this devastating conflict, see why the United States came out of isolation to side with the Allies, and gain a personal look into the lives of WWI fighters. Through the eyes of Roy Blanchard, listeners will see, hear, and feel what it was like to bravely face the terror of the First World War.

From the New York Times bestselling author of War Letters and Behind the Lines, Andrew Carroll’s My Fellow Soldiers draws on a rich trove of both little-known and newly uncovered letters and diaries to create a marvelously vivid and moving account of the American experience in World War I...

Eddie Rickenbacker was a WWI fighter ace. He arrived in France as a fresh greenie who knew little about flying and less about air combat. He learned everything he needed while fighting against the German air force and the famous Flying Circus commanded by Manfred von Richthofen. In this biography of his wartime experiences, Eddie tells us of his midair adventures and battles as well as how he learned to "defeat the hun" and earned the title of Ace.

Delving deep into the motivations, horrific experiences, and ultimate fates of this Harvard-educated quintet - and by extension, of the brilliant young officer class that left its collegiate and postcollegiate pursuits to enlist in the army and lead America’s rough-and-ready doughboys - Five Lieutenants presents a unique, timeless, and fascinating account of citizen soldiers at war and of the price these extraordinary men paid while earnestly giving all they had in an effort to end "the war to end all wars."

In this persuasive biography, Jim Lacey sheds light on General Pershing's legacy as the nation's first modern combat commander, setting the standard for today's four-star officers. When the U.S. entered into World War I in 1917, they did so with inadequate forces. In just over a year, Pershing built and hurled a one-million-man army against 40 battle-hardened German divisions.

October 8, 1918: Amid the last of the Allies' attempts to defeat the Germans, Sgt. Alvin York of Tennessee found himself and his platoon of only 17 men trapped in the thick of heavy machine gun fire. Rather than retreating or calling upon the artillery to take out the nest, York single-handedly took out 25 Germans, dropping them one by one, and captured many more. This is one of the many tales of York's famed heroism, which were heralded as some of the most impressive battle stories in the history of modern warfare. Sergeant York contains the legendary soldier's war diaries.

Ralph was a self-made man who took the good examples set by his parents and grandparents, started with very little, cut his losses when necessary, endured the Great Depression without folding and turned a half section of Iowa farm land into a prosperous operation. In so doing he passed on his work ethic and sound judgement to his family and provided a good life for himself and his family. Serving his country when asked to do so may have saved him from getting mired in the Montana homesteading disaster.

This is a brief account of an ordinary soldier's experiences at Ypres during the early part of World War I. Reginald Davis was a young boy who worked at the publishers Hodder & Stoughton, but like many others of his generation left his workplace to join the army and fight at Ypres and the Somme. It was John Ernest Hodder Williams who, after Davis returned to the offices of Hodder & Stoughton as one of the war-wounded — minus fingers and with other injuries — decided to put Davis' experiences between two covers.

Sport has always been part of our wars – from the famous cricket match played at Gallipoli as a decoy for the evacuation of Australian troops, to the hero of Tobruk, Changi and the Burma– Thailand railway, Colonel Sir Ernest Edward ‘Weary’ Dunlop AC, who so respected his hard-won Wallabies jersey that he insisted on being buried in it, and to legendary Test cricketer Keith Miller, fighter pilot in World War II, who famously said, ‘Pressure is a Messerschmitt up your arse, playing cricket is not'.

This book tells the stories of the Muslims, Christians, Jews and others who made a courageous stand against the mass slaughter of Ottoman Armenians in 1915, the first modern genocide. Foreigners and Ottomans alike ran considerable risks to bear witness and rescue victims, sometimes sacrificing their lives. Diplomats, humanitarians, missionaries, lawyers and other visitors to the Empire stood up, including Tolstoy's daughter, Alexandra; Raphael Lemkin, the jurist who first established genocide as an international crime; and the polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen.

Sport has always been part of our wars – from the famous cricket match played at Gallipoli as a decoy for the evacuation of Australian troops, to the hero of Tobruk, Changi and the Burma– Thailand railway, Colonel Sir Ernest Edward ‘Weary’ Dunlop AC, who so respected his hard-won Wallabies jersey that he insisted on being buried in it, and to legendary Test cricketer Keith Miller, fighter pilot in World War II, who famously said, ‘Pressure is a Messerschmitt up your arse, playing cricket is not'.