I love rivers. The flow of water gives a sense of timelessness, the reflection of light from the surface brightens the colours on the banks and the wider stretches make a feeling of space. I have messed about in boats all my life and I am happiest on inland waterways. What I enjoyed as recreation alongside a medical career has grown into a vocation in my retirement. The more people who know about our beautiful rivers, the better the chances that we can protect them from exploitation and carelessness.
Sweet Thames Run Softly is a classic of natural history literature.
It is reputed to have been read by British servicemen during World War II to remind them of home and peace. It is just as evocative today. It describes a journey down the River Thames in a punt, and it meanders in the same way as the river does.
The beauty lies in the text and the charm is in the author’s etchings. This is a book that I read time and again, whenever I want inspiration or solace.
In 1939, on the eve of the Second World War, Robert Gibbings launched his home-made punt on the River Thames and began a slow journey downstream, armed with a sketchpad and a microscope. From the river's source at the edge of the Cotswold Hills to the bustle of London's docks, Sweet Thames Run Softly is a charming, often eccentric, account of an artist-naturalist adrift in English waters. First published as the Battle of Britain raged overhead, this gentle boating tale was an antidote to the anxieties of wartime and became an immediate best-seller. Our new edition includes the original engravings…
It all started in the cinema of a seaside town in 1970 when, as a young boy, I sat open-mouthed in front of a sparkling Technicolour movie. Before my eyes, the very foundations of British life were defended from tyranny by dashing pilots riding in sleek, powerful fighter planes. The film, The Battle of Britain, instilled a life-long fascination with the events of 1940. Years later I discovered one of The Few had grown up in my hometown and was buried in our local graveyard. I started to research the life and times of this man and his story became the foundations of my first novel, Bluebirds.
Art Donahue is the inspiration for my character, Gerry Donaldson, in my book, and Tally-Ho! is the book he wrote about his life while the Battle of Britain was still raging around him. Art was one of many Americans who volunteered at the risk of losing US citizenship, but as a fully qualified flying instructor he jumped the queue and very quickly found himself in a Spitfire cockpit flying into hostile skies with 64 Squadron. Donahue went on to fight in other theatres and write further on his experiences. Sadly, he did not survive the war, but this unique and vibrant document serves as a memorial and a celebration of a true American pioneer.
Arthur "Art" Donahue was an American who volunteered to join the Royal Air Force in the early days of the Second World War. Flying a Spitfire in the Battle of Britain, he became the first American fighter pilot to fly in action in the Second World War, as well as the first American pilot to be shot down in combat during that war.
Tally Ho! Yankee in a Spitfire is Art Donahue's vivid memoir of his time as a Spitfire pilot during the Battle of Britain and the blitz. It reveals a man who was both brave and reflective. The…
Dr. Jeremy Kepner is head and founder of the MIT Lincoln Laboratory Supercomputing Center (LLSC), and also a Founder of the MIT-Air Force AI Accelerator. Lincoln Laboratory is a 4000-person National Laboratory whose mission is to create defensive technologies to protect our Nation and the freedoms enshrined in the Constitution of the United States. Dr. Kepner is one of five Lincoln Laboratory Fellows, a position that "recognizes the Laboratory's strongest technical talent for outstanding contributions to Laboratory programs over many years." Dr. Kepner is recognized as one of nine MIT Fellows of the Society of Industrial Applied Mathematics (SIAM), for "contributions to interactive parallel computing, matrix-based graph algorithms, green supercomputing, and big data."
A British term of endearment for a person engaged in scientific or technical research, Boffins have played a critical role in the development of our modern society. This book is the autobiography of the first Boffin who was essential in developing the radar system that won the Battle of Britain. Although nearly a century has passed, the “can-do” technical spirit of Boffins, Geeks, Nerds, and Hackers remains at the core of modern innovation.
An account of the history of radar, which traces its evolution and vital military role, particularly with regard to Britain's aerial victories in World War II.
Like First Light, the classic Battle of Britain memoir by Geoffrey Wellum, And Some Fell on Stony Ground provides a vivid and sometimes terrifying portrait of life as an RAF pilot during World War II.
Unlike Wellum, however, the author of this short, fictionalised memoir wasn’t a fighter pilot. He was, instead, a member of Bomber Command, whose crews endured the nightmare of recurrent nocturnal flights over Nazi Germany, where they dodged searchlights, anti-aircraft fire, and lurking German night fighters.
Read Leslie Mann’s posthumously published book, and you’ll feel you were there with him.
A unique glimpse of the deadliest profession of the Second World War.
In June 1941, Flight Sergeant Leslie Mann, a tail gunner in a British bomber, was shot down over Du?sseldorf and taken into captivity. After the war, wanting to record the experiences of the RAF's 'Bomber Boys', he gave voice to his private thoughts and feelings in a short novella, uncovered only after his death.
Visceral, shocking and unglamorous, this compelling story transmits as rarely before the horrors of aerial warfare, the corrosive effects of fear, and the psychological torment of the young men involved. The sights, sounds, smells,…
I'm a retired diplomat and award-winning novelist with a PhD in history. I became fascinated by the Battle of Britain because of a visit to RAF Tangmere, a Battle of Britain airfield, when I was still a girl; that encounter captured my imagination for a lifetime. I read every book I could find, I spent hours in the Imperial War Museum gazing (and touching) the Spitfire. I purchased the memoirs of pilots, watched films, and interviews. I started writing a Battle of Britain novel while still at university, but it was 30 years before I released a book. Within weeks one of the few surviving aces, Wing Commander Bob Doe, wrote me that I had got it “smack on the way it was for us fighter pilots.” There can be no higher compliment to an author of historical fiction.
Nine Lives is an autobiography by one of the RAF aces of the Battle of Britain and, as such, is one of a handful of authentic accounts about the Battle told by a participant. (I actually recommend all these first-hand accounts, but since I’m limited to five titles altogether, I confine myself to two.) Deere’s account stands out for its brutal honesty and his willingness to analyze his behavior and reactions to events. It is not a literary masterpiece, but its sincerity is all the greater. Deere was a New Zealander and therefore this book highlights the often-forgotten contribution of Britain’s Commonwealth to the Battle of Britain.
This is the autobiography of Alan Deere, New Zealand’s most famous RAF pilot who saw action from the Munich Crisis to the invasion of France in 1944.
Al Deere experienced the drama of the early days of the Battle of Britain while serving with Spitfire squadrons based at Hornchurch and Manston, and his compelling story tells of the successes and frustrations of those critical weeks.
Deere’s nine lives are the accounts of his fantastic luck in escaping from seemingly impossible situations. During the Battle of Britain he parachuted from stricken aircraft on three occasions and once was blown up by…
I am a journalist and writer fascinated by the fact that every family has a story to tell, and secrets to keep, passed down the years. As a child, I was intrigued by the adventures of my great-aunts and great-uncles during World War Two; ordinary people thrown into conflict—that older, no-nonsense generation no longer with us. My first novel, A Season of Leaves, is based on my great-auntie’s incredible experiences during and after the war. I listened to her account, researched meticulously, and wove fact into fiction. All my novels have a touch of romance, family conflict, and the real trauma of war visited upon people’s doorsteps.
The Kent countryside has a strong enough presence in this book to become a character in its own right, when the exquisite beauty of an English summer contrasts with the lethal Battle of Britain dog fights leaving vapour trails in the sky overhead. As a local young woman befriends a group of brave, doomed fighter pilots, the story captures the desperation and the absurdities of conflict, and the tender nature of transient and yet hopeful love. The author was commissioned by the RAF to write about the war, and I can tell from his pinpoint, unflinching detail of that unsettling time, that he was a first-hand eyewitness.
Born in London at the height of the Blitz I am a retired NHS Director with a lifelong interest in military aviation. My first journal article, on the Suez Campaign, was published in 1965 since when I have written some 90 articles and eight books and have contributed chapters to several more. Most of my books are triggered by a challenge and I always try to cover ground hitherto ignored so that my books become a unique reference. Works in progress include a history of the RAF involvement in Greece from 1940 to 1950 and the work of the RAF between the wars. I live in Sherborne, Dorset, England.
Greg Baughen had written over a million words on the evolving role and functions of the Royal Air Force from its foundation in 1918 to the post-second world war period, then decided to find a publisher!
The work is thus published in a number of volumes this being the fourth. Never frightened to challenge conventional wisdom the author deals with the RAF and British Government’s preoccupation with strategic bombing at the cost of developing effective tactical air power. As he notes German occupation of much of Europe was accomplished on the ground with effective air support.
Long before the start of the Second World War it had been believed that strategic bombing would be the deciding factor in any future conflict. Then Hitler launched the Blitzkrieg upon France and the Low Countries in 1940, and the much-vaunted French Army and the British Expeditionary Force were swept away in just six weeks.
This new form of warfare shook the Air Ministry, but the expected invasion never came and the Battle of Britain was fought in the air. It seemed that air forces operating independently could determine the course of the war. An Army scarcely seemed necessary for…
I'm a retired diplomat and award-winning novelist with a PhD in history. I became fascinated by the Battle of Britain because of a visit to RAF Tangmere, a Battle of Britain airfield, when I was still a girl; that encounter captured my imagination for a lifetime. I read every book I could find, I spent hours in the Imperial War Museum gazing (and touching) the Spitfire. I purchased the memoirs of pilots, watched films, and interviews. I started writing a Battle of Britain novel while still at university, but it was 30 years before I released a book. Within weeks one of the few surviving aces, Wing Commander Bob Doe, wrote me that I had got it “smack on the way it was for us fighter pilots.” There can be no higher compliment to an author of historical fiction.
Bungay packs more useful information about the Battle of Britain into this outstanding work than dozens of other books on the same topic put together. He provides the Order of Battle for both the RAF and Luftwaffe, records the squadron rotations, the attacks by date and target, the losses of aircraft and crews, and much more. No other book is as precise about what happened to both the RAF and the Luftwaffe not just stage by stage, but day by day. Yet this book also provides lucid analysis of events and assessments of key personalities. While writing about the Battle, I referred to this book so often it is now falling apart!
Stephen Bungay' s magisterial history is acclaimed as the account of the Battle of Britain.
Unrivalled for its synthesis of all previous historical accounts, for the quality of its strategic analysis and its truly compulsive narrative, this is a book ultimately distinguished by its conclusions - that it was the British in the Battle who displayed all the virtues of efficiency, organisation and even ruthlessness we habitually attribute to the Germans, and they who fell short in their amateurism, ill-preparedness, poor engineering and even in their old-fashioned notions of gallantry.
An engrossing read for the military scholar and the general…
This book is a history of the Battle of Britain, but one focusing more on the common folk and non-aviation personnel that held England together, upright, and unconquered during the German onslaught that followed the collapse of France. Meticulously researched, painstakingly analyzed, and somewhat shocking in its conclusions.
Lord, what an eye-opener! This book shows just how deep into totalitarianism a democracy can sink, just how fascistic a democracy can become overnight, and just how riven with class strife and unfair treatment the UK was throughout the battle.
Here are a few examples of the things that were happening during that time.
1) Given the shortage of coal miners and an unwillingness to pay the miners a fair wage, something on the order of twenty thousand young men were effectively enslaved, not conscripted to fight, but enslaved, to mine coal.
2) The British people were lied to consistently and continuously…
Immortalized in Churchill's often quoted assertion that never before "was so much owed by so many to so few," the top-down narrative of the Battle of Britain has been firmly established in British legend: Britain was saved from German invasion by the gallant band of Fighter Command Pilots in their Spitfires and Hurricanes, and the public owed them their freedom. Richard North's radical re-evaluation of the Battle of Britain dismantles this mythical retelling of events. Taking a wider perspective than the much-discussed air war, North takes a fresh look at the conflict as a whole to show that the civilian…
It all started in the cinema of a seaside town in 1970 when, as a young boy, I sat open-mouthed in front of a sparkling Technicolour movie. Before my eyes, the very foundations of British life were defended from tyranny by dashing pilots riding in sleek, powerful fighter planes. The film, The Battle of Britain, instilled a life-long fascination with the events of 1940. Years later I discovered one of The Few had grown up in my hometown and was buried in our local graveyard. I started to research the life and times of this man and his story became the foundations of my first novel, Bluebirds.
It might be a venerable classic, but it’s still in print for a very good reason. Collier focusses on the six weeks of 1940’s English summer when Great Britain was in extreme peril of defeat and subjugation. He relates the history of this pivotal moment using a rich tapestry of personal accounts and eye-witness testimonies of the real people who were involved in this epic struggle. We hear the voices of pilots fighting for their lives in the air, their crews grafting on the ground to keep the aircraft serviceable and the civilians who daily watched the frenetic dogfights that swirled through the sky above their towns and villages, duels to the death upon which the very fate of the nation depended.
This is the gripping story of the Battle of Britain; of some of the most fateful weeks in history.
Drawing on eyewitness accounts from both the RAF and the Luftwaffe, this is a compelling story of history in the making through an intensely fought battle, taking the reader into the heart of the action as told by those who fought and experienced it.
The book not only captures the often savage reality of the air battles over the Channel and southern England, but it also traces the true course of the Battle of Britain as it unfolded between August 6th…
