by
Catanzaro, Francis Bernard, 1924-
Call Number
940.541273 21
Publication Date
2002
Summary
We began our advance toward the Mokmer Airstrip ... The road climbed a ridge 15 or 20 feet high and we found ourselves on a flat coral plateau sparsely covered by small trees and scrub growth ... As we moved westward along the road, two of our destroyers were sailing abreast of the lead elements of the advancing column. The first indication of trouble was the roar of heavy artillery shells sailing over our heads ... aimed at our destroyers ... Shortly after that our forward movement stopped, and we heard heavy firing from the head of the column ... As we waited, we began to hear heavy fire from the rear ... We were cut off and surrounded!In the enormous literature of the Second World War, there are surprisingly few accounts of fighting in the southwest Pacific, fewer still by common infantrymen. This memoir, written with a simple and direct honesty that is rare indeed, follows a foot soldier's career from basic training to mustering out. It takes the reader into the jungles and caves of New Guinea and the Philippines during the long campaign to win the war against Japan. From basic training at Camp Roberts through combat, occupation, and the long journey home, Francis Catanzaro's account tells of the excitement, misery, cruelty, and terror of combat, and of the uneasy boredom of jungle camp life. A member of the famed 41st Infantry Brigade, the 'Jungleers, ' Catanzaro saw combat at Hollandia, Biak, Zamboanga, and Mindanao. He was a part of the Japanese occupation force and writes with feeling about living among his former enemies and of the decision to drop the atom bomb. "With the 41st Division in the Southwest Pacific" is a powerful, gritty, and moving narrative of the life of a soldier during some of the most difficult fighting of World War II.
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0.0430
by
Dryden, Charles W. (Charles Walter)
Call Number
940.544973 20
Publication Date
1997
Summary
How does a black American prepare for a career in a profession traditionally closed to blacks? And how does he or she cope with the frustrations and dangers that subsequent experiences generate? A-Train is the story of one of the black Americans who, during World War II, graduated from Tuskegee Army Flying School and served as a pilot in the 99th Pursuit Squadron. Charles W. Dryden has prepared an honest, fast-paced, balanced, vividly written, and very personal account of what it was like to be a black soldier, and specifically a pilot, during World War II and the Korean War. Colonel Dryden's book commands our attention because it is a balanced account by an insightful man who enlisted in a segregated army and retired from an integrated air force. Dryden's account is poignant in illuminating the hurt inflicted by racism on even the most successful black people. As a member of that elite group of those young pilots who fought for their country overseas while being denied civil liberties at home, Dryden presents an eloquent memoir of the experiences he has shared and the changes he has witnessed.
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0.0400
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by
Dryden, Charles W. (Charles Walter)
Call Number
940.544973 20
Publication Date
1997
Summary
How does a black American prepare for a career in a profession traditionally closed to blacks? And how does he or she cope with the frustrations and dangers that subsequent experiences generate? A-Train is the story of one of the black Americans who, during World War II, graduated from Tuskegee Army Flying School and served as a pilot in the 99th Pursuit Squadron. Charles W. Dryden has prepared an honest, fast-paced, balanced, vividly written, and very personal account of what it was like to be a black soldier, and specifically a pilot, during World War II and the Korean War. Colonel Dryden's book commands our attention because it is a balanced account by an insightful man who enlisted in a segregated army and retired from an integrated air force. Dryden's account is poignant in illuminating the hurt inflicted by racism on even the most successful black people. As a member of that elite group of those young pilots who fought for their country overseas while being denied civil liberties at home, Dryden presents an eloquent memoir of the experiences he has shared and the changes he has witnessed.
Format:
Electronic Resources
Relevance:
0.0400
by
Soga, Keiho, 1873-1957.
Call Number
940.53089956073 22
Publication Date
2008
Format:
Electronic Resources
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0.0383
by
Beard, Richard, 1909-1997.
Call Number
940.548173 22
Publication Date
2002
Summary
The saga of China, Burma, India-World War II's forgotten theater-is as heroic as it is seldom told. CBI ground troops were charged with the Herculean task of carving a road from India to China through humid jungles where disease was as great a hazard as the Japanese, and pilots who "flew the Hump," the treacherous flight route over the Himalayas, braved violent monsoon rains, deadly wind shifts, and mountainsides that suddenly loomed from the clouds. Richard Beard, an Army psychologist assigned to the 142nd General Hospital in Calcutta, dealt daily with emotional trauma. While American and British soldiers hacked their way through dense tropical forests to build the supply route, Beard immersed himself in the internal jungles of those he treated. A pillar to the men he served, Beard was an astute listener and observer, pleased to be playing his part. But his own pillar was his wife, Reva, teaching school half a world away in Findlay, Ohio. In daily letters to Reva, he poured out not only his observations of life in India but also his own longing and passions, and the unfolding drama of war, in painfully exquisite detail tempered with tenderness and humor. Reva's return letters are filled with news of the home front and stories of her young students, but through them all courses a longing for Richard's safe return. In these letters the couple's devotion to each other in the face of separation and their willingness to see the war through to its end demonstrate once again the dedication of the World War II generation.
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0.0368
by
Egger, Bruce E., 1923-
Call Number
940.5421 20
Publication Date
1992
Format:
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0.0342
by
Gorrell, Henry T., 1911-1958.
Call Number
940.5421 22
Publication Date
2009
Summary
"This memoir by United Press war correspondent Henry T. Gorrell provides eyewitness accounts from the battlefields of the Spanish Civil War and the war fronts in Greece, the Balkans, the Middle East, and North Africa during World War II"--Provided by publisher.
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0.0322
by
Rea, Robert Right, 1922-
Call Number
940.544973 19
Publication Date
1987
Format:
Electronic Resources
Relevance:
0.0322
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