Badly wounded at the battle of Arnhem, and then spirited from his hospital bed by the Dutch Resistance, Brigadier John Hackett spent the winter of 1944 in Nazi-occupied Holland, hidden by a Dutch family, at great risk to their own lives, in a house a stone's throw from a German military police billet. After four months in hiding, Hackett was at last well enough to strap a battered suitcase to an ancient bicycle and set out on a high adventure which would, he hoped, lead him to freedom.

An Aussie soldier's diary of the first World War - by turns compelling, illuminating, funny, touching and sad - and absolutely unputdownable.Archie Albert Barwick was an enthusiastic young 24 year old when he joined the First AIF in late August 1914 - his service number was 914. When he learnt that he'd been accepted into the army, he was so happy he turned two somersaults for pure joy. this is his diary, that he kept throughout the war - from Cairo to Gallipoli, from Marseilles thr...

The epic and brutal WWI battle is vividly recounted through the words and photos of the soldiers who lived through it.One of the most famous battles of the Great War, the offensive on the Somme took place in 1916, from July and November. It was there that Kitcheners famous Pals Battalions were first sent into action en masse. It was a battlefield where many of the dreams and aspirations of a nation, hopeful of victory, were agonizingly dashed.Because of its l...

2016 is the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme'There was hardly a household in the land', writes Lyn Macdonald, 'there was no trade, occupation, profession or community, which was not represented in the thousands of innocent enthusiasts who made up the ranks of Kitchener's Army before the Battle of the Somme...'The year 1916 was one of the great turning-points in British history: as the youthful hopes of a generation were crushed in a desperate st...

THE INSPIRATION BEHIND THE BBC DRAMA THE CRIMSON FIELD'On the face of it,' writes Lyn Macdonald, 'no one could have been less equipped for the job than these gently nurtured girls who walked straight out of Edwardian drawing rooms into the manifest horrors of the First World War ...'Yet the volunteer nurses rose magnificently to the occasion. In leaking tents and draughty huts they fought another war, a war against agony and death, as men lay suffe...

The legendary British Army officer recounts his experiences in the Boer War and both World Wars in this memoir with a foreword by Winston Churchill.Lieutenant General Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart had one of the most extraordinary military careers in the history of the British Army. His gallantry in combat won him a Victoria Cross and a Distinguished Service Order, as well as an eyepatch and an empty sleeve. His autobiography is one of the most remarkable of military m...

Charles Upham was the great New Zealand war hero. He was one of the few people in history to have won the Victoria Cross twice, setting new standards of personal heroism during World War II. A quietly spoken sheep farmer back home in Canterbury, at the front in Crete and North Africa he destroyed enemy machinegun posts single-handed and led a frontal assault on enemy guns. His exploits and individual heroism are the stuff of Kiwi legend. He then spent the rest of the war in prisoner-of-war...

November 2008 sees the 90th anniversary of the end of the Great War, 'the war to end all wars' that still haunts and fascinates in equal measure. Richard van Emden's new book tells that story as never before through the words and pictures of the men who were there. The Soldier's War includes incredible never-published-before letters and photographs to reveal the true stories of a lost generation.The Soldier's War traces the war chronologically, taking stories from...

The author of Saturday at M.I.9 and former British soldier recounts his escape from Nazi captivity during World War II in this military memoir.Wounded and captured at Calais in May 1940, Second Lieutenant Airey Neave wasted little time before attempting to escape. Always a thorn in his captors' sides, he earned his place in the "escape-proof" Colditz Castle. Undeterred, he had the distinction of being the first British officer to make a "home run," via Swit...

In what is one of the finest autobiographies to come out of the First World War, the distinguished poet Edmund Blunden records his experiences as an infantry subaltern in France and Flanders. Blunden took part in the disastrous battles of the Somme, Ypres and Passchendaele, describing the latter as 'murder, not only to the troops, but to their singing faiths and hopes'. In his compassionate yet unsentimental prose, he tells of the heroism and despair found among the officers. Blunden's poe...

It is 1915 and the Great War has been raging for a year, when Edward Rowbotham, a coal miner from the Midlands, volunteers for Kitchener's Army. Drafted into the newly-formed Machine Gun Corps, he is sent to fight in places whose names will forever be associated with mud and blood and sacrifice: Ypres, the Somme, and Passchendaele. He is one of the 'lucky' ones, winning the Military Medal for bravery and surviving more than two-and-a-half years of the terrible slaughter th...

This is Bill Cull's unforgettable story of his experiences in WW1: he fought at Gallipoli and on the Western Front where he was captured by the Germans and was a POW until the end of the war.Captain William Cull fought the First World War from both sides of the wire. As a young infantry officer on the Allied side of the Western Front, Cull frequently led patrols out into No Man's Land and raids on the German trenches. He took part in bitter fighting on the Somme at Pozi res, and in...