- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: Casemate Books; First Edition edition (19 April 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1935149059
- ISBN-13: 978-1935149057
- Product Dimensions: 23.1 x 16 x 2.5 cm
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- #20 in Books > History > Military History > World War II > Stalingrad
Two Soldiers, Two Lost Fronts
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Product Description
Product Description
On sand and snow for Hitler . . .returncharacterreturncharacterThis book is built around two recently discovered war diaries-one by a member of the 23rd Panzer Division which served under Manstein in Russia, and the other by a member of Rommel's AfrikaKorps. Together, along with detailed timelines and brief overviews, they comprise a fascinating "you are there" look at the German side of World War II. The stories are told primarily in the first person present tense, as events occurred, and without the benefit (or liability) of postwar reflection.returncharacterreturncharacterThe assignment of keeping the first diary was given to a soldier in the 2nd Battalion, 201st Panzer Regiment by a commanding officers and the author never saw fit to include his own name. This diary covers the period from April 1942 to March 1943, the momentous year when the tide of battle turned in the East. It first details the unit's combat in the great German victory at Kharkov, then the advance to the Caucasus, and finally the brutal winter of 1942-43. returncharacterreturncharacterThe second diary's author was a soldier named Rolf Krengel, and the diary was the original, handwritten copy. It starts with the beginning of the war and ends shortly after the occupation. Serving primarily in North Africa, Krengel recounts with keen insight and flashes of humor the day-to-day challenges of the AfrikaKorps. During one of the swirling battles in the desert, Krengel found himself sharing a tent with Rommel at a forward outpost. returncharacterreturncharacterNeither of the diarists was famous, nor of especially high rank, and no books have been written on their military careers. However, these are the brutally honest accounts written at the time by men of the Wehrmacht who participated in two of history's most crucial campaigns.returncharacterreturncharacterDON A. GREGORY, is a Professor at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. WILHELM R. GEHLEN joined the French Foreign Legion and served in Indochina and North Africa. The authors previously collaborated on Mr. Gehlen's childhood memoir, Jungvolk: The Story of a Boy Defending Hitler's Third Reich (Casemate 2008).returncharacterreturncharacter returncharacterreturncharacter REVIEWS returncharacterreturncharacter"Recommended." -Armor Modeling and Preservation Societyreturncharacterreturncharacter..".provides something that often gets lost in the analysis found in other books: just what it was like, day by day, living in a Wehrmacht unit...a very personal view of the war...quickly puts you in the shoes of the diarists..."Internet Modeler, 10/2009
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3 reviews
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Misleading and Padded with non-diary information
1 Oct 2010
Format:Hardcover
As stated there are two diaries from the Eastern and North African Fronts. No deception there but the Eastern Front title is actually a record of battalion level activity and not a personal diary of an individual soldier as the title suggests. Further, this diary is mostly a listing of daily objectives and advances with a bit of information regarding resulting experiences. I was not seeking a battle porn type of diary but the Eastern Front portion is a rather dry list of map objectives and topographic references taken and lost. There is one very poor map, a reproduction of the original, to track the advance of the unit. The text would have been enhanced by the use of clearer maps to correlate the unit actions with the diary. There are points of interests in that: 1.One sees the hectic pace of operations of a mechanized unit. 2.How small in quantity the actual point of the attack actually was..sometimes it was a company of infantry combined with a few armored vehicles which broke the enemy positions. 3.The relatively light casualties incurred by this unit,(A KIA/WIA list is included),considering the pace of operations.
This section is padded with an overall chronology of the Easter Front war which only adds a number of pages to the book and is of no use to the reader if he/she is conversant with the campaign. The battalion war diary aspect of the Eastern Front portion is unlikely to be of interest to the casual general reader.
The North Africa campaign version is the diary of an individual solder. It does provide an interesting view of a soldier who has the fortune to be both on the front lines but also spends considerable time in the rear echelon undergoing training, hospitalization and the reassignment here and there which is more the norm of soldiering than being a front-line soldier. However, the diary may be suspect regarding the entries as an entry regarding a witnessed naval engagement does not have any citation in naval records. Ref.p.178 and the battle resulting in 100POWS. Believe the diary may be in error regarding dates or ????
Again, there is padding regarding a chronology of the North African campaign which only adds pages to flesh out what otherwise would have been a very slim book.
Do not recommend for purchase and only as a borrowed volume from the library.
This section is padded with an overall chronology of the Easter Front war which only adds a number of pages to the book and is of no use to the reader if he/she is conversant with the campaign. The battalion war diary aspect of the Eastern Front portion is unlikely to be of interest to the casual general reader.
The North Africa campaign version is the diary of an individual solder. It does provide an interesting view of a soldier who has the fortune to be both on the front lines but also spends considerable time in the rear echelon undergoing training, hospitalization and the reassignment here and there which is more the norm of soldiering than being a front-line soldier. However, the diary may be suspect regarding the entries as an entry regarding a witnessed naval engagement does not have any citation in naval records. Ref.p.178 and the battle resulting in 100POWS. Believe the diary may be in error regarding dates or ????
Again, there is padding regarding a chronology of the North African campaign which only adds pages to flesh out what otherwise would have been a very slim book.
Do not recommend for purchase and only as a borrowed volume from the library.
8 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Great look at the German war experience.
15 July 2009
Format:Hardcover
"Two Soldiers, Two Lost Fronts" is a great look into the German experience during WWII. While there are countless memoirs written by German soldiers, they are often written years after the fact, and lack the immediacy and honesty of a dairy. "Two Soldiers" is in fact two recently discovered diaries, written by German soldiers on two very, very different fronts of the war. Together, they offer a total view of the German war experience.
3 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Great book.
3 Aug 2009
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Enjoyed reading book. Could be about any soldiers in any other army. Recommend it to others to read.
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