Index, bibliography, notes, ill (maps), p.816.In the Trenches of Hell On 19 July 1916, 7000 Australian soldiers - in the first major action of the AIF on the Western Front - attacked entrenched German positions at Fromelles in northern France. By the next day, there were over 5500 casualties, including nearly 2000 dead - a bloodbath that the Australian War Memorial describes as 'the worst 24 hours in Australia's entire history. Just days later, three Australian Divisions attacked German positions at nearby Pozi�res, and over the next six weeks they suffered another 23,000 casualties. Of that bitter battle, the great Australian war correspondent Charles Bean would write, 'The field of Pozi�res is more consecrated by Australian fighting and more hallowed by Australian blood than any field which has ever existed . . .' Yet the sad truth is that, nearly a century on from those battles, Australians know only a fraction of what occurred. This book brings the battles back to life and puts the reader in the moment, illustrating both the heroism displayed and the insanity of the British plan. With his extraordinary vigour and commitment to research, Peter FitzSimons shows why this is a story about which all Australians can be proud. And angry.world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, world war 1914-1918 - australian participation - fromelles and pozieres

Index, bibliography, notes, ill (maps), p.565.non-fictionPasschendaele epitomises everything that was most terrible about the Western Front. The photographs never sleep of this four-month battle, fought from July to November 1917, the worst year of the war- blackened tree stumps rising out of a field of mud, corpses of men and horses drowned in shell holes, terrified soldiers huddled in trenches awaiting the whistle. The intervening century, the most violent in human history, has not disarmed these pictures of their power to shock. At the very least they ask us, on the 100th anniversary of the battle, to see and to try to understand what happened here. Yes, we commemorate the event. Yes, we adorn our breasts with poppies. But have we seen? Have we understood? Have we dared to reason why? What happened at Passchendaele was the expression of the 'wearing-down war', the war of pure attrition at its most spectacular and ferocious. Paul Ham's Passchendaele- Requiem for Doomed Youth shows how ordinary men on both sides endured this constant state of siege, with a very real awareness that they were being gradually, deliberately, wiped out. Yet the men never broke- they went over the top, when ordered, again and again and again. And if they fell dead or wounded, they were casualties in the 'normal wastage', as the commanders described them, of attritional war. Only the soldier's friends at the front knew him as a man, with thoughts and feelings. His family back home knew him as a son, husband or brother, before he had enlisted. By the end of 1917 he was a different creature- his experiences on the Western Front were simply beyond their powers of comprehension. The book tells the story of ordinary men in the grip of a political and military power struggle that determined their fate and has foreshadowed the destiny of the world for a century. Passchendaele lays down a powerful challenge to the idea of war as an inevitable expression of the human will, and examines the culpability of governments and military commanders in a catastrophe that destroyed the best part of a generation. Collapse summary world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, france - campaigns - passchaendaele

Ill (maps), p.326non-fictionOver The Top is based on Harry Hartnett's diaries, which his family gave to Chris Byrett, a lawyer and WWI buff. It details the battles, the long marches and the recoveries with many amusing anecdotes which kept the men smiling and eased the tiredeness of the daily grind.world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front - personal recollections, henry george hartnett

Index, bibliography, ill (maps), p.620.non-fictionUsing hundreds of brutally honest and extraordinary eyewitness accounts of the diggers in the muddy and bloody trenches, Western Front Diaries reproduces their private diaries, letters and postcards to tell of their heart-rending experiences, battle by bloody battle. Includes a gallery of previously unpublished photographs.world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, world war 1914-1918 - personal recollections

Index, bibliography, ill (maps), p.248.non-fictionThis abridged edition of the bestselling 'Fromelles' includes the recent discovery of the largest mass war grave since the Second World War, the recovery of the missing Diggers' remains and the names of those who have been identified, as well as the opening of the new Fromelles (Pheasant Wood) Military Cemetery in 2010.world war 1914 - 1918 - campaigns - western front - fromelles, war graves - france

Notes, p.337.non-fictionIn that hour was born in me a fear that lasted throughout the whole winter. It was the dread of dying in the mud, going down in that stinking morass and though dead being conscious throughout the ages. Waves of fear at times threatened to overwhelm me ... a little weakness, a little slackening of control at times and I might have gone over the borderline. In the light of the sun, on firm ground, I could laugh at fate. But where the churned mud half hid and half revealed bodies, where dead hands reached out of the morass, seeming to implore aid - there I had to hold tightworld war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, george deane mitchell - personal recollections

Ill p.63.non-fiction The Albatros family of fighters were amongst the most effective aircraft employed by the German Air Service for much of World war 1. This volume provides a Jasta by Jasta breakdown of the German Albatros aces on the western front.world war 1914-1918 - aerial operations - germany, fighter pilots - germany

Index, notes, ill, maps, p.222.non-fictionIt would be hard to find anyone better qualified the "Sally Home of the "11th Hussars to tell the story of the Cavalry on the Western front during the First World War.soldiers - great britain - biography, world war 1914-1918 - western front - cavalry corps

Index, bibliography, ill, maps, p.187.non-fictionThe biography of Capt George Ingram VC, MM, the last Australian VC recipient of the First World War. From country childhood in Bagshot and Seville to a gunner with the Australian Garrison Artillery and the Tropical Force's Matupi Battery. He then served with the 24th Battalion AIF on the Western Front where he was awarded the Military Medal and the Victoria Cross. After the war he became a soldier settler, an original Shrine Guard and during World War Two he served with the Royal Australian Engineers. Throughout his life he carried the physical and mental scars of his service in the war.soldiers - victoria - biography, george ingram - biography

Bibliography, notes, ill, maps, p.245.non-fictionRetrace Australia's role in the First World War from the trenches of Somme Mud to the wider war on the Western Front. Imagine this. You are a country boy and just eighteen. The war has been raging for two years and because of your age, you have not been eligible for enlistment. Your mates, older by a few months are joining up and disappearing to the great adventure across the world in Europe. And there is forever talk of the need for reinforcements, for men like you to join up and support the Empire, Australia and your mates in the line. Such was the case for Edward Francis Lynch, a typical country boy from Perthville, near Bathurst. When war was declared in early August 1914, he was just sixteen and still at school, but like a generation of young males in Australia, there was something to prove and a need to be there. Will Davies, editor of the bestselling Somme Mud, meticulously tracked Lynch and his battalion's travels; their long route marches to flea ridden billets, into the frontline at such places as Messines, Dernancourt, Stormy Trench and Villers Bretonneux, to rest areas behind the lines and finally, on the great push to the final victory after August 1918. In words and pictures Davies fills in the gaps in Private Lynch's story and through the movements of the other battalions of the AIF provides impact and context to their plight and achievements. Looking at these battlefields today, the pilgrims who visit and those who attend to the land we come to understand how the spirit of Australia developed and of our enduring role in world politics.world war 1914-1918 - personal narratives - australia, western front 1914-1918 - australian participation

Index, bibliography, notes, maps, p.524.non-fictionIn the middle of the 20th century the Nazi and Soviet regimes starved, shot and gassed, 14 million people in the zone of death between Berlin and Moscow ... today's Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, western Russia and the eastern Baltic coasteastern europe - history - twentieth century, massacres - eastern europe - twentieth century

Index, bibliography, maps, p.766.non-fictionA broad summary of the battles on both the Western and Eastern fronts for the liberation of Europe in 1944-1945world war 1939-1945 - campaigns france, world war 1939-1945 - campaigns - eastern europe

Ill, p.244.non-fictionDon Charlwood was born in Melbourne in 1915. Accepted as a RAF navigator in 1940, he was posted to 103 Squadron at Elsham Wolds in the winter of 1942. There he crewed up with a pilot from Western Australia and a British crew to fly a Lancaster bomber. In No Moon Tonight he gives a profound insight into the inner lives of the men of Bomber Command and their hopes and fears in the face of mounting losses. He depicts the appalling human cost of the air war in an account which has been favorably compared to other enduring memoirs of the 1st World War, namely Sassoon's Memoirs of an Infantry Officer and Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front. A memorable first hand account of the air war over Germany.world war 1939-1945 - aerial operations - britain, world war 1939-1945 - personal narratives - australia

Index, bibliography, maps, p.96.non-fictionThe North African campaign has been studied in detail over the years but much of the study has been dedicated to the battles between the British Eighth Army and Rommel's Afrika Korps. There has been little serious study of Wavell's campaign against Italian forces in 1940-41, nor of the role played by the Australian Sixth Division.world war 1939 – 1945 – campaigns – north africa, libya - campaigns - 1940-1941

Bibliography, index, ill (b/w plates) ( maps), pg.298.non-fictionThe authors delve into the secret history of Saddam's war. Their revelations are crucial to understanding the Gulf crisis and future conduct of foreign policy in the Middle Eastmiddle east - foreign policy, iraq - history, gulf war 1991

p.253.fictionA fictional account of aerial warfare on the Western front in the first world warworld war 1914-1918 - aerial operations - fiction, aerial warfare - fiction

index, bib, ill (plates), maps, ports, p.863.non-fictionLes Carlyon's The Great War is the epic story of the fighting men who wove themselves into legend as part of the largest tragedy in Australian history - 179,000 dead and wounded - leaving a nation to mourn its fallen heroes in 'one long national funeral' into the 1930s and, now again, a century later. As he did with the best-seller Gallipoli, Carlyon leads the reader behind the lines, across the western front and other theatres of battle, and deep into the minds of the men who are witnesses to war. Having walked the fields of France, Belgium and Turkey on his quest for a truth beyond the myth, Carlyon weaves us a mesmerising narrative that shifts seamlessly from the hatching of grand strategies in the political salons of London and St Petersburg to the muddy, bloody trenches of Pozieres and Passchendaele where ordinary soldiers descended into a maelstrom unimaginable. australian army - history, world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front

bibliography, index, notes, ill, p.152non-fictionTen years after the end of World War I, the Sydney Sun reported that an unknown ANZAC still lay in a Sydney psychiatric hospital. David Hastings follows this one unknown ANZAC, George McQuay, from rural New Zealand through Gallipoli and the Western Front, through desertions and hospitals, and finally home to New Zealandworld war 1914-1918 - biography, mcquay george

index, ill, maps, p.343.non-fictionThe the compelling story of Lieutenant Joseph "Darkie" Maxwell DCM, MC and Bar, VC – the second highest decorated Australian soldier of the First World War."A flash blinds me... We are lost in a chaos of flying mud... Smoke, filth,confusion, racket! I spit and splutter and swear... Oh Christ! I think I'm flamin' well dead." This is the compelling story of Lieutenant Joseph "Darkie" Maxwell DCM, MC and Bar, VC – the second highest decorated Australian soldier of the First World War. Meticulously researched by historian John Ramsland, Maxwell's colourful life is traced from his childhood on the Hunter coalfields until his death at age 71 in a soldier's settlement home in Matraville Sydney. Maxwell was a vivid storyteller who wrote Hells Bells and Mademoiselles, telling of his experiences in the war. In telling Maxwell's story, Ramsland has uncovered many forgotten documents to piece together an extraordinary life of an extraordinary man.wold war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, joseph maxwell - biography

index. bibliography, ill, maps, p.234.non-fictionNigel Jones retells the political and military story of World War I, records the grim reality of living in the trenches and in a pictorial record, shows what the Western Front looks like nowadays. This edition has a new introduction and is the essential guide for all visitors to the Western Front. world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - western front, world war 1914-1918 - monuments

index, ill, maps, p.224.non-fictionThe Western Front in World War I was the scene of devastating trench warfare and astonishing human loss: nearly 750,000 soldiers perished in the battles fought in France and Belgium from 1914 to 1918. In The Western Front, renowned historian Richard Holmes traces the path those soldiers took, and presents the political, military, and human dilemmas of a bitter and bloody war.world war 1914-1918 - western front - history, world war 1914-1918 - military history

Index,notes, p274.non-fictionhe presence of Osama bin Laden and his terrorist bases in Afghanistan has brought the Taliban into sharp focus as the most radical and extreme Islamist movement in the world today. Little is known about the Taliban because of the deep secrecy that surrounds the organization, its leaders and aims." "The Taliban has become a major player in the new 'Great Game' - harking back to the late-nineteenth-century British and Russian confrontation in the region - involving competition between Western oil companies, manipulation from Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran, and covert operations by the CIA. Taliban sheds new light on a shadowy movement which poses a real threat to world peace.afghanistan - politics and government, afghanistan - islam and politics

Index, notes, p.250.An informed critical assessment of historical and contemporary events in Vietnam and their implications particularly for Australian foreign policy. vietnam war 1961-1975 – history, vietnam war 1961-1975 – australian involvement

Index, bibliography, notes, ill, maps, p.722.non-fictionVietnam became the Western world's most divisive modern conflict, precipitating a battlefield humiliation for France in 1954, then a vastly greater one for the United States in 1975. Max Hastings has spent the past three years interviewing scores of participants on both sides, as well as researching a multitude of American and Vietnamese documents and memoirs, to create an epic narrative of an epic struggle. He portrays the set pieces of Dienbienphu, the Tet offensive, the air blitz of North Vietnam, and less familiar battles such as the bloodbath at Daido, where a US Marine battalion was almost wiped out, together with extraordinary recollections of Ho Chi Minh's warriors. Here are the vivid realities of strife amid jungle and paddies that killed 2 million people. Many writers treat the war as a US tragedy, yet Hastings sees it as overwhelmingly that of the Vietnamese people, of whom forty died for every American. While all the world has seen the image of a screaming, naked girl seared by napalm, it forgets countless eviscerations, beheadings and murders carried out by the communists. The people of both former Vietnams paid a bitter price for the Northerners' victory in privation and oppression. Here is testimony from Vietcong guerrillas, Southern paratroopers, Saigon bargirls and Hanoi students alongside that of infantrymen from South Dakota, Marines from North Carolina, Huey pilots from Arkansas.vietnam war 1961-1975 – history, vietnam war 1961-1975 – personal recollections

Index, bibliography, notes, ill, maps, p.734.non-fictionMartin Windrow's book is an account of the battle of Dien Bien Phu, the first defeat of modern Western forces by a guerilla army.vietnam war 1945-1975 – french involvement, battle of dien bien phu

Index, bibliography, ill, maps, p.358.non-fictionIn the line of fire' explores the nature of combat from the perspective of the men doing the actual fighting. From the heights of Gallipoli to the trenches of the Western Front, from the deserts of North Africa to the jungle POW camps of the Thai-Burma Railway, from the savage cold of a Korean winter to the steamy heat of Vietnam this book details what it's really like to be in the line of fire. Also it reveals the experiences of Australian women at war and the combat photographers.military participation - australia, sustralia - history - military

Index, ill, maps, p.160.non-fictionThe story of how western forces used the "brown waterways" to move troops and equipmentvietnam war 1961-1975 - history, vietnam war 1961-1975 - naval operations

p.224.non-fictionA memoir by a WWI fighter pilot, with the adventurous spirit of 'War horse' and the charm of 'The little prince'. A singular, lyrical book, 'Sagittarius rising' is at once an exuberant memoir from the Lost Generation and a riveting tale of the early days of flight during World War I. Cecil Lewis lied his way into the British Army's Royal Flying Corps at age sixteen and was ordered to a squadron on the Western Front only a year later. At the time, flying was so new that designers hadn't even decided on basic mechanics such as how many wings a plane should have. Despite this, Lewis mastered virtually every kind of single-engine plane in the RFC, going on to excel in active duty and even to dogfight the Red Baron--and live to tell the tale. Full of infectious charm and written with the prose and pacing of a novel, 'Sagittarius rising' beautifully recounts Lewis's harrowing exploits in the sky alongside his wild times of partying and chasing girls while on leave in London. His coming-of-age story is unlike any other WWI memoir you've read before. world war 1914-1918 - aerial operations - britain, cecil lewis - memoir

Index, bib, ill, maps, p.163.non-fictionAustralian troops fighting in France between 1916 and 1917world war 1914-1918 - australian involvement, world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - france

Index, bib, ill, maps, p.163.non-fictionAustralian troops fighting in France between 1917 and 1918world war 1914-1918 - australian involvement, world war 1914-1918 - campaigns - france