Military History Encyclopedia on the Web

Memories of The Royal Electrical Mechanical Engineers WWII, Sylvester Till. A short but very readable memoir of one of the millions of soldiers whose lives were disrupted by the Second World War. Till spent most of his war in Iraq, serving with one of the essential support units that kept the army working. As a result we see more of the daily life of the soldier overseas. [see more]

Partners in Command, Mark Perry. This is a dual biography of George Marshall and Dwight Eisenhower, the two most important American army officers of the Second World War. Perry looks at the way their two careers intertwined and the part they played in creating and maintaining an effective coalition to fight the war. [see more]

Fateful Choices, Ian Kershaw. A fascinating book that looks at ten of the most important turning points during the Second World War, starting with the British decision to stay in the war in 1940 and ending with the German decisions to declare war on the United States and to turn the persecution of the Jews into the Final Solution. Kershaw has managed to find a new approach to the history of the Second World War, and gives us an interesting insight into the systems of government in the main combatant nations of the Second World War [see more]

Beyond Peleliu, Peter Baird. A darkly compelling novel that looks at the impact war can have on the lives of everybody who comes into contact with it, for generations after the fighting has ended. Peleliu is the battle chosen here, because the author's father served in that battle, but the novel's message about the horrors of war and the shadows they cast is equally valid for any modern war [see more]

Rehearsals - The German army in Belgium, August 1914, Jeff Lipkes. This is a well researched, harrowing and utterly convincing examination of the atrocities committed by the German army as it invaded neutral Belgium in August 1914. Too often dismissed as fantasy or propaganda, this work helps redress the balance, looking at the mass executions of civilians that followed the invasion. [see more]

Liberation or Catastrophe, Michael Howard. A series of eighteen essays examining the military history of the twentieth century, looking at the causes of the First and Second World Wars, the Cold War, the place of Europe in the post-Cold War world and the correct response to the threat from terror. A thought provoking series of essays from a distinguished historian. [see more]

Survivors: British Merchant Seamen in the Second World War, G. H. and R. Bennett. This fascinating book looks at the fate of those Merchant Seamen whose ships were sunk by enemy action during the Second World War. It follows the survivors of those sinkings from the moment their ship was first hit to their final rescue. Each stage of the process is illustrated in the survivor's own words [see more]

Churchill's Crusade: The British Invasion of Russia 1918-1920, Clifford Kinvig. A fascinating look at a little known British campaign, the intervention in Russian in 1918-1920 that began as an attempt to reopen the Eastern Front of the First World War and turned into an attack on the Bolshevik regime. Although the British intervention was part of a wider international campaign, Britain, and Churchill in particular, played a key role in prolonging the campaign. [see more]

The Old Lie - The Great War and the Public School Ethos, Peter Parker. This book looks at the Public School ethos, and how it distorted the views of the generation that greeted the war with such enthusiasm in 1914. Parker does this by looking at the literature produced about Public Schools and by their old boys. [see more]

Wellington: A Military Life, Gordon Corrigan. This in an excellent military biography of the Duke of Wellington. It focuses very heavily on Wellington the general, allows Corrigan to describe the wider campaigns in some detail, giving a good idea not only of what Wellington did, but also why he did it. [see more]

Scorpion Down, Ed Offley. An interesting book that provides an alternative theory about the sinking of USS Scorpion, an American submarine lost in 1968. Offley suggests that the submarine was actually sunk by the Soviets in revenge for the possible sinking of a Soviet submarine [see more]

Eating for Victory. This volume is a collection of food information leaflets issued in Britain during the Second World War. It contains a wide range of leaflets, from simple collections of recipes to advice on nutrition. Some concentrate on using wartime ingredients such as dried eggs, while focus on how to make the best of small quantities of things that were in short supply, such as sugar [see more].

Make Do and Mend. This book is a collection of wartime Make Do and Mend leaflets issued in Britain during the Second World War. While it is food rationing that attracts most attention now, this book reminds us that clothes were also strictly rationed while fuel was in short supply. The majority of these leaflets give advice on how to repair clothes, how to avoid damaging clothes or how to make the best use of fuel for heating, hot water and cooking. [see more]

The Line upon a Wind, Noel Mostert. This is an excellent account of the greatest naval war of the age of sail. Mostert covers a wider range of topics than most books on this subject, while always remaining readable. There is a good section on the rise of American naval power and the War of 1812 [see more]

Darkness before the Dawn, Sgt. J.N. Farrow. This is the wartime diary of Sgt. J.N. Farrow, a prisoner of war in Changi for four years from the fall of Singapore to the end of the war. The book in provides an invaluable insight into the life of a P.O.W. in the Far East. [see more]