Strange And Obscure Stories Of World War Ii

Here are overlooked or forgotten tales from the world's greatest conflict. These are stories of courage, daring, and stupidity, some of which would challenge the imaginations of Hollywood scriptwriters. Some of the many true tales that author Donald Aines recounts include: • He would never be cast as a dashing war hero, but a cast member of "The Addams Family" television show volunteered for one of the most dangerous jobs the Army Air Force had to offer. • The US Navy's deadliest submarine claimed an unexpected victim with its last torpedo, and led to one of the war's most harrowing tales of survival. • Bob Hoover's escape from a German stalag would have made a great movie. • British commando "Mad Jack" Churchill earned his nickname, arming himself to fight a 20th century war with a 15th century attitude and weapons. • The Germans and Japanese wasted precious resources developing weapons more dangerous to the users than their enemies. • The GI who stole the voices of his victims, and other Allied and Axis serial killers. Within the pages of Strange and Obscure Stories of World War II,the reality of war trumps fiction.

"As combat veterans and high commanders know, logic is often a stranger in wartime." --William B. Breuer, in The annals of World War II are mined with captivating cases of strange coincidences, ominous premonitions, and baffling mysteries. Now, William Breuer's painstaking research has yielded over 100 fascinating historical accounts, including: The mysterious fire on the Normandie . . . Who really was behind the eerily efficient destruction of the famed ocean liner? The ominous "Deadly Double" advertisement in The New Yorker . . . Was it a coded leak to Japanese and German spies announcing the upcoming bombing of Pearl Harbor? The botched Nazi kidnapping of the Duke of Windsor . . . How did a serendipitous series of events save the duke from Hitler's grasp (and the Allied forces from a crippling strategic setback)? The curious sinking of the Tang . . . How did this deadliest of U.S. submarines come to meet such an unexpected and mysterious end? "Anyone interested in twists of fate should find this book fascinating." --Library Journal "While away a few hours or spend a few minutes at a time enjoying this collection of inexplicable, mysterious, and strange tales." --Nashville Banner

Accounts of eleven bizarre but true incidents during World War II include a secret alliance between the U.S. Navy and the Mafia and Japanese bombing by balloon of our Midwest.

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 The war in the Pacific cost the army 57,137 lives, and the Eighth Air Force lost more than 26,000 airmen. The end date for counting casualties was December 31, 1946, to account for those who died of lingering injuries. #2 The United States suffered only 68 civilian deaths at Pearl Harbor, compared to the hundreds of thousands killed in Russia, China, Germany, Poland, and Japan. However, the American deaths are still a tragedy for any family. #3 The deaths of the Japanese military and civilian populations were estimated at 2. 1 million and 8 million, respectively. The Allied bombings of Japanese cities, especially the firebombings of Tokyo and Dresden, as well as the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands. #4 The final death toll for all the countries that sided with the Allies is between about 50 million and 100 million deaths. The statistics on a sheet of paper do not begin to describe the loss of life.

Henry Lasoski, an officer in the Polish army, was there on the first day of World War II, thrusting his bayonet awkwardly into a German soldier hours after Hitler’s army invaded his homeland in 1939. And Jacques Smith was there on the last, a member of the honor guard aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay when the Japanese signed the documents of surrender in 1945. From start to finish, this chronicle of fifty-three personal testimonies illuminates the Second World War in a way no mere accumulation of facts can. In a journalistic tour de force, Elizabeth Mullener over the course of twelve years found eyewitnesses to virtually every major event of World War II, and she found them all in one American city—New Orleans. Some are natives of the city and some are not, a testament to the upheaval of war and its power to scatter people around the globe. The people she writes about are not grand heroes or prime movers. They are young men shaking in their foxholes, young women stitching up wounded soldiers, and children facing a world gone topsy-turvy. And they saw it all. They witnessed the London Blitz and the siege of Stalingrad; the attack on Pearl Harbor and the Bataan Death March; the battle of Iwo Jima and the Nuremberg trials; the Normandy invasion and parties at the USO. Their memories are powerful. Harold Eck recalls sharks grazing his legs as he treaded water for four days after the USS Indianapolis sank in the Pacific Ocean. Anthony DeLucca saw bodies stacked like cordwood at Buchenwald. Christine Strevinsky slid a knife through the neck of a Nazi commandant at the age of nine. Frank Rosato played “The Missouri Waltz” for Harry Truman at Potsdam. All poignantly related through Mullener’s graceful and compelling prose, the episodes in War Stories provide an unusually intimate history of World War II and a direct, visceral connection to the central event of the twentieth century.

Ernest Hemingway stalks U-Boats. A Belgian woman halts the Panzers. Adolf Hitler plays Santa Claus. If you think these are tall tales, guess again. More than 140 of the most bizarre, curious, and downright strange incidents from World War II are documented here based on personal interviews, archives and declassified documents.

In peacetime cartoonists are a diverse collection of individuals with their own styles and projects, but when the trumpets of war blow it is like unleashing the dogs of war. Hitler, Stalin, Churchill, Roosevelt and Mussolini were a gift for them and, as this collection shows, one they weren't about to turn down. This book shows that humour was one of the key weapons of war, with countries using cartoons to demoralise their opponents and maintain morale. Each country had its own style: the British liked understatement, showing people drinking cups of tea while bombs fell, whilst the Germans chose Churchill serving up a cocktail of blood, sweat and tears to an emaciated and sickly British lion. Showcasing the very best cartoons from Britain, the USA, Germany, Russia plus the work of all of WWII's greatest cartoonists, including Bill Mauldin, Fougasse, Emett, David Low and Graham Laidler (Pont), this book is guaranteed to make you laugh.

ON HALLOWED AND HAUNTED GROUND Discover the paranormal legacy of the Second World War. In this book, you will encounter dozens of phenomena in the European and Pacific theaters as well as historic locations in the US where the spirits of the dead are unable—or unwilling—to let the past go. The ghost of an admiral gives a tour of the USS Lexington Tourists at Dieppe are haunted by the terrifying sounds of battle A full-body apparition appears at Schofield Barracks Ghost tanks are witnessed patrolling the Russian front Phantom footsteps shock the guards at Hickam Air Force Base Ghostly soldiers knock on doors at Iwo Jima A spirit-sailor keeps eternal watch at Pearl Harbor This book also shares fascinating stories of supernatural warfare. Learn about wizards and witches in England casting spells to hold the Germans at bay; Dion Fortune and the Fraternity of the Inner Light working magic in support of the Allies; and Aleister Crowley waging a psychic campaign to capture high-ranking Nazi, Rudolf Hess. Haunted World War II explores the high strangeness and haunted aftermath of the most devastating clash of nations in living history.