Carnage and Courage: A Memoir of FDR, the Kennedys, and World War II

(Hardback)

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Carnage and Courage is the story of an American womans journey from upper-crust ingnue to a career in the US diplomatic corps. At President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's behest, Page Wilson left the US to serve in London with Ambassador Joseph Kennedy as he took up his post just before World War II began and the Blitz commenced.
With the conflict in Europe already underway, Wilson, working with Kennedy, shares the grip of war with the men and women who are engaged against Germany. When the bombs finally fall on Britain, Kennedy sends Wilson back to America--fulfilling a promise he and Roosevelt made to keep her safewhere she anxiously awaits US involvement. Upon meeting the man she will marry, a combat pilot, her role begins to mirror that of so many women of war erathe struggle to maintain a home that is re-billeted constantly and the worry for her husband in combat.
Wilsons journey starts with an appointment from the highest levels of government and continues along a path many young women would take as America fought to bring peace to the world. These womens lives are a shared battle through the years of the worst war the world has ever known, the years of struggle between Munich and Hiroshima, between certain death and brave survival, not only for the men and women under arms but for their wives and families back home as well.

Reviews

"What a sparkling memoir....Drinking martinis with President Roosevelt at Hyde Park, working for Ambassador Joseph Kennedy in London, listening to Winston Churchill sing to his wife, meeting Salvador Dali... and what a life Page Huidekoper Wilson has lived, and she writes about her WWII years with champagne bubbles. Wonderful, just wonderful." Kitty Kelley

"As Hitlers armies swept westward over Europe and Great Britain prepared for war, Page Wilson, aide to Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., U.S. Ambassador to Britain, was our fly on the wall. Not since Mollie Panter-Downes dispatches to The New Yorker from her London flat in the 1940s have we been treated to such personal portraits of life in London and the United States as the world descended into madness." Robert T. Hall, Former President of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers

"Anyone who dreaded the lights being extinguished in Europe, anyone who felt the presence of the impending onslaught in Britain, anyone who knew that America would have to come to the rescue - all of us will cherish this wonderful memoire by a true American woman." Maria Riva, Author of Marlene Dietrich by Her Daughter

An insightfully written reportage touched by her own compassion and the breadth of knowledge she gained from WWII embassy life in England. Janine Selendy, Co-Chairman and Publisher, Horizon International, Yale University
"What a sparkling memoir....Drinking martinis with President Roosevelt at Hyde Park, working for Ambassador Joseph Kennedy in London, listening to Winston Churchill sing to his wife, meeting Salvador Dali... and what a life Page Huidekoper Wilson has lived, and she writes about her WWII years with champagne bubbles. Wonderful, just wonderful." Kitty Kelley

"As Hitlers armies swept westward over Europe and Great Britain prepared for war, Page Wilson, aide to Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., U.S. Ambassador to Britain, was our fly on the wall. Not since Mollie Panter-Downes dispatches to The New Yorker from her London flat in the 1940s have we been treated to such personal portraits of life in London and the United States as the world descended into madness." Robert T. Hall, Former President of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers

"Anyone who dreaded the lights being extinguished in Europe, anyone who felt the presence of the impending onslaught in Britain, anyone who knew that America would have to come to the rescue - all of us will cherish this wonderful memoire by a true American woman." Maria Riva, Author of Marlene Dietrich by Her Daughter

An insightfully written reportage touched by her own compassion and the breadth of knowledge she gained from WWII embassy life in England. Janine Selendy, Co-Chairman and Publisher, Horizon International, Yale University

Author Bio

Page Wilson, now in her 90s, is an active writer and a social justice activist. She has written for "The New York Times, The Washington Post" and "The Baltimore Sun" is the author of "Through the Looking Glass Darkly, A Day with President Garry Boldwater," and coauthor of "How to Cook Reagan's Goose." She lives in Washington DC.