Footsloggers: An Infantry Battalion at War, 1939-45

(Paperback, Main)

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Description

Shortlisted for the 2023 Military History Matters Book of the Year AwardThe only way to truly understand what it was like to fight in the Second World War is to listen to the experiences of those men who were there. And often, there was nowhere more dangerous than on the ground. In Footsloggers, Peter Hart reconstructs one infantry battalion's war in staggering detail. Based on his interviews with members of the 16th Durham Light Infantry, Hart bears witness not only to their comradeship, suffering, dreadful losses and individual tragedies, but also their courage and self-sacrifice as they fought their way across North Africa, Italy and Greece. This is a human look at the inhuman nature of war from the author of At Close Range and Burning Steel.

Reviews

'Another powerful entry in Hart's 'British Band of Brothers' series' - Major Gordon Corrigan

'Powerful, vivid and haunting ... the boredom, horror, humour, and everything else that went with life at the front [makes this] an emotional ride' - Andrew Mulholland

'A fascinating and well-written insight ... Acclaimed writer and historian Peter Hart brings to life the spirit of the normal civilian soldier during wartime, charting their hopes, personal thoughts and fears' - Key Military

Author Bio

Peter Hart was the oral historian at the Imperial War Museum for nearly 40 years. A prolific military history author, he has acted as an army guide, runs his own battlefield tour company and has a successful weekly podcast series, Pete & Gary's Military History. His previous books for Profile include At Close Range and The Last Battle.