The River Battles

The River Battles Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle version is available to download in english. Read online anytime anywhere directly from your device. Click on the download button below to get a free pdf file of The River Battles book. This book definitely worth reading, it is an incredibly well-written.

The River Battles

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Douglas & McIntyre
Page : 480 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2021-09-18
Category : History
ISBN : 1771623128

Get Book

The River Battles by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

The Canadians called it the Promised Land. In late September 1944, the Emilia-Romagna plain before I Canadian Corps stretched to the far horizon--a deceptively wide-open space where the tanks could run free. Throughout British Eighth Army, hopes ran high that once it entered the plain, the Germans could be driven from Italy. As soon as the advance began, however, the plain's true nature was revealed: the land was criss-crossed by rivers, canals and drainage ditches over which all bridges had been demolished. With higher command urging haste, the Canadians entered a long and nightmarish series of battles to win crossings over each waterway, whose high banks provided the Germans with perfect defensive positions. Early fall rains caused rivers to spill their banks and transformed the countryside into the worst quagmire the soldiers had ever seen. More than five months of battle followed, with weeks of hard fighting required to advance from one river to the next. Each month, conditions only worsened, and the casualty rates rose appallingly. As their comrades fell one by one, most soldiers sought merely to survive. Doing that much required every measure of stamina, courage and fighting skill they possessed. The fifth and final Canadian Battle Series volume set in Italy, The River Battles tells the story of this campaign's last and hardest months. In riveting detail and with his trademark "you-are-there" style, Mark Zuehlke shines a light on this forgotten chapter of Canada's World War II experience.

The River Battles

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Douglas & McIntyre
Page : 598 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2019-11-09
Category : History
ISBN : 9781771622363

Get Book

The River Battles by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

The Canadians called it the Promised Land. In late September 1944, the Emilia-Romagna plain before I Canadian Corps stretched to the far horizon—a deceptively wide-open space where the tanks could run free. Throughout British Eighth Army, hopes ran high that once it entered the plain, the Germans could be driven from Italy. As soon as the advance began, however, the plain’s true nature was revealed: the land was criss-crossed by rivers, canals and drainage ditches over which all bridges had been demolished. With higher command urging haste, the Canadians entered a long and nightmarish series of battles to win crossings over each waterway, whose high banks provided the Germans with perfect defensive positions. Early fall rains caused rivers to spill their banks and transformed the countryside into the worst quagmire the soldiers had ever seen. More than five months of battle followed, with weeks of hard fighting required to advance from one river to the next. Each month, conditions only worsened, and the casualty rates rose appallingly. As their comrades fell one by one, most soldiers sought merely to survive. Doing that much required every measure of stamina, courage and fighting skill they possessed. The fifth and final Canadian Battle Series volume set in Italy, The River Battles tells the story of this campaign’s last and hardest months. In riveting detail and with his trademark “you-are-there” style, Mark Zuehlke shines a light on this forgotten chapter of Canada’s World War II experience.

Battles of the Red River War

Author : J. Brett Cruse
Publisher : Texas A&M University Press
Page : 274 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2017-08-03
Category : History
ISBN : 9781623491529

Get Book

Battles of the Red River War by J. Brett Cruse Pdf

Battles of the Red River War unearths a long-buried record of the collision of two cultures. In 1874, U.S. forces led by Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie carried out a surprise attack on several Cheyenne, Comanche, and Kiowa bands that had taken refuge in the Palo Duro Canyon of the Texas panhandle and destroyed their winter stores and horses. After this devastating loss, many of these Indians returned to their reservations and effectively brought to a close what has come to be known as the Red River War, a campaign carried out by the U.S. Army during 1874 as a result of Indian attacks on white settlers in the region. After this operation, the Southern Plains Indians would never again pose a coherent threat to whites’ expansion and settlement across their ancestral homelands. Until now, the few historians who have undertaken to tell the story of the Red River War have had to rely on the official records of the battles and a handful of extant accounts, letters, and journals of the U.S. Army participants. Starting in 1998, J. Brett Cruse, under the auspices of the Texas Historical Commission, conducted archeological investigations at six battle sites. In the artifacts they unearthed, Cruse and his teams found clues that would both correct and complete the written records and aid understanding of the Indian perspectives on this clash of cultures. Including a chapter on historiography and archival research by Martha Doty Freeman and an analysis of cartridges and bullets by Douglas D. Scott, this rigorously researched and lavishly illustrated work will commend itself to archeologists, military historians and scientists, and students and scholars of the Westward Expansion.

Roer River Battles

Author : David R. Higgins
Publisher : Casemate
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2010-07-26
Category : History
ISBN : 9781935149590

Get Book

Roer River Battles by David R. Higgins Pdf

An account of the ups and downs of a six-month-long WWII campaign with “a well detailed chronological order of the battles [and] interesting photographs” (Armorama). A selection of the Military Book Club. Following the Allied breakout from the Normandy beachhead in July 1944, the vaunted German Army seemed on the verge of collapse. As British and US forces fanned out across northwestern France, enemy resistance unexpectedly dissolved into a headlong retreat to the German and Belgian borders. In early September, an elated Allied High Command had every expectation of continuing their momentum to cripple the enemy’s warmaking capability by capturing the Ruhr industrial complex and plunging into the heart of Germany. After a brief pause to allow for resupply, Courtney Hodge’s First Army prepared to punch through the ominous but largely outdated Westwall, the Siegfried Line, surrounding Aachen. But during the lull, German commanders such as the “lion of defense,” Walter Model, reorganized depleted units and mounted an increasingly potent defense. Though the German Replacement Army funneled considerable numbers to the front, they too often strained an overburdened supply system and didn’t greatly enhance existing combat formations. More importantly, the panzer divisions, once thought irretrievably destroyed, were resupplied and reinvigorated. When the Allied offensive resumed, it ran into a veritable brick wall—gains measured in yards, not miles, if any were made at all. While both sides suffered equally in an urbanized environment of pillbox-infested hills, impenetrable forests, and freezing rain, the Germans were on the defensive and better able to inflict casualties out of proportion to their own. For the US First Army, what was originally to be a walk-through turned into a frustrating six-month campaign that decimated infantry and tank forces alike. The “broad front,” as opposed to a “Schwerpunkt” strategy, led to the demise of many a citizen-soldier. Drawing on primary Wehrmacht and US sources, including battle analysis and daily situation and after-action reports, The Roer River Battles provides insight into the desperate German efforts to keep a conquering enemy at the borders of their homeland. Tactical maps down to battalion-level help clarify the very fluid nature of the combat. Combined, they serve to explain not just how, but why decisions were made and events unfolded, and how reality often differed from doctrine in one of the longest US campaigns of World War II.

Battle of Stones River

Author : Larry J. Daniel
Publisher : LSU Press
Page : 343 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2012-11-05
Category : History
ISBN : 9780807145166

Get Book

Battle of Stones River by Larry J. Daniel Pdf

Three days of savage and bloody fighting between Confederate and Union troops at Stones River in Middle Tennessee ended with nearly 25,000 casualties but no clear victor. The staggering number of killed or wounded equaled the losses suffered in the well-known Battle of Shiloh. Using previously neglected sources, Larry J. Daniel rescues this important campaign from obscurity. The Battle of Stones River, fought between December 31, 1862, and January 2, 1863, was a tactical draw but proved to be a strategic northern victory. According to Daniel, Union defeats in late 1862—both at Chickasaw Bayou in Mississippi and at Fredericksburg, Virginia—transformed the clash in Tennessee into a much-needed morale booster for the North. Daniel's study of the battle's two antagonists, William S. Rosecrans for the Union Army of the Cumberland and Braxton Bragg for the Confederate Army of Tennessee, presents contrasts in leadership and a series of missteps. Union soldiers liked Rosecrans's personable nature, whereas Bragg acquired a reputation as antisocial and suspicious. Rosecrans had won his previous battle at Corinth, and Bragg had failed at the recent Kentucky Campaign. But despite Rosecrans's apparent advantage, both commanders made serious mistakes. With only a few hundred yards separating the lines, Rosecrans allowed Confederates to surprise and route his right ring. Eventually, Union pressure forced Bragg to launch a division-size attack, a disastrous move. Neither side could claim victory on the battlefield. In the aftermath of the bloody conflict, Union commanders and northern newspapers portrayed the stalemate as a victory, bolstering confidence in the Lincoln administration and dimming the prospects for the "peace wing" of the northern Democratic Party. In the South, the deadlock led to continued bickering in the Confederate western high command and scorn for Braxton Bragg.

Ortona

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
Page : 474 pages
File Size : 53,9 Mb
Release : 2009-07-01
Category : History
ISBN : 9781926706023

Get Book

Ortona by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

A masterful retelling one of the major victories of Canadian troops over the German army’s elite division during WWII. In one blood-soaked, furious week of fighting, from December 20 to December 27, 1943, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division took the town of Ortona, Italy, from elite German paratroopers ordered to hold the medieval port town at all costs. Infantrymen serving in the Loyal Edmonton Regiment and the Seaforth Highlanders, supported by tankers of the Three Rivers Regiment, moved from house to house in hand-to-hand combat amid heavy shelling and wrested the town from the grip of the fierce German defenders. Getting into Ortona had been a battle of its own. Ortona, the pearl of the Adriatic, stands on a promontory impregnable from three sides, with seacliffs on the north and east, and a deep ravine on the west. The Canadian infantrymen, drawn from virtually every corner of Canada, attacked from the south under the command of Major-General Chris Vokes, fighting across narrow gullies, mud-choked vineyards and olive groves, into the narrow streets of Ortona itself. When the vicious battle was over, 2605 Canadians were dead or wounded. But the town that had become known as "Little Stalingrad" was now in Allied hands.

Forgotten Victory

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
Page : 416 pages
File Size : 50,7 Mb
Release : 2014-10-25
Category : History
ISBN : 9781771620420

Get Book

Forgotten Victory by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

During the winter of 1944–45, the western Allies desperately sought a strategy that would lead to Germany’s quick defeat. After much rancorous debate, the Allied high command decided that First Canadian Army would launch the pivotal offensive to win the war—an attack against the Rhineland, an area of Germany on the west bank of the Rhine. Winning this land would give them a launching point for crossing the river and driving into Germany’s heartland. This was considered the road to victory. For those who fought, the names of battlegrounds such as Moyland Wood and the Hochwald Gap would forever call up memories of uncommon heroism, endurance and tragic sacrifice. Their story is one largely lost to the common national history of World War II. Forgotten Victory gives this important legacy back to Canadians.

Ortona Street Fight

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Orca Book Publishers
Page : 151 pages
File Size : 41,9 Mb
Release : 2011-04
Category : History
ISBN : 9781554693986

Get Book

Ortona Street Fight by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

A dramatic account of Canada's first major triumph of World War II, the December 1943 battle for Ortona, Italy.

Terrible Victory

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
Page : 562 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2009-07-01
Category : History
ISBN : 9781926685809

Get Book

Terrible Victory by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

Mark Zuehlke is an expert at narrating the history of life on the battlefield for the Canadian army during World War II. In Terrible Victory, he provides a soldiers-eye-view account of Canada's bloody liberation of western Holland. Readers are there as soldiers fight in the muddy quagmire, enduring a battle that lasted three weeks and in which 6,000 soldiers perished. Terrible Victory is a powerful story of courage, survival, and skill.

Thunder Along the Mississippi

Author : Jack D. Coombe
Publisher : Bantam
Page : 324 pages
File Size : 51,9 Mb
Release : 1998
Category : History
ISBN : WISC:89069264976

Get Book

Thunder Along the Mississippi by Jack D. Coombe Pdf

The Civil War ironclad gunboats along the Mississippi wrote a stunning new page in naval history and helped seal the fate of the Southern rebellion. Thunder Along the Mississippi brings to life this all-but-forgotten chapter of the Civil War.

No Better Place to Die

Author : Peter Cozzens
Publisher : University of Illinois Press
Page : 308 pages
File Size : 42,8 Mb
Release : 1991-07
Category : History
ISBN : 0252062299

Get Book

No Better Place to Die by Peter Cozzens Pdf

A mere handful of battlefields have come to epitomize the anguish and pain of America's Civil War: Gettysburg, Shiloh, Chancellorsville, Chickamauga. Yet another name belongs on that infamous list: Stones River, the setting for Peter Cozzens's No Better Place to Die. It was here that both the Union and Confederate armies lost over one-quarter of their forces in battle casualties. The Confederacy's defeat at Stones River unleashed a wave of dissension that crippled the army's high command and ultimately closed Tennessee to the South for two years. The loss deterred the British and French from coming to the aid of the South in the Civil War, with tragic effects for the Southern cause. In the 126 years since the guns fell silent at Stones River, few books have examined the bloody clash and its impact on the war's subsequent outcome. No Better Place to Die recounts the events and strategies that brought the two armies to the banks of this central Tennessee river on December 31, 1862. Cozzens re-creates the battle itself, following the movements and performance of individual regiments. A series of maps clarifies the combat activity. Cozzens frequently lets the men who fought the battle speak for themselves, through letters, diaries, memoirs, and battlefield communications. Here we learn about such critical moments as General Philip Sheridan's gallant defense along the Wilkinson Pike, one of the war's most tenacious stands against overwhelming odds, and the bravery in battle exemplified by Brekenridge's attack on the Union left, a doomed assault with the poignancy of Pickett's charge. Over twenty thousand Union and Confederate soldiers were killed, wounded, or captured in the bloody New Year's battle of Stone's River. The impact of their struggle extended far beyond the thousands of shattered human lives, ultimately imperiling the fortunes of the Confederacy. No Better Place to Die pays tribute to the heroes, the scoundrels, the mistakes, the bravery, and the grief at Stone's River.

The Cinderella Campaign

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Douglas & McIntyre
Page : 470 pages
File Size : 45,7 Mb
Release : 2017-11-11
Category : History
ISBN : 9781771620901

Get Book

The Cinderella Campaign by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

They thought of themselves as the "Cinderella Army," and international correspondents agreed. This was because First Canadian Army had been relegated to the left flank of the Allied advance toward Germany from the Normandy beaches and given the tough, thankless task of opening the Channel ports from Le Havre to Ostend in Belgium. Then suddenly in early September 1944, securing these ports became an Allied priority, as this would allow Field Marshal Montgomery to drive to the Rhine with Operation Market Garden and win the war before Christmas. Given only scant access to the Allied supply chain, the Canadians and their British partners in I Corps tackled the task assigned. Just getting to the ports proved a terrific undertaking fought against brutal German resistance. And once there, they faced fortresses that had been prepared for years to defeat an attack. "Lost outposts," the Allies called them, but the Germans within were not going to give up easily. And so over the month of September, the Canadians set about fighting for control of each port, scrambling for supplies while under constant military pressure to get those ports open now. For Canada this was the Cinderella Campaign, the battle for the Channel ports. For those who fought it, the sacrifice of comrades dead and wounded would never be forgotten.

Breakout From Juno

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Douglas & McIntyre
Page : 1 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2011-11-08
Category : History
ISBN : 9781553659723

Get Book

Breakout From Juno by Mark Zuehlke Pdf

The ninth book in the Canadian Battle Series, Breakout from Juno, is the first dramatic chronicling of Canada's pivotal role throughout the entire Normandy Campaign following the D-Day landings. On July 4, 1944, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division won the village of Carpiquet but not the adjacent airfield. Instead of a speedy victory, the men faced a bloody fight. The Canadians advanced relentlessly at a great cost in bloodshed. Within 2 weeks the 2nd Infantry and 4th Armoured divisions joined coming together as the First Canadian Army. The soldiers fought within a narrow landscape extending a mere 21 miles from Caen to Falaise. They won a two-day battle for Verrières Ridge starting on July 21, after 1,500 casualties. More bloody battles followed, until finally, on August 21, the narrowing gap that had been developing at Falaise closed when American and Canadian troops shook hands. The German army in Normandy had been destroyed, only 18,000 of about 400,000 men escaping. The Allies suffered 206,000 casualties, of which 18,444 were Canadians. Breakout from Juno is a story of uncommon heroism, endurance and sacrifice by Canada's World War II volunteer army and pays tribute to Canada's veterans.

Damn Slavers!

Author : Robert James Warner
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 716 pages
File Size : 49,9 Mb
Release : 2006-03
Category : History
ISBN : 142083746X

Get Book

Damn Slavers! by Robert James Warner Pdf

The History of the Sea, Lake, and River Battles of the Civil War, is an expose, a denunciation, a condemnation of the lies, the distortions, the deceits, the misrepresentations, and the slanders of the biased civil war historians, the biased movie makers, and the biased makers of TV Specials, who write distorted books, distorted movies, and make distorted TV Specials about the civil war. For example, President Grant is slandered as the butcher of the civil war, when the real butcher is the traitor Robert E. Lee by an actual count of the men he killed in the battles he fought! Another example is the big lie that the Monitor and Merrimac battle was a draw when it was a clear cut victory for the Monitor! There are two classes of people in The Damn Slavers: The people in the 22 Loyal states and in the 11 traitor states: the Loyalists: the victims; and the people in the 11 traitor states and in the 22 Loyal states: the traitors: the villains! One of the biggest vile lies of the civil war is the depraved lie the traitors won most of the battles! The author counted hundreds of the bigger land battles and the sea, lake, and river battles! This battle count is what Damn Slavers is all about! Surprise, Surprise! The Loyalists won most of the bigger land battles of the civil war by a ratio of about 2 to 1 from the start of the civil war and won most of the sea, lake, and river battles too, by an overwhelming margin!! If you want to learn some real truths about the civil war, read Damn Slavers! A History of the Sea, Lake, and River Battles of the Civil War!

Battle at the River

Author : Paul J. Bennett
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 51,9 Mb
Release : 2017
Category : Battles
ISBN : OCLC:1159899183

Get Book

Battle at the River by Paul J. Bennett Pdf

An enemy commander. A skilled tactician. Only one can be victorious. The Norland raiders are at it again. When the Baron of Bodden splits their defensive forces, Sergeant Gerald Matheson thinks that today is a day like any other, but then something is different. At the last moment, Gerald recognizes the warning signs, but they are outnumbered, outmaneuvered, and out of luck. How can they win this unbeatable battle? Battle at the River is a stand-alone short story set in the World of Merceria that incorporates characters from the Heir to the Crown Series. If you like intense battle scenes and unexpected plot twists, then you will love Paul J Bennett's tale of a soldier who thinks outside the box.