What is the best war book you have ever read?

[DwightPruitt]

"Other Clay: A Remembrance of the World War II Infantry" by Charles R. Cawthon

 

Cawthon served as an officer in the 29th Division (116th Regiment) and was intimately acquainted with soldiers like Tom Howie and Sidney Bingham. A pre-war journalist, his writing is sublime.

 

Find a copy and read it-- you will not be disappointed.

 

 

I'll second that. "Other Clay" is a great book!

 

Here are some of my favorites:

 

1) "Eisenhower's Lieutenants" by Russell Weighly. A great condensed history of the war in NW Europe and the personalities involved.

 

2) "Company Commander" by Charles B. MacDonald. Mentioned earlier in this thread, I believe it to be the best first person narrative of the Second World War.

 

3) "With the Old Breed" by E.B. Sledge. The "Company Commander" of the Pacific War. Fantastic book.

 

4) "Time For Trumpets" by Charles B. MacDonald. The story of the American soldier in the Battle of the Bulge.

 

5) "See Here, Private Hargrove" by Marion Hargrove. Not a war book per se, but a light-hearted book about a draftee becoming a soldier in the pre-war Army. Spent 15 weeks on the NY Times best-seller lst in 1942.

 

6) "Brave Men" and "Here is Your War" by Ernie Pyle These two books are prime examples why Ernie Pyle was so beloved. There are parts that literally bring tears to my eyes. Pyle's books, along with Hargrove's still are very common in their war time editions and can be found in most used book stores for a couple of bucks apiece. Buy them.

[APO472]

I must admit I am biased on this but here is my all time favorite...

[Jeff]

One great read is Nam by Mark Baker. Also one of my favs is The Forgotten Soldier by Guy Sajer

[siege1863]

BASTOGNE by Peter Elstob. One of my first and one of my favorites.

[Popo367]

Great books, now I just have to start aquiring them. Just wanted to let everyone know something I found a couple of days ago. I think a lot of you will find this website usefull. Google books....................You are able to preview books, so if there is a book you want look it up and it will let you preview most of it. The other awesome feature that it has is that for really old and out of print books, it allows you to download the whole entire book FOR FREE. I downloaded severall WWI USMC books which are very hard to find.

 

With the help of a few Marines

Dear Folks at home

And they thought we wouldn't fight

The tale of the Devil Dog

History of the AEF

 

I ended up downloading about 20 books. The search engine will find passages in several of the books that are in the system. Recently printed books are in the system and you can pretty much see the whole thing before you buy it. There is a book called "Semper Fi," which is new and I was able to preview about 1/4 of it.

[Guest RT Ohio]

Here are mine:

 

1) "Secret Commandos" By John Plaster

2) "SOG" By John Plaster

3) "Running Recon" By Frank Greco

4) "Special Forces at War (1957-1975)" By Shelby Stanton

5) "Kontum" By Frank Greco

6) "Reflections of a Warrior" By Franklin D. Miller

[Manchu Warrior]

I recently read "Bat 21". The book was a thin paperback and I really just read it to see how different the book was from the movie and I ended up really enjoying the book and did not put it down until I finished reading it. Great book of an incredible journey.

[RANDALL 1953]

We Were Soldiers Once...And Young Lt. Gen. Harold G. Moore (Ret) and Joseph L. Galloway. New York Time bestseller, Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps choice for reading by all Marines in 1993. Garry Owen!

[disneydave]

The Longest Winter

 

Stranger to Myself

 

Holding Juno

[Yank]

Piece of Cake by Derek Robinson.

[Sparkyasundevil]

Jake,

 

I am a little surprised that is your favorite book. I know E/506 is near and dear.

 

My list not in any order are;

 

Currahee!-Don Burgett

Vanguard of the Crusade-Mark Bando

D-Day with the Screaming Eagles-George Koskimaki

Seven Roads to Hell-Don Burgett

Parachute Infantry-David Kenyon Webster

Avenging Eagles the forbidden tales of the 101st in WWII-Mark Bando

The Longest Day-Cornelius Ryan

 

If you want info on just the 101st Airborne in WWII then Bando is the guy!

[Troy13]

Take your pick......I enjoyed them all.

 

Troy

 

[dan]

That's a hard one to narrow down as there are so many. Out of the hundreds of books I've read over the last 30-40 years let me include:

 

The Men Of Company K, An autobiography of a WWII rifle company, by Harold P. Leinbaugh and John D. Campbell. It's about Company K, 333rd Infantry Regiment, 84th Division.

 

Citizen Soldiers, The US Army from the Normandy Beaches to the Bulge to the surrender of Germany, by Steven Ambrose, an excellent book to read.

 

365 Days, by Ronald J. Glasser M.D., former Major, US Army Medical Corps. Major Glasser was a doctor stationed in Camp Zama, Japan during Viet Nam. When the fighting got intense and the casualties mounted, Camp Zama received the overflow of wounded from Viet Nam. Although this is a novel, he tells the story as told to him by the young soldiers he treated. I've read this book many times. I highly recommend it.

 

Dan

[Jeeper704]

Here are a few I've often read:

 

"He rode up font for Patton" by Brig. gen. Albin F Irzyk (8th Tank Bn - 4th AD)

"Phantom Nine" by Dr. Walter E Reichelt (9th AD)

"Bitter Woods" by John S D Eisenhower

"Green Light" by Martin Wolfe (81st Troop Carrier Squadron)

"Voices from the foxholes" by Dorothy Chernitsky (110th Infantry Regiment - 28th ID)

"Look out below!" by Chaplain Francis L Sampson

"With Geronimo across Europe" by R Edward O'Brien (501st PIR - 101st AB)

"GI Tom Myers' War Memoirs" by Tom Myers - Marcel Scheidweiler (110th Infantry Regiment - 28th ID)

 

"Schicksale zwischen Sauer und Our - Soldaten und Zivilpersonen erzâhlen" by Roland Gaul (Volume I and II)

In German, stories told by American and German soldiers and Luxembourg civilians in the Battle of the Bulge.

 

As for the "other side";

"Das letzte Kriegsjahr im Westen" by Heinz Günther Guderian (116th Panzer Division)

Was in contact with this officer.

"Die Geschichte der Panzer Lehr Division im Westen 1944 - 1945" by Helmut Ritgen (Panzer Lehr)

 

And the list goes on ...

 

Erwin

[Andrei]

I have many favorites. Here is a non exhaustive list in no particular order :

 

- Par le sang versé by Paul Bonnecarrere

- Les tambours de bronze by Jean Lartéguy

- Un million de dollars le Viet by Jean Lartéguy

- Les Hors-La-Loi by Jean Mabire

- Les hommes peints by Marc Flament

- Piste sans fin by Marcel Bigeard and Marc Flament

- Le Baron Ungern, Khan des Steppes by Leonid Yuzefovitch

- The War of the Running Dogs by Noel Barber

- Da Nang Diary by Tom Yarborough

- Once a Warrior King by David Donovan

- Secret Commandos by John Plaster

- SOG by John Plaster

- Black Berets and Painted Faces

by Gary Linderer

- Brennan's War by Matthew Brennan

- Silence was a weapon by Stuart Herrington

- ChickenHawk by Robert Mason

- About Face by David Hackworth

 

And many more...

[Jim Baker]

What a great thread. Many books here I've read, and several I want to read.

 

One not yet listed:

 

Guadalcanal Diary by Richard Tregaskis

 

Tregaskis was a correspondent and was there. Great first hand accounts. I have a 1943 edition and the poor thing is falling apart.

[Camp_Kearny]

From WWI, I liked "Through the Wheat" by Thomas Boyd (a novel but based on the authors service during WWI) and "Toward the Flame" by Hervey Allen. Both of these books are dense but very good.

 

From the inter-war period, I like "Soldiers of the Old Army" by Victor Vogel. A good memoir of the army during the 1930s when the Infantry still had horses.

 

From WWII, I like "Quartered Safe Out Here" by George Fraser and "Here Is Your War" and "Brave Men" by Ernie Pyle.

 

I would highly recommend all six of these books for people interested in WWI and WWII.

 

Ian

[Kurt Barickman]

I really enjoy all the books that Mark Bando has written. First person account favorites would be Seven Roads to Hell by Burgett and With the Old Breed on Peleliu and Okinawa by Sledge.

 

Kurt Barickman

[market garden]

By far it would be a some what obscure book called "Ashes of Honor' by Christene De'Le Mazera ( I think I spelled that right ) It is this man's story of his time spent in the Waffen SS in the Charlamene Div. A really good read.

[ccmax]

In terms of memoirs written in English I agree with Mr. Barickman: so far the book that impressed me the most is E.B. Sledge's "With the Old Breed." Bill Mauldin's "Up Front" was able to transmit the feel of combat to American civilians who didn't take part in the war, as it was published in 1945 and in my opinion it ranks as one of the greatest American memoirs of WWII. I also like Paul Fussell's "Doing Battle", which has a liberal perspective on the war and Army life but a great memoir nonetheless. Another great book by a Marine was written by William Manchester, after revisiting some key places of the PTO.

 

Many great books of personal recollections from WWII have not been translated to English as well.

[River Patrol]

Sledge - "With the Old Breed"

Meyer & Peters - "On the Ground - The Secret War in Vietnam"

 

and the best......

 

Hackworth - "Steel My Soldiers' Hearts"

[BEAST]

As already mentioned, "Company Commander"

Anything by Gerald Astor

 

Robert Heinlein's "Starship Trooper". For those of you who don't know, this is science fiction. However this was recommeded reading when I was in ROTC and is an excellent read on small unit leadership. For more info, check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starship_Troopers

[Andrei]

By far it would be a some what obscure book called "Ashes of Honor' by Christene De'Le Mazera ( I think I spelled that right ) It is this man's story of his time spent in the Waffen SS in the Charlamene Div. A really good read.

 

This is Christian de la Mazière and Waffen der SS Div. Charlemagne. Christian passed away two years ago.

[Chris_B]

"The Killing Zone" by Frederic Downs, Jr

 

Not for a 9 or 5 year old though. Downs was a very brave Lt. in Vietnam, who was very seriously wounded by a mine. He pulls zero punches in his book, which is about his war in Vietnam, what he saw, and what he did. He does not hesitate to tell exactly the truth, whether it was about the Army run prostitution, or about when he ran through a bag shaped ambush- twice- to recover one of his men, or about shooting a civilian through the hand as she was stealing munitions, or about threatening the life of one of his own that was endangering the entire platoon with his cowardice, or about almost ordering the ambush of non combatants in a free-fire zone. Highly recommenced. Downs was nothing more or less than human and honest in his book, and makes no excuses, asks for no sympathy, and portrays himself just as he was. A gutsy book, should be read by more people in my opinion

[101CH47]

A few of my favorite -

 

The Last Knight of Flanders - Allan Brandt

Twilight of the Gods - Thordolf Hillblad

With Our Backs to Berlin - Tony Le Tissier

Seven Days in January - Wolf T. Zoepf

Black Edelweiss - Johnann Voss

 

Of that list Black Edelweiss and Twilight of the Gods are a toss up for the best.