All Quiet on the Home Front


Book Description

A “fascinating” look at hardship, heroism, and civilian life in England during the Great War (World War One Illustrated). The truth about the sacrifice and suffering among British civilians during World War I is rarely discussed. In this book, people who were there speak about experiences and events that have remained buried for decades. Their testimony shows the same candor and courage we have become accustomed to hearing from military veterans of this war. Those interviewed include a survivor of a Zeppelin raid in 1915; a Welsh munitions worker recruited as a girl; and a woman rescued from a bombed school after five days. There are also accounts of rural famine, bereavement, and the effects on families back home—and even the story of a woman who planned to kill her family to save them further suffering.




V for Victory


Book Description

Tells of the Amerian efforts to provide equipment for World War II and tells of the situation in America at the time.




Fighting on the Home Front


Book Description

'History at its most celebratory' Daily Telegraph 'Adie uses her journalistic eye for personal stories and natural compassion to create a book definitely worthy of her heroines' Big Issue 'Fascinating, very readable . . . provides a complete wartime women's history' Discover Your History * * * * * * Bestselling author and award-winning former BBC Chief News Correspondent Kate Adie reveals the ways in which women's lives changed during World War One and what the impact has been for women in its centenary year. IN 1914 THE WORLD CHANGED forever. When World War One broke out and a generation of men went off to fight, bestselling author and From Our Own Correspondent presenter Kate Adie shows how women emerged from the shadows of their domestic lives. Now a visible force in public life, they began to take up essential roles - from transport to policing, munitions to sport, entertainment, even politics. They had finally become citizens, a recognised part of the war machine, acquiring their own rights and often an independent income. The former BBC Chief News Correspondent charts the seismic move towards equal rights with men that began a century ago and through unique first-hand research shows just how momentous the achievements of those pioneering women were. This is history at its best - a vivid, compelling account of the women who helped win the war as well as a revealing assessment of their legacy for women's lives today.




The Home Front, U.S.A.


Book Description




The Home Front


Book Description

The Great War is now typically regarded as senseless and futile, but most New Zealanders at the time considered it to be a war to preserve security and freedoms, to punish an aggressive enemy and to win a better world. Yet the war years proved a tumultuous time, and bitterness and animosities ran alongside idealism and sacrifice. Families were broken up as soldiers departed. Civil liberties were curtailed as the government wielded unprecedented powers. Divisive issues, economic volatility and a rising death toll all threatened resolve. Finally, in the last weeks of the war, a devastating influenza pandemic arrived in New Zealand and extracted a deadly toll. In The Home Front Steven Loveridge and James Watson offer a compelling account of how a small and developing country confronted the complex questions and brutal realities of a world war.




En Guerre


Book Description

Explores World War I through French graphics from books, magazines, and prints of the period, presenting a wide range of perspectives.




Deserters of the First World War


Book Description

The story of First World War deserters who were shot at dawn, then pardoned nearly a century later has often been told, but these 306 soldiers represent a tiny proportion of deserters. More than 80,000 cases of desertion and absence were tried at courts martial on the home front but these soldiers have been ignored. Andrea Hetherington, in this thought-provoking and meticulously researched account, sets the record straight by describing the deserters who disappeared from camps and barracks within Great Britain at an alarming rate. She reveals how they employed a range of survival strategies, some ridding themselves of all connection with the military while others hid in plain sight. Their reasons for desertion varied. Some were already living a life of crime whilst others were conscientious objectors who refused to respond to their call-up papers. Boredom, protest, troubles at home or physical and mental disabilities all played their part in men deciding to go on the run. Andrea Hetherington’s timely book gives us a vivid insight into a hitherto overlooked aspect of the First World War.




When the War Came Home


Book Description

The Ottoman Empire was unprepared for the massive conflict of World War I. Lacking the infrastructure and resources necessary to wage a modern war, the empire's statesmen reached beyond the battlefield to sustain their war effort. They placed unprecedented hardships onto the shoulders of the Ottoman people: mass conscription, a state-controlled economy, widespread food shortages, and ethnic cleansing. By war's end, few aspects of Ottoman daily life remained untouched. When the War Came Home reveals the catastrophic impact of this global conflict on ordinary Ottomans. Drawing on a wide range of sources—from petitions, diaries, and newspapers to folk songs and religious texts—Yiğit Akın examines how Ottoman men and women experienced war on the home front as government authorities intervened ever more ruthlessly in their lives. The horrors of war brought home, paired with the empire's growing demands on its people, fundamentally reshaped interactions between Ottoman civilians, the military, and the state writ broadly. Ultimately, Akın argues that even as the empire lost the war on the battlefield, it was the destructiveness of the Ottoman state's wartime policies on the home front that led to the empire's disintegration.




Hardball on the Home Front


Book Description

More than 5000 major and minor league baseball players left the baseball diamond to serve in the military during World War II, but President Roosevelt insisted that baseball still be played to boost the country's morale. More than 400 replacement players made their major league debuts between 1943 and 1945, among them Sal Maglie, Andy Pafko, Red Schoendienst and Stan Musial. The author of this book points out that the true story of wartime baseball rests mostly with the players whose careers were not so well remembered or documented. He highlights nine players--Frank Mancuso, Ford Mullen, Ed Carnett, Lee Pfund, George Hausmann, Cy Buker, Bill Lefebvre, Eddie Basinski, and Nick Strincevich--who took the field while the major leaguers were fighting in the war. They share their memories of being called up to play in the majors, and their feelings about providing much needed and much wanted entertainment to thousands of Americans during the war years.




V is for Victory


Book Description

Describes life in the United States during World War II, discussing such activities as civil defense, the Japanese relocation, rationing, propaganda, and censorship.