On 4th June, 1944, Rome was the first European capital to fall to the Allies, after what had been the biggest battle they had fought up to that point.  More men, more guns, more equipment.  More planes and more bombs. All had been flung against a formidable defensive line; and despite dogged resistance, the mighty Allied battering ram had eventually prevailed with a crushing victory that had been hailed all around the free world. Read more…

What a loss that so much untold and unrecorded history and interesting information goes to the graves with people. Thank goodness for those people who have kept, and do keep, diaries. Blogging also has to be a great way for future generations to view the lives of people doing everyday things which may be viewed as humdrum or uninteresting now but, to those who will follow, will be of great interest. Thank goodness for museums and record offices who are guarding our history because without them we would be all be the poorer without the information they hold. Read more…

Trawling through archives can be a confusing and often bewildering experience.  Obviously, they all have different content, but they also have different systems and approaches to the material they house and different means by which the general public can access what they have.  These are my thoughts on just a few: Read more…

When eighteen year-old Sergeant Les Silver and the rest of his crew arrived at the quiet airfield of Tempsford, near Bedford, none of them had any idea they would be carrying out Special Duties operations.  They had trained on four-engine Halifax bombers and assumed that once they’d finished their heavy bomber conversion course at Dishford in Yorkshire, they’d be going on bomber missions over Nazi-occupied Europe.  Read more…

Getting Started

18 September 2006
About three weeks ago I set myself this date as the day I simply had to start writing the book, so for the past fortnight it’s been a frantic scrabble to get to a stage where I feel I’m ready to go.   Read more…