Research Catalog

Title

Unsung heroes : the twentieth century's forgotten history-makers / Erik Durschmied.

Author

Durschmied, Erik.

Publication

London : Hodder & Stoughton, 2003.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

467 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, portraits; 25 cm

Summary

Here are instances of heroic deeds with no immediate witness, or exploits hidden from the public because the truth was politcally inconveneint, such as the Scholls' attempt in 1943 to raise their nation's consciousness, suppressed by Hitler's totalitarian propaganda machine. The Canadian nuclear physicist Dr Louis Slotin's heroism was not revealed to the public - in 1946 'the bomb' was supposed to be fail-safe. In the case of George Ferdinand Duckwitz in 1943, nobody discovered that he was the man behind the betrayal of the Nazi plan, and he was not about to publise his disloyalty to his Fuhrer. A US pilot held out against impossible odds in a clapped-out aircraft in 1941 and a British battalion against an entire army in Korea in 1951. And there is a sergeant who in 1916 blundered into an 'impregnable fortress' and took it single-handedly. These brave men and women were not inspired buy a desire for glory. Their motivation was a sense of moral stubbornness in which duty became the better part of valour. Some dared to stand up to injustice, fight hypocrisy and some had to pay a bitter price for remaining loyal to their principles : all of them changed the course of history.

Subject

• 1900-1999
• Heroes > History > 20th century
• War > History > 20th century
• Heroes
• War
• Weltkriege
• Gefallener

Genre/Form

History.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (p. [445]-451) and index.

Contents

Verdun, 25 February 1916: Feldwebel Kunze, A hero in spite of himself -- Jutland, 31 May 1916: Boy Jack Cornwell, A return to the land fit for heroes -- Wake Atoll, 8 December 1941: Cunningham, Devereux and Elrod, The right stuff -- Munich, 18 February 1943: Die Weisse Rose, Calling all Germans ... ' -- Copenhagen, 1 October 1943: G.F. Duckwitz, The Nazi who saved the Danish Jews -- Baltic, 30 January 1945: Aleksandr Marinesko, For Stalin' -- Los Alamos, 21 May 1946: Dr. Louis Slotin, The Chief Armourer of the United States -- Korea, 22-25 April 1951: The Glorious Glosters, Heroes all -- Indochina, 8 May 1954: Genevieve de Galard, The Angel of Dien Bien Phu -- Budapest, 23 October 1956: Colonel Pal Maleter, A whiff of freedom.

ISBN

• 0340825197
• 9780340825198

LCCN

2008428493

OCLC

• ocm51668270
• 51668270
• SCSB-1285121

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library