The encouragement and generous support of the Association of the United States Army has been important from the beginning of this enterprise. I particularly thank Gen. (ret.) Gordon R. Sullivan, the association president and former Army chief of staff, Lt. Gen. (ret.) Theodore G. Stroup, Jr., and Lt. Gen. (ret.) Thomas G. Rhame.
At the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, New York, I am grateful to the former director, Cynthia M. Koch, and to supervisory archivist Robert Clark. Likewise, at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kansas, I appreciate the assistance of archivist Christopher Abrahamson.
My appreciation again goes to the George C. Marshall Research Library at the Virginia Military Academy in Lexington, Virginia: to Joanne D. Hartog, director of research and scholarly programs; Paul B. Barron, director of the library and archives; Peggy L. Dillard, assistant librarian and archivist; Brian D. Shaw, president of the George C. Marshall Foundation; and, at VMI, Gen. (ret.) J. H. Binford Peay III, the superintendent; Prof. Malcolm “Kip” Muir, Jr.; and Brig. Gen. (ret.) Charles F. Brower IV.
For a third time I thank the Colonel Robert R. McCormick Research Center at the First Division Museum in Wheaton, Illinois, a division archive without peer. I especially appreciate help from Col. (ret.) Paul H. Herbert, executive director of the Cantigny First Division Foundation, and from Eric Gillespie, director of the research center, and Andrew E. Woods, research historian. I made very good use of the D-Day Archival Collection and other 29th Infantry Division material held by the Maryland Military Historical Society at the Fifth Regiment Armory in Baltimore, Maryland. Thanks to Wayde Minami and especially Joe Balkoski.
The flourishing National World War II Museum in New Orleans has been a source of encouragement and assistance. Thanks to Gordon H. “Nick” Mueller, the president and CEO, Stephen Watson, Jeremy Collins, Lindsey Barnes, Cindy McCurdy, Tom Czekanski, Stacy Peckham, and Sam Wegner.
The Combined Arms Research Library at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, provided an exceptionally diverse array of materials. Thank you to Edwin B. Burgess, Rusty P. Rafferty, Kathleen M. Buker, and Elizabeth J. Merrifield.
In the Office of History for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at Ft. Belvoir, Virginia, I thank Michael J. Brodhead, John Lonnquest, and Matthew T. Pearcy. In the Special Collections and Archives at the U.S. Military Academy Library, West Point, New York, I thank Suzanne M. Christoff, Susan M. Lintelman, Alicia M. Mauldin-Ware, and Valerie Dutdut. Thanks too to Janis Jorgensen, the Heritage Collection manager at the U.S. Naval Institute in Annapolis, Maryland, and to John W. Greco at the Naval History and Heritage Command in Washington, D.C.
In the United Kingdom, I appreciate help from the staff of the National Archives in Kew. At the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives at King’s College in London, I thank Kate O’Brien, Frances Pattman, Lianne Smith, and Patricia J. Methven, the director of archive services. Grateful thanks once again to Roderick Suddaby and his staff in the Department of Documents at the Imperial War Museum. In Germany, thanks to Michael Epkenhans and Markus Pöhlmann at the Militärgeschictliches Forschungsamt in Potsdam.
Thanks to Doug McCabe, in the department of archives and special collections at Ohio University Library in Athens, Ohio, home to the remarkable Cornelius Ryan Collection. I also appreciate the help of Julian M. Pleasants and Diane Fischler in using the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, in the University of Florida history department. Likewise, I appreciate the help of Cynthia L. Tinker, project coordinator at the Center for the Study of War and Society, University of Tennessee at Knoxville.
At the York County Heritage Trust in York, Pennsylvania, Lila Fourhman-Shaull, the library and archives director, was especially generous in helping me research the papers of Jacob L. Devers. Thanks to Brig. Gen. (ret.) John W. Nicholson and Martha Sell of the American Battle Monuments Commission, and to Rena Church, director-curator of the Aurora Public Art Commission/ Grand Army of the Republic Museum in Aurora, Illinois.
Walking the ground is vital for any military historian, and I have visited most of the European battlefields described in this volume, beginning in the mid-1990s, when I served as the Berlin bureau chief of The Washington Post. On several occasions I had the good fortune to study the terrain, at places like the Bulge, the Hürtgen Forest, and Colmar, with professional soldiers. For this I particularly thank Gen. (ret.) Montgomery C. Meigs and Gen. Carter F. Ham, both of whom commanded the U.S. Army in Europe, as well as two former chiefs of Army history, Maj. Gen. (ret.) William A. Stofft and Brig. Gen. (ret.) Harold Nelson, and a team of fine historians: Scott Wheeler, Andrew N. Morris, and Layne Van Arsdale.
This is the sixth book I have written with the remarkable John Sterling as my editor and close friend; collectively those books total more than 3,700 pages, and John has improved every page. At Henry Holt, and at the publisher’s parent company, Macmillan, I also thank John Sargent, Steve Rubin, Maggie Richards, Pat Eisemann, Katie Kurtzman, Kenn Russell, Meryl Levavi, Emi Ikkanda, Chuck Thompson, Jason Liebman, and Muriel Jorgensen. Jolanta Benal has copyedited all three volumes of the Liberation Trilogy, making each better in ways large and small.
All sixty-eight maps in the Liberation Trilogy are the work of master cartographer Gene Thorp, who has been a delightful, innovative partner throughout this project. My friend and agent for twenty-seven years, Rafe Sagalyn, helped see me through it all.
My thanks also goes to Antony Beevor, Ben Bradlee, Tom Brokaw, Steve Coll, Leonard Downie, Jr., Glenn Frankel, Donald E. Graham, Ken Heckler, Fred Hiatt, Robert G. Kaiser, Lewis Libby, David H. Petraeus, Catherine B. Reynolds, Wayne R. Reynolds, Thomas E. Ricks, William B. Schultz, David Von Drehle, Geoffrey Wawro, Gerhard L. Weinberg, Bob Woodward, and fellow scribbler David Maraniss. Particular thanks to Sir Max Hastings and his wife, Penny, for their generous hospitality and friendship.
Grateful acknowledgment is made of permission to quote various materials: Viscount Montgomery of Alamein for extracts from the writings of his father, Field Marshal Bernard L. Montgomery; Roger Kirk for an oral history with Adm. Alan Goodrich Kirk; Virginia P. Montgomery, for extracts from an unpublished memoir by her father, Robert P. Patterson; Linda Gilmore, for extracts from a memoir by her brother, Richard Henry Byers; George Patton “Pat” Waters, for extracts from prisoner-of-war journals kept by his father, John K. Waters, and for a photograph of Lt. Col. Waters; Margot Taylor for extracts from “And Came Safe Home,” a diary by her father, William Steel Brownlie; Annette Conway for an extract from the “The Man Who Worked on Sunday,” by her father, L. F. Skinner; Mavis Jones for extracts from the papers of her husband, Lt. Col. E. Jones; and Dani Smith for extracts from the diary of her father, J. H. Patterson.
Also: the Trustees of the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, King’s College London, for material from the collections of Capt. B. H. Liddell Hart, Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke, Maj. Gen. J. B. Churcher, Maj. Gen. Francis de Guingand, Brigadier Sir Geoffrey Hardy-Roberts, Gen. H. L. Ismay, Col. T. G. Lindsay, Brig. J. S. W. Stone, and R. W. W. “Chester” Wilmot. And thanks to the Trustees of the Imperial War Museum, London, for material from the collection of Major E. M. Elliott.
In instances where current copyright holders could not be located, or where permissions arrived too late to be noted in this edition, I will gladly include acknowledgments in future editions.
Beyond all others, and far beyond this writer’s powers of expression, I thank my gorgeous wife of thirty-four years, Jane.
INDEX
The index that appeared in the print version of this title does not match the pages in your eBook. Please use the search function on your eReading device to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below.
Aachen
capture of
Cathedral treasures
QUEEN and
Abbaye-aux-Hommes
Abbaye Blanche
Abbaye d’Ardenne
Abrams, Lt. Col. Creighton W.,
Jr.
“Act of Military Surrender”
Adair, Maj. Gen. Allan H.S.
Adams, John
Adlerhorst (Hitler HQ)
African Americans
Agincourt, Battle of (1415)
Agony Grapevine
AIRMAIL program
ALBANY, Operation
Alençon
Alexander, Field Marshal Sir Harold
Alexandra, Czarina of Russia
Allen, Maj. Gen. Terry de la Mesa
Allied Control Council
Allied intelligence. See also Ultra
Allies. See also Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force; and specific countries and individuals
Anglo-American forces meet Red Army in Germany
British-American relationship and
conflicts over Bulge
conflicts over Strasbourg
conflicts over strategy
cost of war in Europe for
Eisenhower’s leadership style and
plan for postwar Europe and
postwar tensions among, and Yalta
strategic symbiosis of
Alsace
NORDWIND and
ALSOS intelligence unit
Alvarez, Luis W.
Ambrose, Stephen E.
American Legion
Amiens
Andrus, Maj. Gen. Clift
Antonov, Gen. Aleksei I.
Antwerp
Bulge and
Eisenhower vs. Montgomery and campaign for
ports and
V-1 and V-2 attacks
Antwerp X unit
ANVIL (later DRAGOON)
Anzio
Apollo, H.M.S.
Ardennes
Bulge and
German retreat from
HERBSTNEBEL and
Argentan
ARGONAUT. See Yalta Conference
Arkansas, U.S.S.
Armed Forces Network
Army Talks
Arnhem
Battle of
Arnold, Gen. Henry H. “Hap”
Aron, Robert
Arthur, Jean
Article of War No. 64
Ascension Day Commandos
Associated Press
As You Like It (Shakespeare)
Atlantic Wall
atomic bomb
Augusta, U.S.S.
Auschwitz concentration camp
Austerlitz, Battle of (1805)
Austria
Authie
Avranches
Axis
disintegration of
Axis Sally
B-17 Flying Fortresses
B-24 Liberators
B-26 Marauders
B-29 Superfortress
Babcock, John B.
Baby Blitz (January–May 1944)
Baccarat
Base 901
Baedeker, Karl
Balck, Gen. Hermann
Balkans
Balkoski, Joseph
Baltic
Barnett, U.S.S.
Barton, Maj. Gen. Raymond O. “Tubby”
Bastogne
Battle of
Baugnez massacre. See also Malmédy massacre
Baum, Capt. Abraham J. (Task Force Baum)
Bayerlein, Gen. Fritz
Bayeux
fall of
Bayeux Tapestry
Bayfield, U.S.S.
BBC
Beauvoir, Simone de
Beckett, Samuel
Beethoven, Ludwig van
Belfort Gap
Belgian resistance
Belgium
Bulge and
civilians in
liberation of
Bell for Adano, A (Hersey)
Belorussia
Bennett, Ralph
Bénouville bridge
Berchtesgaden
Bergen-Belsen concentration camp
Berghof (Hitler home)
Bergman, Ingrid
Beria, Lavrenty P.
Berlin
bombing of
Eisenhower on
Eisenhower shifts from, as main objective
Eisenhower vs. Montgomery and single- vs. multipronged thrust toward
fall of
final days of war and
postwar plan for
Soviet advance on
V-E Day and
Yalta and
Berlin, Isaiah
BERLIN plan. See MARKET GARDEN, Operation
Bernhard, Prince of the Netherlands
Bernières
Besançon
Best
Béthouart, Gen. Antoine
Beveland Peninsula
biological weapons
Bitburg
Bittrich, Gen. Wilhelm
Bizerte
Black Forest (Schwarzwald)
black market
Blake, William
Blaskowitz, Gen. Johannes
Blithe Spirit (Coward)
Blumentritt, Gen. Günther
BODENPLATTE, Operation (Hangover Raid)
Bogart, Humphrey
Boggess, Lt. Charles
Bohlen, Charles E.
bombing
Bulge and
Caen and
COBRA and
CROSSBOW vs. V-1 sites
D-Day and
DRAGOON and
Falaise and
fratricidal
of Germany
MARKET GARDEN and
OVERLORD and
“precision”
Roer and
St.-Vith and
Bormann, Martin
BOSTON, Operation
Boulogne
Bourg-Léopold
Bourguébus Ridge
Bradley, Gen. Omar N.
Antwerp and
awarded fourth star
Berlin and
Brereton and
Brittany and
Bulge and
Churchill and
COBRA and
concentration camps and
D-Day and
Devers and
Eisenhower and
Eisenhower shifts main attack to
Eisenhower vs. Montgomery and
Falaise Pocket and
final days of war and
First Army returned to command of
Frankfurt advance and
fuel shortages and
German surrender and
heads new 12th Army Group
Hodges and
Hürtgen and
January 1945 position of
Le Mans and
liberation of Paris and
logistics and
Luxemburg HQ of
manpower shortages and
MARKET GARDEN and
Merkers treasure and
Metz and
Montgomery and
Namur HQ and
Ninth Army and
Normandy and
OVERLORD plan and
Patch and
Patton and
propaganda and
Pyle and
QUEEN and
Rhine crossing and
Ruhr and
Ted Roosevelt and
Victory position of
winter supplies and
Brandenberger, Gen. Erich
Braque, Georges
Bratge, Capt. Willi
Braun, Eva
Braun, Wernher von
Breedonck prison
Brenner Pass, Allied forces meet at
Brereton, Lt. Gen. Lewis H.
Breskens Pocket
Brest
Bridge Too Far, A (Ryan)
Bright, Sgt. Alton C.
Britain. See also specific battles, individuals and military units
Alliance formed by
Eisenhower honored in
impact of war on
manpower shortages
Britain, Battle of
“Britain is Now Occupied Territory” (Orwell)
British I Airborne Corps
British 1st Airborne Division
British I Corps
British Second Army
British 3rd Parachute Brigade
British 3rd Infantry Division
British 4th Queen’s Own Hussars
British 6th Airborne Division
British 7th Armored Division (Desert Rats)
British VII Corps
British Eighth Army
British VIII Corps
British 11th Armored Division
British XII Corps
British 21st Army Group
advance to Belgium
advance to Germany
Antwerp and
Berlin and
Bulge and
casualties and
German surrender and
January 1945 position of
MARKET GARDEN and
OVERLORD and
Rhine crossing and
Ruhr and
victory position of
British XXX Corps
British 43rd Infantry Division
British 50th Infantry Division
British 51st Highland Division
British Air Ministry
British Bomber Command
British Coldstream Guards Regiment
British Commandos
British Dorsetshire Regiment
British Empire
British Foreign Office
British Grenadier Guards Regiment
British Guards Armored Division
British Home Guard
British Irish Guards Regiment
British King’s Liverpool Regiment
British Liberation Army
British Ministry of Transport
British Royal Air Force (RAF)
British Royal Army Pay Corps
British Royal Artillery
British Royal Engineers
British Royal Hampshire Regiment
British Royal Marine Commandos
British Royal Marines
British Royal Navy
British Royal Signal Corps
British Royal Warwickshire Regiment
British Scots Guards Regiment
British War Office
British Welsh Guards Regiment
Brittany
Brolo landing
Brooke, Field Marshal Sir Alan
dwindling of army and
Eisenhower and
German surrender and
Malta and
Montgomery vs. Eisenhower and
personality of
VARSITY PLUNDER and
on WW II
Yalta and
Brooks, Maj. Gen. Edward H.
Browning, Lt. Gen. Frederick A.M. “Boy”
Bruce, David K.E.