Pappy's War

Pappy's War PDF Author: John Paris
Publisher: Merriam Press
ISBN: 1576382095
Category : Airmen
Languages : en
Pages : 412

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Book Description

Pappy's War

Pappy's War PDF Author: John Paris
Publisher: Merriam Press
ISBN: 1576382095
Category : Airmen
Languages : en
Pages : 412

Get Book Here

Book Description


Pappy's War

Pappy's War PDF Author: John Paris
Publisher: CreateSpace
ISBN: 9781470053703
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
Merriam Press Military Monograph 17. Fifth Edition (February 2012). This story is about the author's experiences while serving as an enlisted man in the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II. It is a condensed narrative of his training in the States, and his experiences in the Eighth Air Force in wartime England in early 1944. While with the Eighth he participated in some of the greatest air battles ever fought. These included bombing raids over Hamburg, Berlin and Leipzig along with other lesser-known targets. His B-17 sustained grievous damage while on a "milk run" over France, and later was shot down while raiding the great industrial city of Leipzig located deep in the eastern part of Germany. Then his narration recounts the trials and tribulations of his bailout, capture, interrogation, and confinement in Stalag-Luft IV. This prisoner of war camp was located in the province of Pomerania, in north central Germany, that is now part of Poland. He was known as "Kriegsgefagen der Luftwaffe" #3057. Incarcerated there for a period of six months, he relates the story of his life as a prisoner of the Germans. Late in the war, as the Russians were driving into Poland, and threatening to encircle their place of confinement, they were marched west in the dead of winter with little food or shelter, for a total of seventy days. It was the worst winter in northern Europe since such records were kept, as attested by the severe weather encountered by our troops during the Battle of the Bulge. While on this march, along with three others, he escaped. After three weeks, and many adventures later, they broke into the British battle lines near Hanover. Relive John's odyssey as a member of a B-17 crew of the 600th Bomb Squadron, 398th Bomb Group, Eighth Air Force. Contents: Dedication; Acknowledgments; Preface; "Big Ass Bird"; England; Hamburg; First Blood; Big "B"; Milk Run; London Town; Red Lion Inn; Toulouse; Mayday (M'daidez); Bailout; Frankfurt; Kriegie; Black March; Escape; Back Up, Joe; 398th Bombardment Group (H); Boeing B-17G "Flying Fortress" Flies Again in the Markings of the 398th Bomb Group; 42 photos and illustrations.

Pappy Gunn

Pappy Gunn PDF Author: Nathaniel Gunn
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781418437763
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 456

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Book Description
The name--..oft heard and heralded during and after World War II PAPPY GUNN ordinarily speaks for itself----------------------------however in this book, the unforgettable, untold to this day, human story of the legendary "Pappy Gunn," hero of the Pacific Air War and to his family who knew and loved him ------.this story is told with the understanding of one who had the foreknowledge and burning determination to sort out the facts and myths about him, Nathaniel Gunn, the author, fellow lover of flying, and his youngest son, who was with him until his untimely crash in Civilian life doing what he loved to do - flying, flying, flying!! You'll find the story intriguing in its discoveries, packed with Pappy's own personal original files, long forgotten letters, documents and photographs spanning Pappy's youth into the U.S. Navy, marriage, retirement in Hawaii and move to the Philippine Islands. Then, the untimely entrance of the United States in the WWII bombing and capture of Manila. Most of all, this story draws a perceptive focus on --.the man----as the person and courageous patriot he truly was, joining the U. S.Air Force he was at this time--. Fighting 3 wars at once His family imprisoned by the Japanese.. The brass who needed him to accomplish the impossible And, the enemy who had the upperhand, but not for long !! Thank God - his was a triumphant battle in all three!!!!

Indestructible

Indestructible PDF Author: John R Bruning
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0316339393
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 512

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Book Description
In this remarkable WWII story by New York Times bestselling author John R. Bruning, a renegade American pilot fights against all odds to rescue his family -- imprisoned by the Japanese--and revolutionizes modern warfare along the way. From the knife fights and smuggling runs of his youth to his fiery days as a pioneering naval aviator, Paul Irving "Pappy" Gunn played by his own set of rules and always survived on his wits and fists. But when he fell for a conservative Southern belle, her love transformed him from a wild and reckless airman to a cunning entrepreneur whose homespun engineering brilliance helped launch one of the first airlines in Asia. Pappy was drafted into MacArthur's air force when war came to the Philippines; and while he carried out a top-secret mission to Australia, the Japanese seized his family. Separated from his beloved wife, Polly, and their four children, Pappy reverted to his lawless ways. He carried out rescue missions with an almost suicidal desperation. Even after he was shot down twice and forced to withdraw to Australia, he waged a one-man war against his many enemies -- including the American high command and the Japanese--and fought to return to the Philippines to find his family. Without adequate planes, supplies, or tactics, the U.S. Army Air Force suffered crushing defeats by the Japanese in the Pacific. Over the course of his three-year quest to find his family, Pappy became the renegade who changed all that. With a brace of pistols and small band of loyal fol,lowers, he robbed supply dumps, stole aircraft, invented new weapons, and modified bombers to hit harder, fly farther, and deliver more destruction than anything yet seen in the air. When Pappy's modified planes were finally unleashed during the Battle of the Bismarck Sea, the United States scored one of the most decisive victories of World War II. Taking readers from the blistering skies of the Pacific to the jungles of New Guinea and the Philippines to one of the the war's most notorious prison camps, Indestructible traces one man's bare-knuckle journey to free the people he loved and the aerial revolution he sparked that continues to resonate across America's modern battlefields.

Operation PLUM

Operation PLUM PDF Author: Adrian R. Martin
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 1603441840
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385

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Book Description
They went in as confident young warriors. They came out as battle-scarred veterans, POW camp survivors . . . or worse. The Army Air Corps’ 27th Bombardment Group arrived in the Philippines in November 1941 with 1,209 men; one year later, only 20 returned to the United States. The Japanese attacked the Philippines on the same morning as Pearl Harbor and invaded soon after. Allied air routes back to the Philippines were soon cut, forcing pilots to fight their air war from bases in Java, Australia, and New Guinea. The men on Bataan were eventually taken prisoner and forced into the infamous Death March. The 27th and other such units were pivotal in delaying the Japanese timetable for conquest. If not for these units, some have suggested, the Allied offensive in the Pacific might have started in Hawaii or even California instead of New Guinea and the surrounding islands. Based largely on primary materials, including a fifty-nine-page report written by the surviving unit members in September 1942, Operation PLUM (from the code name for the U.S. Army in the Philippines) gives an account of the 27th Bombardment Group and, through it, the opening months of the Pacific theater. Military historians and readers interested in World War II will appreciate the rich perspective presented in Operation PLUM

Baa Baa Black Sheep

Baa Baa Black Sheep PDF Author: Gregory Boyington
Publisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0804150796
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 363

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Book Description
Here, in his own words, is the true story of America's wildest flying hero, of his extraordinary heroism, and of his greatest battle of all—the fight to survive. The World War II air war in the Pacific needed tough men like Colonel Pappy Boyington and his Black Sheep Squadron. The legendary Marine Corps officer and his bunch of misfits, outcasts, and daredevils gave new definition to “hell-raising”—on the ground and in the skies. Pappy himself was a living legend—he personally shot down twenty-eight Japanese planes, and won the Congressional Medal of Honor and the Navy Cross. He broke every rule in the book doing so, but when he fell into the hands of the vengeful Japanese his real ordeal began.

Pappyland

Pappyland PDF Author: Wright Thompson
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0735221251
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
The New York Times bestseller! “A warm and loving reflection that, like good bourbon, will stand the test of time.” —Eric Asimov, The New York Times “Bourbon is for sharing, and so is Pappyland.”—The Wall Street Journal The story of how Julian Van Winkle III, the caretaker of the most coveted cult Kentucky Bourbon whiskey in the world, fought to protect his family's heritage and preserve the taste of his forebears, in a world where authenticity, like his product, is in very short supply. Following his father’s death decades ago, Julian Van Winkle stepped in to try to save the bourbon business his grandfather had founded on the mission statement: “We make fine bourbon—at a profit if we can, at a loss if we must, but always fine bourbon.” With the company in its wilderness years, Julian committed to safeguarding his namesake’s legacy or going down with the ship. Then he discovered that hundreds of barrels from the family distillery had survived their sale to a multinational conglomerate. The whiskey that Julian produced after recovering those barrels would immediately be hailed as the greatest in the world—and soon would be the hardest to find. Once they had been used up, a fresh challenge began: preserving the taste of Pappy in a new age. Wright Thompson was invited to ride along as Julian undertook the task. From the Van Winkle family, Wright learned not only about great bourbon but about complicated legacies and the rewards of honoring your people and your craft—lessons that he couldn’t help but apply to his own work and life. May we all be lucky enough to find some of ourselves, as Wright Thompson did, in Pappyland.

Risk Taker, Spy Maker

Risk Taker, Spy Maker PDF Author: Barry Michael Broman
Publisher: Casemate
ISBN: 1612008976
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
“Broman’s true tales of putting his life on the line recruiting and running spies in a dozen countries are the stuff of action movies.” —Peter Arnett, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Live from the Battlefield Joining the CIA after fighting in Vietnam as a Marine, Barry Broman’s first posting was war-torn Cambodia. He was present at the fall of Phnom Penh in 1975, escaping just before the Khmer Rouge took power. During his career, he was twice chief of station, once a deputy chief of station, and he supervised an international paramilitary project in support of the Cambodian resistance to Vietnamese invaders. He was actively involved in several assignments in counter-narcotics operations in Southeast Asia including a major bust that yielded 551 kilograms of high-grade heroin from a major drug trafficker. His favorite agent against a variety of hard targets was a fellow whose only demand was that his assignments be “life threatening.” (He survived them all.) As amazing as the characters Broman has met are the places he’s been, with visits to little-known and rarely seen places like the Naga Hills on the India–Burma border, the world-famous but off-limits jade and ruby mines of Burma, and the isolated Banda Islands of Indonesia, the home of nutmeg. Broman’s engaging tone is complemented by photographs taken throughout his career, many of them his own, made using the skills he learned as a teenager working for the Associated Press in Southeast Asia—including Marines in action in Vietnam, the ravages of war in Cambodia, and opium buyers forcing growers to sell in Burma. “[A] remarkable life story.” —Booklist

Winning from Downunder

Winning from Downunder PDF Author: Noel Tunny
Publisher: Boolarong Press
ISBN: 1921555572
Category : World War, 1939-1945
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
WINNING FROM DOWNUNDER discusses the three advantages namely Leadership, Largesse and Luck enjoyed by the U.S.A. and Australia that brought the Japanese conquest of South East Asia and much of the Pacific to an end. The book gives insights into the personalities of the senior leaders of the Allies as revealed by their own actions and by the opinions expressed by their contemporaries. Some contentious topics are analysed such as what did Churchill and Roosevelt know about the Japanese plans before Pearl Harbour, the facts behind L.B. Johnson's visit to Australia and his receipt of a Silver Star Medal and whether or not there was a 'Brisbane Line' defense planned for Australia. When discussing the Atomic Bombing,the Women who went to War, the Heroism and the Brutality of War, this book is faithful to Lord Byrons belief that there are deeds that should not pass away and names that should not be forgotten. and the observation of Sir George MacAuley Trevalyn referring to the impelling poetry of truth in Historical Study.

One of Thousands: A Navigator in the European Air War

One of Thousands: A Navigator in the European Air War PDF Author: Frederick Fooy
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 1483429156
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 250

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Book Description
Jules "Julie" Lasner volunteered for service after the United States entered World War II, and he was trained as a navigator in a B-17 Flying Fortress. Lasner flew twenty-seven missions over occupied Europe during the final phases of a strategic bombing campaign against Germany, dodging the Luftwaffe's anti-aircraft defenses in the cold, wintry skies. Based on interviews with Lasner as well as his wartime correspondence, this book offers a glimpse into his experiences as a member of the 8th Air Force. Along with thousands of others, he pounded the Third Reich around the clock in a four-engine bomber over the last eight months of the war. This account offers an insider's look into the state of the German air defenses as well as some of the effects of the strategic bomb offensive. Lasner's story shows that one person's experiences and decisions affect many people, and it also reveals how he was affected by total war. Go beyond the statistics that so often dehumanize conflict with One of Thousands.