War Diaries

These are entirely Napoleon Bonaparte's own words, written and spoken, and collected in journal form. A particular focus here has been put on Napoleon's writings that pertain to military and state matters. The dates in terms of the revolutionary calendar have been modernized, and names and titles of individuals mentioned have been maintained with no attempt at uniformity. This production was begun on the 250th year of Napoleon's birth.

The late Dr. Michihiko Hachiya was director of the Hiroshima Communications Hospital when the world's first atomic bomb was dropped on the city. Though his responsibilities in the appalling chaos of a devastated city were awesome, he found time to record the story daily, with compassion and tenderness. Dr. Hachiya's compelling diary was originally published by the UNC Press in 1955, with the help of Dr. Warner Wells of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Sir Barnes Wallis CBE became a household name after the hit 1954 film The Dam Busters in which Michael Redgrave portrayed a shy, slightly abstracted genius at odds with bureaucracy. Yet this was a simplified picture of a complicated, mercurial man. Wallis' contribution to British aircrafts and weapons is legendary; from the R100 intercontinental airship and innovative aircrafts like the Wellesley and Wellington, to bombs that destroyed hitherto invulnerable targets, and variable-geometry aerodynes.

In 1939, 17-year-old Mary found herself in an extraordinary position at an extraordinary time: it was the outbreak of the Second World War and her father, Winston Churchill, had been appointed first lord of the admiralty; within months he would be prime minister. The young Mary Churchill was uniquely placed to observe this remarkable historical moment and her diaries - most of which have never been published - provide a front-row view of the great events of war, as well as exchanges and intimate moments with her father.

Nazi-occupied Prague, 1942: Amelia is hiding in her closet when flashlights blind her and she’s captured by the SS. Out on the cobblestone street, her heart shatters as her mother is shot before her eyes. She is shoved onto a freight train with hundreds of others—hours pass as they travel in darkness. Arriving in a concentration camp, Amelia fears for her life when she is led to a block by a soldier. He is her enemy, yet he secretly passes her a piece of bread; an act that saves her.

July 1942 Dear diary, despite the war raging around me, I find I can’t stop thinking about the American officer, Sergeant Dale Johnson. I’ve never known anyone as brave, kind and handsome! But I promised myself I wouldn’t care this much about a man again, especially when he could be transferred at any time. Yet that only makes me want to relish our time together. Now fighting my heart feels like the biggest battle.

Viscount Horatio Nelson (1758-1805), known as ‘The Hero’ during his own lifetime was both an inspiring commander and an innovative tactician, becoming a rear admiral after defeating the Spanish fleet at the Battle of Cape St Vincent. He was also responsible for the great victories of the Nile (1798) and Copenhagen (1801). Revered by his officers and men, he was renowned for both his arrogance and his scandalous love affair with the beautiful Emma Hamilton.

The candid, poignant, unforgettable writing of the young girl whose own life story has become an everlasting source of courage and inspiration. Hiding from the Nazis in the “Secret Annex” of an old office building in Amsterdam, a 13-year-old girl named Anne Frank became a writer. The now famous diary of her private life and thoughts reveals only part of Anne’s story, however. This audiobook rounds out the portrait of this remarkable and talented young author.

Since 2002, Mohamedou Slahi has been imprisoned at the detention camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. In all these years, the United States has never charged him with a crime. A federal judge ordered his release in March 2010, but the U.S. government fought that decision, and there is no sign that the United States plans to let him go.

Martha Gellhorn was a strong-willed, self-made, modern woman whose journalism, and life, were widely influential at the time and cleared a path for women who came after her. An ardent anti-fascist, she wrote about real people doing real things with intelligence and passion. She is most famous, to her enduring exasperation, as Ernest Hemingway's third wife. Long after their divorce, her short tenure as "Mrs. Hemingway" from 1940 to 1945 invariably eclipsed her writing and, consequently, she never received her full due.

25,000 feet above Malta -- that is where the Spitfires intercepted the Messerschmitts, Macchis and Reggianes as they swept eastwards in their droves, screening the big Junkers with their bomb loads as they pummeled the island beneath -- the most bombed patch of ground in the world.

For the vast majority of its war, 514 Squadron was stationed at RAF Waterbeach, Cambridgeshire, operating Lancaster bombers. Aircrew members were drawn not just from Britain but also Canada, Australia, and New Zealand amongst others. Over 400 members of the squadron were to lose their lives in the two years of the squadron's existence, which saw the loss on operations of 66 aircraft, with another 14 being written off in accidents.

This unique and gripping document contains the recently discovered diaries of a German businessman, John Rabe, who saved so many lives in the infamous siege of Nanking in 1937 that he is now being honored as the Oskar Schindler of China. As the Japanese army closed in and all foreigners were ordered to evacuate, Rabe mobilized the remaining Westerners in Nanking and organized an "International Safety Zone" which guaranteed safety to all unarmed Chinese by virtue of Germany's pact.

The diary of a young Jewish housewife who, together with her husband and five-month-old baby, fled the Warsaw ghetto at the last possible moment, and survived the Holocaust hidden on the "Aryan" side of town in the loft of a run-down tinsmith's shed. Rescued from the Ashes documents the incredible life story of Leokadia Schmidt and her small family and their daily struggle to survive the Warsaw Ghetto.

The first volume in the best-selling Letters of Note series was a collection of hundreds of the world's most entertaining, inspiring, and unusual letters, based on the seismically popular website of the same name. In this volume, Shaun Usher turns to the theme of war. Letters of Note: War brings together some of the most remarkable letters that encapsulate human experience of war, from unimaginable feats of courage and compassion, to unthinkable episodes of violence and horror. Includes letters by Kurt Vonnegut, Alexander Hamilton, Martha Gellhorn, and many more.

Rhianyn's mother, Traphaunes' wife, a student of Cordysia's greatest Elven teacher, a veteran of the First Sylestian War, one of new Sylestia's cultural architects, guildmaster of the War Mages, accomplished poet (although few knew), midwife, mentor to Elven cadets, and some even believed a prophetess.

World War II rises in its vastness and complexity over the rest of human history. The war was a gigantic melting pot of violence, power, and ideology that will leave an indelible scar on human history. This diary of the Second World War has been able to cover all facets of the conflict and is a fundamentally empirical work, which narrates events as they occurred, rejecting value judgments, and therein lies its value. The Second World War Diary represents a milestone in this field. This audiobook includes 12 hours, the 12 months, day by day, from January 1944 to December 1944.

World War II rises in its vastness and complexity over the rest of human history. This diary of the Second World War has been able to cover all facets of the conflict and is a fundamentally empirical work, which narrates events as they occurred, rejecting value judgments, and therein lies its value: It is an insurmountable encyclopedia as an audiobook. This audiobook includes the year 1945 till the end of WW2 and a one-hour special, "Defendants in the Courtroom", which includes the Nuremberg Trials and more.

World War II rises in its vastness and complexity over the rest of human history. A number of victims difficult to conceive, never surpassed by any other conflict; the masses of men, women, and resources mobilized in a conflict that shook even the most remote ends of the planet; the ideological battle between totalitarianism and democracy, between fascism and communism, the passions and hatred that it aroused; the unimaginable horror and fanaticism of the Holocaust; geopolitical games; the repetition of World War I on an even more dire scale.

World War II rises in its vastness and complexity over the rest of human history. A number of victims difficult to conceive, never surpassed by any other conflict; the masses of men, women, and resources mobilized in a conflict that shook even the most remote ends of the planet; the ideological battle between totalitarianism and democracy, between fascism and communism, the passions and hatred that it aroused; the unimaginable horror and fanaticism of the Holocaust; geopolitical games; the repetition of World War I, on an even more dire scale.