Lanterna Rally
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The Road to Russia
Author: Bernard Edwards
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
Published: 2002-01-01
Total Pages: 225
ISBN-13: 0850528984
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Bernard Edwards, the formidable naval historian, has researched the fate of Convoys PQ13 and PQ17 bound from Iceland to Northern Russia as well as the westbound Convoy QP13. Attacked relentlessly by aircraft and U-boats, the former lost a total of thirty ships while QP13 ran into a British minefield off Iceland, losing seven vessels. The Road to Russia is an important addition to the bibliography of this bitterly fought campaign.
Allied Convoys to Northern Russia, 1941–1945
Author: William Smith
Publisher: Pen and Sword Maritime
Published: 2024-03-30
Total Pages: 365
ISBN-13: 1399054759
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →While the experiences of the men and ships who sailed in the Allied convoys to North Russia between August 1941 and May 1945 have been fully documented, the wider political, diplomatic and military factors which determined the campaign are less well known. The principal actors Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin each had their own agendas and expectations, influenced by advisers and competing national priorities. These inevitably gave rise to differences putting pressure in turn on the convoy program while the varying effectiveness of German counter-action was a significant and unpredictable factor. 1942 was dominated by pressure on Churchill from Roosevelt and Stalin to increase the size of convoys at a time when the Royal Navy lacked the necessary escorts. This deficiency was exacerbated by heavy merchant shipping losses and the demands of Operation TORCH. The temporary convoy suspension in 1943 followed the deployment of German heavy warships to Norway and the diversion of escorts to Operation HUSKY. A serious Anglo-Soviet rift, which led to Allied threats to discontinue the program, was only resolved by lengthy negotiations. It resumed until temporarily suspended due to the D-Day landings after which the increasing escort availability allowed operations to run uninterrupted until May 1945. This carefully researched work providing an overview of the strategic factors dominating the costly yet war-winning Arctic convoy program will be welcomed by experts and laymen alike.
Arctic Convoys 1942
Author: Mark Lardas
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2022-09-15
Total Pages: 190
ISBN-13: 1472852443
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →A new history of the most crucial few months of the Arctic Convoys, when Germany's air power forced the Allies to retreat to the cover of winter. Between spring and autumn 1942, Germany was winning the battle of the Arctic Convoys. Half of PQ-15 was sunk in May, PQ-17 was virtually obliterated in July, and in September 30 percent of PQ-18 was sunk. The Allies were forced to suspend the convoys until December, when the long Arctic nights would shield them. Mark Lardas argues that in 1942, it was Luftwaffe air power that made the difference. With convoys sailing in endless daylight, German strike aircraft now equipped and trained for torpedo attacks, and bases in northern Norway available, the Luftwaffe could wreak havoc. Three-quarters of the losses of PQ-18 were due to air attacks. But in November, the Luftwaffe was redeployed south to challenge the Allied landings in North Africa, and the advantage was lost. Despite that, the Allies never again sailed an Arctic convoy in the summer months. Fully illustrated with archive photos, striking new artwork, maps and diagrams, this is the remarkable history of the Luftwaffe's last strategic victory of World War II.
Forgotten Sacrifice
Author: Michael G. Walling
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2012-10-20
Total Pages: 365
ISBN-13: 1782002901
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Award-winning historian Mike Walling captures the essence of the Arctic Convoys of World War II. In 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union in the largest offensive operation ever undertaken. Operation Barbarossa saw defeat after defeat heaped on the Soviet army. With Russia's forces left staggering under the strain and in desperate need of supplies, Britain and the United States launched an ambitious operation to resupply the Soviet Union using convoys sent through the Arctic. Their journey was punctuated by torpedo attacks in freezing conditions, Stuka dive bombers, naval gun fire, and weeks of total darkness in the Arctic winter, with ships disappearing below the waves weighed down by the ice and snow on their decks. Drawing on hundreds of oral histories from eyewitnesses and veterans of the convoys, plus original research into the Russian Navy archives at Murmansk, historian Michael G. Walling offers a fresh retelling of one of World War II's pivotal yet largely overlooked campaigns.
Arctic Convoys 1942
Author: Mark Lardas
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2022-09-15
Total Pages: 97
ISBN-13: 1472852419
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →A new history of the most crucial few months of the Arctic Convoys, when Germany's air power forced the Allies to retreat to the cover of winter. Between spring and autumn 1942, Germany was winning the battle of the Arctic Convoys. Half of PQ-15 was sunk in May, PQ-17 was virtually obliterated in July, and in September 30 percent of PQ-18 was sunk. The Allies were forced to suspend the convoys until December, when the long Arctic nights would shield them. Mark Lardas argues that in 1942, it was Luftwaffe air power that made the difference. With convoys sailing in endless daylight, German strike aircraft now equipped and trained for torpedo attacks, and bases in northern Norway available, the Luftwaffe could wreak havoc. Three-quarters of the losses of PQ-18 were due to air attacks. But in November, the Luftwaffe was redeployed south to challenge the Allied landings in North Africa, and the advantage was lost. Despite that, the Allies never again sailed an Arctic convoy in the summer months. Fully illustrated with archive photos, striking new artwork, maps and diagrams, this is the remarkable history of the Luftwaffe's last strategic victory of World War II.
The Allied Convoy System, 1939-1945
Author: Arnold Hague
Publisher: US Naval Institute Press
Published: 2000
Total Pages: 216
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Drawn from one of largest collections of convoy records in existence, this book describes the development and operations of Allied convoy systems.
Why Me, Lord?
Author: William A. Carter
Publisher: Jabberwocky Books
Published: 2007
Total Pages: 0
ISBN-13: 9780980245714
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Why Me, Lord? is a firsthand account by a veteran of one of the most tragic chapters in World War II naval history, the infamous PQ 17 convoy across the North Atlantic to north Russia in the summer of 1942. 35 merchant ships carried war materiel to support the Soviet defense against invading Nazi armies before the U.S. and Great Britain opened a second front with the invasion of North Africa late in 1942. After the convoy was abandoned by its American and British naval escort vessels in U-boat-infested waters, 24 of its 35 merchant ships were lost to enemy attack. The author, then a young U.S. Naval officer commanded a Navy Armed Guard contingent aboard the American freighter, S.S. Ironclad, and was awarded the Silver Star for valor as a result of his leadership during combat with attacking German aircraft. He tells the story of his experiences in vivid detail and paints a memorable portrait of both the wartime navy and Soviet Russia's White Sea ports. The book also details the return voyage aboard the U.S. liberty ship, S.S. Richard Bland, which, if anything, was even more harrowing. The Bland was sunk off Iceland after being torpedoed three times north of the Arctic Circle, with its surviving crew members, including the author, being forced into lifeboats in frigid North Atlantic waters. Written more than 60 years after the events it describes, "Why Me, Lord?" is one of the very few, and quite possibly the last, firsthand accounts of this important, though little known, chapters of World War II naval history.
Through Ice and Fire
Author: Leona J. Thomas
Publisher:
Published: 2015
Total Pages: 240
ISBN-13: 9781781554401
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →On the Russian Arctic convoys in 1942, Leonard H. Thomas kept a secret notebook from which he later wrote his memoirs. These contained many well-observed details of life onboard his ship, HMS Ulster Queen. He detailed observations of the hardships that followed when they endured being at action stations and locked in the engine room, under fire from the skies above and the sea below, and only able to guess at what was happening from the cacophony of sounds they could hear. Thomas tells of how the crew suffered from an appalling lack of food, the intense cold, and the stark conditions endured for weeks on end berthed in Archangel in the cold of the approaching Russian winter. There are also insights about the morale of the men and lighter moments when their humor kept them going. These stories can now be told as his daughter has edited them into an account that illustrates the fortitude and bravery of the men who sailed through ice and fire to further the war effort so far from home.
The Royal Navy and the Arctic Convoys
Author: Malcolm Llewellyn-Jones
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2013-05-13
Total Pages: 280
ISBN-13: 1134730101
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →The book is a masterpiece of operational history, and is written with surprising candour, given that the author was a member of the Naval Staff. The men who took part in these operations were drawn from Britain, Canada, America (particularly for the merchant service). This book provides a detailed account of naval actions (with maps) based on close examination of all relevant documentation and interviews with principal participants.
