Book Description
Here is a unique collection of fifty years of essays by William F. Buckley, Jr. chosen to form an unconventioanl career as the consevative writer par excellence.
Customer Reviews:
Interesting Read on a Conservative Icon.......2007-04-25
Miles Gone By is an account of the life of William Buckley, whom many see as a conservative icon. Buckley shares many facets of his interesting life, particularly the following:
1. Early childhood and close-knit family (I believe he was one of 10 children).
2. Memories of his father and mother both of who he loved dearly.
3. His years at Yale University and how the liberal bias drove him to write his book "God and Man at Yale".
4. Memories of the 1950 class at Yale.
5. His deep sea expedition to see the wreck of the Titanic.
6. His sailing and skiing trips with various celebrities.
7. Starting the National Review.
8. Relationships with 10 special people of various backgrounds and poltical persuasions (David Niven, Ronald Reagan, Henry Kissinger, Clare Boothe Luce, Tom Wolfe, Vladimir Horowitz, Roger Moore, Alistair Cooke, Princess Grace, and John Kenneth Galbraith). I particularly enjoyed this section.
The areas mentioned above are just a few mentioned. While Buckley undeniably comes from a rather refined background, his writing style is not arrogant. Indeed, he often thanks his Creator for the life he has lived and gives credit to other people when due.
Read and enjoy the book and learn more about one of our country's great conservative icons. Recommended.
Interesting and Unique. Provides a large step to understanding the puzzle of this author.......2006-12-31
"Miles Gone By" seems to be a near complete biography and one that allows the reader to see how the puzzle fits together. It would be easy to overlook the uniqueness of this life by labeling the author as mostly reflecting a political point of view. He has shown in many of his other books his diversity of interests and his ability to inform his readers about activities and the events taking place in the world at the same time. I remember in his book "Racing Through Paradise how much I learned about sailing and how interesting it was to consider his political points of view presented as a part of each days activities. Miles Gone By seems to show the many sides and interests of his life as pieces of puzzle that reveal more of who he really is. The story is not in his point of view but is more so in whom he really is.
A favorite chapter (2) was "God and Man at Yale" which was about his first book. I like to underline in red what stands out as I read and this chapter is mostly "red" in my book. In 1950 it was controversial to defend individualism, religion and capitalism. His education seemed to be, somewhat like his early life, one full of advantage and opportunity. Considering that it was even more of a surprise when he questioned the very mission of the institution he had been privileged to attend. He replied to his critics saying "a very recent graduate is not only supremely qualified, but uniquely qualified, to write about the ideological impact of an education he has experienced."
Later in the book he says that as a senior citizen his faith has never left him. Through out his life we find in this biography that he has held tight to his religious convictions. Considering the years his life has spanned in the political arena this willingness to proclaim his own faith is made even clearer in this book.
Both Buckley and Nixon have written about world leaders in a way that really adds to ones understanding of events. In many of Nixon's books those insights, even though insightful, seemed stand-alone. In this book many of the chapters deal with relationships but instead of standing alone as a subject for consideration they validate the unique impact that Buckley has had thorough out his life. This book will show you a very very interesting man.
Hear this book!.......2006-06-26
The best way to read this book is to hear it, to get the audio CD. I am not in tune with Mr. Buckley's political and religious views, but am in admiration of his love of the written and spoken word and of debate. His reading of the text is a treat, and I take inspiration from his breadth of interests and friendships with those whose views he does not agree.
Fear not the eschaton; Miles Gone By.......2006-04-17
"Herein lies an anachronism in the vast expanse of eternity." was to be carved into the headstone of Lord Peter Wimsey, a character written by Dorothy L. Sayers, however it is a fitting commentary to Buckley's collected personal essays. Buckley writes best when he writes personally, and his collection of pieces chosen here will stand the test of time more elegantly than columns with titles that read, "Robert S. McNamara, Crime Syndicate Head."(Although come to think of it, perhaps history has leant that some heft. However, most people alive don't know who the Whiz Kid was, and so much of what Buckley wrote of is meaningless to four generations, now. It is hard for many people to understand that most people under the age of forty in this country have very little memory of Ronald Reagan.) And yet, when we come to the personal, there is a voice for manners, for elegance in language, pride in scholarly pursuit and sportsmanship, that cries out like a voice in the wilderness. His writing on these subjects that touch his heart is timeless. I expect he has often repeated those words of Whittaker Chambers on Weariness, because they haunt him, when reflected upon, they resonate more deeply with me at forty than they did at seventeen when I first read them. His son Christopher once said his father was a Catholic with a Protestant work ethic, and I found the passage about the Sea Cloud, the very begininng when he almost misses his plane because of his demanding schedule, and his wife shows him a bit of temper for always having to be on Overdrive, very humorous. (Patricia Taylor Buckley's unwritten book is the one I'd really like to read.) Buckley has sucked the marrow out of the bones of life, and he has had interesting friends and experiences to share. Breaking into a gymnasium with Ronald Reagan, stealing his own boat with a hacksaw from the boatyard, standing on his head on the South Pole, Atlas-Shrugged-style. "The greatest sin passion can committ is to be joyless." is another quote by Sayers, and Buckley has lived with a joyful passion, and a twinkle in his eye that sparkles in these pages. How many of us will look back and wish we'd sailed the Atlantic, skied Alta, finished that novel, and been a polemical influence that toppled the Berlin Wall? At the end of an exhaustive interview for the magazine [...] decades ago in the time of radicals, when the interviewer asked him a complicated question about the doom and gloom of American society and how could Buckley cling to his optomistic conservative ideals when the disestablishmentarianists were threatening the country he answered it was easy because, "I know my Redeemer liveth." You have to love it, just love the thought of Hugh Hefner's reaction, and that Hef printed it. This book will flaunt eschatology; it is the redeemer of Buckley's literary collections. I am pleased he had the courage to compile and publish these very personal writings, they are his best work.
Now What?.......2005-12-27
"Miles Gone By" contains a meaningful collection of essays, which to me, demonstrates 80 years unselfish attention to others. I've followed Mr. Buckley and his ideas for years, (decades) thoroughly enjoying his suggestions and wake-up calls for sanity. Yes, I see him as the guy who rides shotgun for the rest of us, as half asleep in our stagecoach, we Rumble Left and Right through Indian Territory on our way to Progress. Here, I believe is the epitome of his ethics: "Wake up! An ethical man would be ethical even when no one was looking." I thank him for that; after all, he has been a big player in the Great Work of the Maker.
For me, Miles Gone By, and especially the epilogue, reveals an unusual, but faint and unexpected thread of grieving stitched through the collection. Almost a mourning that life's journey went too quickly. As if to whisper: "Now what? Is this all there is? Was my Life real? Where did my old possessions go? Where are the souls of my dead friends? Sorry I stepped on a few toes but I was doing my damnedest to show people how to contribute to the promise of Life!"
I perceive two lovely facets of his persona in this book. One is the right hand going like blazes playing bwv988; the second is his left hand, steadily setting the pace for the right hand as it expresses Holy élan.
The cover portrait is haunting. It speaks miles about a joyful, triumphal life; whilst perhaps biting his bottom lip in memory of sailing very close to the wind at times, and...wondering whether the journey thus far, has made any difference at all? Now, if I were to meet Mr. Buckley face to face, I would quote a passage from Donald Shimoda's Handbook : "Here, (William Frank,) is a test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: If you're alive, it isn't." Full stop.
So, good sailing and fair weather to you in whatever you're supposed to do next. Cheers!
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Miles Gone By
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The Lexicon: A Cornucopia of Wonderful Words for the Inquisitive Word Lover
ASIN: 0786179848 |
Product Description
In this autobiography, woven from personal pieces composed over the course of a celebrated writing life of more than fifty years, youll meet William Buckley the boy, growing up in a family of ten children; Buckley the political enfant terrible, whose debut book, God and Man at Yale, was a New York Times best-seller; Buckley the editor of National Review, hailed as the founder of the modern conservative movement; Buckley the family man; Buckley the spy and novelist of spies; and Buckley the bon vivant. Youll also meet Buckleys friends: Ronald Reagan, Henry Kissinger, Clare Boothe Luce, Tom Wolfe, David Niven, and many others.
Along the way, listeners will be treated to Buckleys romance with wine, his love of the right word, his intoxication with music, and his joy in skiing and travel.
Book Description
In celebration of his 80th birthda, Regnery presents Bill Buckley's New York Times bestseller. Included are treasured essays from the beloved founder of National Review that captures Buckley's joyful boyhood and family life.
Customer Reviews:
Highly Appropriate.......2006-07-17
I always thought of Buckley has having four careers. He was of course that TV fellow that talked funny and look down his nose at his guests and viewers on a show that was very successful - Firing Line; he was that business man, writer, and publisher that started the National Review; he wrote fiction spy novels, and he wrote his sailing stories.
Most people would be happy and content to achieve just one of those undertakings. One might imagine that running the National Review for all those years and keeping it fresh was an enormous challenge. I never agreed with all the stories in the NR and conservatives are now much more complicated people but if you think it is easy to start something like the NR, try starting your own national magazine.
In any case I read many of his books and very much appreciated his sailing books. His book on crossing the Pacific "Racing Through Paradise: A Pacific Passage" was one of the best sailing books ever written. Hence the quote by John Kenneth Galbraith, who "consistently writes pleasant tributes to my own books, inevitably advising the reader that my political opinions should be ignored, my fiction or accounts of life at sea appreciated". Maybe you have to be a sailor to understand his books but it is unlikely.
In terms of a biography it would be very difficult for Buckley to achieve the same level of literary excellence in a biography that he might write today as compared to some of his many past writings. So in the end his collection of selected writings speak for themselves and are most appropriate. He does not need a conventional autobiography - his writing for those of us that have read his books are perfect. We understand that was always his strength.
How can one really criticize this book? The CD for myself was not needed. Incidentally and it is not really the same but George Plimpton came out with a similar series of stories which he called - a readers collection - in the book "George Plimpton on Sports" also available at Amazon.com, published in 2003. I read that book also and thought it was excellent and often very funny but less autobiographical. It is the same idea but for some reason it was never a best seller as the present book appears to be.
Miles still with us.......2005-11-06
Thanks to this marvelous (as usual) piece the miles gone by are still with us. I don't know why but I find myself contrasting this favorably with W. V. Quine's "The Time of My Life". While I might occasionally read Quine's autobiography for insights on his philosophy, and find his life much like the rigorous mathematical logic of his books, "Miles" represents much more the sort of days I would imitate had they not already gone by. This is a comfortable book that leads to comfortable hours.
Product Description
Limited edition, signed by the author.
Average customer rating:
- He often says very little but he says it so well.
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Miles Gone by: A Literary Biography Library Edition
William F. Buckley
Manufacturer: Blackstone Audiobooks
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ASIN: 0786179422 |
Customer Reviews:
He often says very little but he says it so well........2006-06-17
I'm afraid this review will be very lonely. Apparently no one is listening to the audio cassette version & writing about it. William Buckely is a gifted writer & his work translates well to the spoken word especially with him as the narrator. He tells of his childhood at some length which was privledged. He didn't think so at the time. His father thought that schooling abroad would be helpful & so to his horror he was dragged away from his idyllic life to boarding school in England for a time. Apparently he hated it. What he does like sailing. I love the open sea too so I enjoyed those stories. It is obviously his first love & he returns to it again & again. He has had a remarkable career as a journalist, commentator & editor of National Review since busting out with his first book a runaway best seller, God & Man at Yale. This was published I believe right out of school, in the early 50's. He has the resources to pursue whatever he wants & he has done a lot be it horseback riding, skiing or riding the Trans Siberian Railroad across the length of Russia. But always he returns to sailing. He has raced extensively, talks at length about the mechanics of sailing & life at sea. He seems to have met everybody & is friends with most of them. He has even gone sailing with a lot of them. He is the man when it come to modern conservatism in America, but there is little evidence of that in this work. He has the knack of seeming to be humble even as he is blowing his own horn. I enjoy the stories as I drive along. Time well spent.
Book Description
In Where the Hell Are the Guns?, author George Blackburn returns to the early years of the Second World War. This volume – which completes Blackburn’s award-winning trilogy, extending its coverage to the entire war – brings wartime Canada and England to life in captivating, often comic, detail. With the skill of a novelist and the instincts of a seasoned reporter, this gifted storyteller traces the evolution of Canada’s 4th Field Regiment from a motley assortment of ill-equipped recruits to the cream of the Allied artillery, more than ready to distinguish itself in the maelstrom of the battle for Normandy.
The Second World War comes to a generation of Canadians one sunny September weekend in 1939. It is a Canada woefully unprepared for conflict, and 4th Field Regiment is rapidly assembled from a grab-bag of volunteers from all walks of life – many of them mavericks and misfits from a depression-ravaged land. The regiment passes its first year in Canada in makeshift accommodation, including hastily converted stables and pigsties in the exhibition grounds of Ottawa and Toronto. For the first few months the soldiers must wear incomplete and moth-eaten uniforms from the Great War, and their early training is conducted using obsolete equipment or no equipment at all. One year into the war, the regiment arrives in England without weapons or vehicles, and a month later, with Britain moving toward the greatest crisis in her history, the regiment is finally equipped with guns – French ones with wooden wheels, dating from 1898.
From these inauspicious beginnings, the regiment slowly evolves – with mishap and occasionally mayhem along the way – into a proud and polished regiment, which in 1942 is declared “the best field regiment in Britain.” By the time the Allied troops land on the beaches in Normandy, the boys of 4th Field are more than ready to go to war.
Customer Reviews:
Time to Read the Trilogy .......2007-10-10
I was reading a short story that Mark Blackburn wrote - using some short portions from his father, George Blackburn's book. Mark has been doing a short biography on his parents - for a few of his family friends - and has made both George, his father, and Grace, his mother come to life again.
George Blackburn - the author of the Trilogy THE GUNS OF NORMANDY, THE GUNS OF WAR, AND WHERE THE HELL ARE THE GUNS, left all of his family and friends in 2006. Below is the quote from some of the writing Mark has done from WHERE THE HELL ARE THE GUNS.
"You try to talk with her, but for some reason that too is difficult. So you turn on the little `Viking' radio [a tube radio that would remain in the service of our family, functioning perfectly for another half century] - you turn on the radio and lie back with your arms around each other, listening to dance bands - from far-off New York and Chicago, where life is carrying on as though no crisis exists . . ."
(p. 18 "Where the Hell are the Guns?") -- George G. Blackburn
I wrote to Mark, "This is some of the best writing I have ever read - I know this writing came from your father - but it takes the same gift from the one who knows what to choose to pass on - as it did for the gift of the writer to put the words on paper - in the first place. The time has come for me to read all three of your father's books - slowly. They are absolutely poetic. Thanks for sharing George G. Blackburn's heart!"
After reading some of the things Mark has written, I know it is now my hour - my window in time - to read these three wonderful books. I have short letters from George Blackburn and even short stories that others have not read, but these books, and the things I am reading from them, must be kept alive. It is the way we honor the dead - history!
I appreciate your reviews. You might write to Mark Blackburn (he is seen in reviews on Amazon) with things about his father. You will want to see the tribute to him in his Obituary and Mark can point you in that direction. This might work: http://www.legacy.com/CAN-Ottawa/Obituaries.asp?Page=LifeStory&PersonID=19936078
And now to the first book!
"Memories Arranged By Our Hearts, Bring Dreams Without Effort Or Tutor" .......2006-09-22
"Where The Hell Are The Guns? A Soldier's Eye View of the Anxious Years, 1939-44" is the very first book written by George G. Blackburn from his award-winning trilogy of war books but was the last one to be published. It was awarded "The Best Non-Fiction Talking Book of the Year" by The Canadian National Institute for the Blind in 1997.
"The night is frigid, and the crystal-clear sky, drenched in stars, is criss-crossed with the silent shifting shafts of searchlights. Memories of past Christmas Eves are inextricably mixed up with wondering what is going on in Canada. Was the child stillborn, and they are not telling you until after Christmas - or it is something even worse? ~ George G. Blackburn ~
These were the thoughts and feelings of Mr. Blackburn on Christmas Eve of 1942. When he joined Canada's 4th Field Regiment, his wife was pregnant with their first child, who was born on Christmas Day. It was so disheartening for him not to be able to be with his wife at the time of her delivery of a baby girl. He had morbid thoughts about his wife dying of complications having her first child, but was so relieved when he received a cable three days after Boxing Day that his wife delivered an eight-pound baby girl and she was feeling wonderful.
Here Mr. Blackburn chronicles what transpired in the years 1939 thru 1944 after joining Canada's 4th Field Regiment deployed in England during the Second World War. Although in the early stages the troop had very limited warfare and equipment, and worn out and incomplete uniforms, they still came out as the "Best Field Regiment in Britain."
He relives the war in a very detailed manner in a way the reader would be guaranteed an undivided attention while reading this book. He has a very special ability of retelling his story vividly and clearly. At one point in time, he couldn't conceal being overly emotional, nostalgic and homesick and composed a song dedicated to his wife, the late Grace Blackburn. It's called "Are You Really There?" His fellow trooper, Wally Driemel, a Baker troop signaler, loved the song, which was often played by the Regimental Orchestra at Saturday night dances. Another fellow trooper, Signaler Ralph Cooper, used to play his song and do impromptu solo performances on pub pianos. So impressed with his own composition, he offered it to Jerry Wilmot, host of the BBC Armed Forces Network weekly musical show, who was also very impressed and promised him to have it orchestrated by none other than a great conductor and arranger, Robert Farnon, one of Frank Sinatra's finest arrangers/conductors. He advised him to listen each week, which he did faithfully until he had given up, but Wally Driemel did not give up and continued listening to the show until it was finally played. And sadly, Mr. Blackburn missed listening to "a great presentation of his song" played on the show. A music video of this song was made and won three major awards: Silver Award at the 1999 Worldfest - New York, Silver Award at the 1999 Worldfest - Arizona, and Bronze Award at the 2000 CINDY Competition - California.
"There's no such thing as the present
We live by the past in the future
Memories arranged by our hearts,
Bring dreams without effort or tutor.
I have memories too, but they are too good to be true
Are you really there?
Or are you just illusion?
Do you breathe and smile - do you feel warm emotion?
Was there really music in the air?
Did that bellhop really see confetti in our hair?
Were there drives by moonlight - did you wear blue chiffon?
Do you go for autumn? And did we dance till dawn?
There are many things to prove to me you care,
But, darling, I can't help repeating: Are you really there?"
I'm so grateful and sincerely thank Mr. Blackburn for sending me an inscribed copy of this remarkable and interesting book as well as "The Guns of Normandy" and "The Guns of Victory," which I wholeheartedly recommend. It's a must-read for every generation. Thank you, Sir, for the kind gesture! It's much appreciated.
Canada growls.......2004-01-30
If asked, one is unlikely to name Canada as a warrior nation. Sort of like Belgium. However, WHERE THE HELL ARE THE GUNS? testifies that the country's citizens are fully capable of daubing on the warpaint.
At the 1939 outbreak of WWII, author George Blackburn was a journalist. Seeking to enlist, he was turned down by the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal Canadian Air Force because of substandard vision. However, he sneaked into the army reserve on the basis of a sloppy eye exam administered by a reserve medical officer. Recommended for a commission, he went into officers' training in August 1941, and was subsequently assigned to the 4th Field Regiment of artillery already training in the United Kingdom. This book is the story of the 4th Field from it's formation at the war's outbreak to July 1944, when the unit shipped to France, and Blackburn's personal involvement from August '41. Two other books by the same author, THE GUNS OF NORMANDY and THE GUNS OF VICTORY, chronologically narrate his wartime adventures following the 4th Field's insertion into battle post D-Day.
Blackburn's style is unusual. When describing the experiences of others, he naturally uses the third person. However, when describing his own, he uses the second person - the only time I've ever come across such in an autobiography. So, the text has a semi-detached tone, as when George describes his reception at the 4th Field as a replacement subaltern of unproven worth:
" ... you are an untried greenhorn whose opinion is not sought nor welcome when volunteered. You feel abandoned ... you burn with resentment ... Until you are accepted as a full-fledged member of the mess ..., you retire to your cot each night after dinner to write letters, read and put down diary notes..."
Even the photo section containing twenty-three pictures includes not one of the author. Frankly, I found Blackburn's visual absence puzzling and his lack of first-person involvement in the narrative a bit stilted. Sort of like the Queen's use of the royal "we". But don't let this distract you from the underlying excellence of the story.
If you're expecting a combat narrative, WHERE THE HELL ARE THE GUNS? isn't it. Except for a relatively brief aside about the August '42 Dieppe debacle, this volume is a revealing and sympathetic look at the life of an army unit training in the rear far from the front trenches. Indeed, George's outfit was resident in Britain preparing for the Big One from September 1940 to July 1944 - almost four years! Life for the 4th Field's troops was an endless round of training and rigorous field exercises cemented together by the morale-busting drudgery and monotony of camp life, and enlivened only by letters and parcels from home, visits to London or nearby pubs, and fraternization with the English citizens, e.g. dances with the local ladies and Christmas parties thrown for the local kids.
A student of World War II should find this volume a valuable look at a side of the conflict infrequently given print recognition. And who knew that the Canucks could be so feisty?
The Longest, Sometimes Darkest Years.......2003-09-10
Although the last of Blackburn's three volumes about World War Two to be published (the others being The Guns of Normandy and The Guns of Victory), this one focuses on the "anxious years" beginning in 1939 when the Allies scrambled to respond to the rapid and extensive initiatives of the German army (e.g. the invasion of Poland) which nearly achieved victory both in continental Europe and then in Great Britain. What if there had been no Lend-Lease program? What if all of the British troops had been trapped on the beaches of Dunkirk? In that event, what if an invasion of England had then succeeded? What if Hitler had not invaded Russia? Blackburn never directly addresses questions such as these but they are nonetheless relevant to his core thesis that the Allies were ill-prepared in 1939 to fight what became World War Two. The question "Where the hell are the guns?" could well be re-phrased "Where the hell is everything and everyone we need to defeat the German army?" As in the other two volumes, Blackburn's focus is on his own experience with the Canadian 4th Field Regiment. The circumstances in which he and his comrades found themselves in 1939 are representative of virtually all other Allied forces at that time: Not having anywhere near enough of the materiel they needed...and most of what they did have was obsolete. Nonetheless, by the time of the Normandy Invasion in June of 1944, the Canadian 4th Field Regiment had become among the most highly effective of all Allied fighting units as, by then, an Allied victory was assured. This volume carefully traces that difficult process of preparation and subsequent achievement from May of 1939 through July of 1944.
In The Divine Comedy, Dante reserves the last and worst ring in hell for those who, in a moral crisis, preserved their neutrality. I was reminded of that as I read and then re-read the three volumes. Although each was written from Blackburn's perspective with the material anchored in his personal experience with the Canadian 4th Field Regiment, he fully understands and appreciates difficulties concerning logistics throughout the Allied military forces. My previous use of the word "scrambled" correctly describes Allied efforts (1939-1942) to assemble the men and (yes) women needed to train, equip them, and then deploy to greatest military advantage. Errors of judgment were obviously inevitable. However, Blackburn never hesitates to criticize certain military leaders who, in a moral crisis, preserved their neutrality. Throughout World War Two, so many courageous Allied troops were needlessly killed or wounded because of their leaders' timidity and indecision or concern for their own image. (Churchill once referred to then prime minister Neville Chamberlain as being "a sheep in sheep's clothing.") At best, war is messy and often brutal. Casualties are inevitable. Nonetheless, Blackburn correctly asserts that much of the anxiety during 1939-1944 could have been alleviated by more efficient and more effective leadership at all levels of Allied military operations.
In the concluding chapter, Blackburn includes a brief excerpt from James Hilton's Good-bye, Mr. Chips when the dying schoolmaster recalls happier times long ago: "What a host of little incidents, all deep-buried in the past -- problems that had once been urgent, arguments that had once been keen, anecdotes that were funny only because one remembered the fun. Did any emotion really matter when the last trace of it vanished from human memory; and if that were so, what a crowd of emotions clung to him as their last home before annihilation! He must be kind to them, must treasure them in his mind before their long sleep." More than 60 years ago, Blackburn and his comrades in the Canadian 4th Field Regiment began a process of preparation, together with millions of other Allied forces, to face arguably one of the greatest military opponents throughout history. In the three volumes, Blackburn (like Charles Chipping) reflects back on his experiences, recalling persons and events with respect, appreciation, and affection. By sharing his wartime reminiscences and reflections, his joys and irritations, as well as the lessons he learned and the values which prevailed throughout those "anxious years" long ago, the significant "little incidents" will remain vivid for generations to come, rather than "deep-buried in the past."
Fascinating Story Of Canadian Preparations For WWII!.......2003-08-08
Canada has prove to be one of the inexplicable backwaters in terms of any self-generated genesis of texts covering the wartime experience for Canadians as the dark storm clouds of war drifted over the British commonwealth and as one of the dominion states Canada became more and more drawn into the conflict in defense of Britain. In this sense the certainty of war loomed larger over our northern neighbors long before it appeared as either likely or inevitable to the average American. In this book, "Where The Hell Are The Guns? A Soldier's Eye View of the Anxious Years 1939-1944", former Canadian soldier George Blackburn retells the fascinating tale of how Canada began to prepare in earnest for the deadly and fateful conflicts to come.
Although this represents the first volume of a trilogy of works that spans the duration of the Second World War and Canada's participation therein, it I the last of the three volume work to be published, largely made possible by the critical and commercial success of "The Guns Of Normandy; A Soldier's Eye View, France 1944" and "Guns Of Victory: A Soldier's Eye View, Belgium, Holland and Germany 1944-45" before it. Here the reader is treated to a quite personal and detailed description of how Canada turned its quiet, placid and peace-loving population into the veritable contributors to the Allied war effort it became in the fateful years leading up to the conflict and beyond. By using the device of concentrating on one particular unit, his own 4th Field Regiment, he traces with great fidelity and poignant accuracy the evolution of this rag-tag collection of untrained and undisciplined young recruits into a formidable fighting force, the so-called fighting sharp edge of the Canadian Artillery forces, a group about to prove themselves to the Allies and the world at large as one of the most adept and battle capable in the world.
What is so memorable about Blackburn's account is the fact that it is so representative of so many young men and women who came of age in the clear cool autumn of 1939 following the blitzkrieg attack by Germany's Wehrmacht against Poland. Like all the Allied forces, Canada was dreadfully poorly equipped for the coming fight, and was forced by the dint of circumstance to remake it military force from nothing into an incredible something, and that story of that transformation is interestingly documented here. In the midst of an unrequited economic Depression shared with its brothers below the national boundaries in the United States, the volunteers quickly streamed in under the twin flags of patriotic fervor and the growl of empty bellies looking for regular meals.
From such inauspicious and humble beginnings the training starts in earnest, and without the stuff of war, without guns, or trucks, or artillery, they began the long and arduous training process that would later hold them in such good stead on the beaches of Normandy and beyond. Surviving in makeshift barracks that were hastily converted from barns, stables, and even pigsties in regional fairs and exhibition grounds, the troops learned to improvise and train as best they could with the limited resources at hand. Even as they were trained they wore the outmoded and moth-ravaged leftover uniforms remaining from the Great War of 1914-1918. Indeed, the chronicle of their training is an incredible tale of use of obsolete weaponry and outmoded tactics until their regiment is finally more fully equipped and trained in preparation for the invasion of Normandy in 1944, when they finally have the chance to prove their mettle under fire. This is an absorbing and entertaining book, one that is both well written and full of unusual material, and one I can highly recommend. Enjoy!
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- Out of Place: A Memoir
- Pioneer Women
- Pursuit Of Freedom: A True Story Of The Enduring Power Of Hope & Dreams
- Reason for Hope: A Spiritual Journey
- Sailing Alone Around The World
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- Phil Gordon's Little Blue Book: More Lessons and Hand Analysis in No Limit Texas Hold'em
- McDonald's Happy Meal Toys in the U.S.A.
- Dracula: The Connoisseur's Guide
- Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil
- Facade Construction Manual
- History: Fiction or Science
- Guide to the Vascular Plants of the Blue Ridge
- International Taxation U.S. Taxation of Foreign Persons and Foreign Income Second Edition Volume 2
- Exito latino : secretos de 100 professionales latinos de más poder en Estados Unidos
- Creative Solution Finding : The Triumph of Full- Spectrum Creativity over Conventional Thinking
Nearer, My God: An Autobiography of Faith
God and Man at Yale
Last Call for Blackford Oakes (Blackford Oakes Novel)
Buckley: The Right Word (Harvest Book)
