Fighting in Flanders: The Experiences of an American Journalist During the Opening Campaigns of the First World War in Europe - Couverture rigide

Powell, E Alexander

Couverture rigide

ISBN 10 : 1782820205 ISBN 13 : 9781782820208

Editeur : Leonaur Ltd, 2012

Synopsis

The opening shots of a great conflict

The German plan of attack in 1914 involved a giant 'hooking' movement commencing within Germany itself and then advancing through Luxembourg and neutral Belgium towards the Continental channel ports before arcing south-east to embrace the French heartland. France would be taken from the rear of Verdun on the River Meuse to Orleans on the Loire. Paris-caught squarely in the middle of this giant sweep-would be literally enveloped. History shows that the plan did not go the way the Germans intended and their advance, stopped by the French and the B. E. F, meant the war became stalemate of trenches, wire and mud, a war of attrition that led to the eventual defeat of Germany. Initially, however, it seemed as though nothing could prevent the advance of the vast juggernaut of that was the German army. The first stages of the Great War went very much according to plan and the first nation casualty was Belgium. The war quite literally rolled over this small nation and students of the conflict have tended to overlook these important events as a tiny nation fought to defend itself against hopeless odds. The author of this book was an American journalist who was present in Europe at the time these events were taking place, he saw the campaign unfold with his own eyes and has recorded what he saw for posterity. This is an interesting book, about the outbreak of hostilities to the arrival on the field of battle of the British Army, told from an unusual perspective.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket.

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur

Nothing is more unwise, on general principles, than to attempt to write about a war before that war is finished and before history has given it the justice of perspective. The campaign which began with the flight of the Belgian Government from Brussels and which culminated in the fall of Antwerp formed, however, a separate and distinct phase of the Greatest of Wars, and I feel that I should write of that campaign while its events are still sharp and clear in my memory and before the impressions it produced have begun to fade. I hope that those in search of a detailed or technical account of the campaign in Flanders will not read this book, because they are certain to be disappointed. It contains nothing about strategy or tactics and few military lessons can be drawn from it. It is merely the story, in simple words, of what I, a professional onlooker, who was accorded rather exceptional facilities for observation, saw in Belgium during that nation's hour of trial. An American, I went to Belgium at the beginning of the war with an open mind. I had few, if any, prejudices. I knew the English, the French, the Belgians, the Germans equally well. I had friends in all four countries and many happy recollections of days I had spent in each. When I left Antwerp after the German occupation I was as pro-Belgian as though I had been born under the red-black-and- yellow banner. I had seen a country, one of the loveliest and most peaceable in Europe, invaded by a ruthless and brutal soldiery; I had seen its towns and cities blackened by fire and broken by shell; I had seen its churches and its historic monuments destroyed; I had seen its highways crowded with hunted, homeless fugitives; I had seen its fertile fields strewn with the corpses of what had once been the manhood of the nation; I had seen its women left husbandless and its children left fatherless; I had seen what was once a Garden of the Lord turned into a land of desolation; and I had seen its people--a people whom I, like the rest of the world, had always thought of as pleasure-loving, inefficient, easy-going--I had seen this people, I say, aroused, resourceful, unafraid, and fighting, fighting, fighting. Do you wonder that they captured my imagination, that they won my admiration? I am pro-Belgian; I admit it frankly. I should be ashamed to be anything else.

Biographie de l'auteur

E. Alexander Powell (August 16, 1879 – November 13, 1957) was an American war correspondent during World War I and author. He generally published material under the name E. Alexander Powell; his full name was Edward Alexander Powell. Powell was born in Syracuse, New York in 1879. In 1898–1899 he worked for the Syracuse Journal, and in 1902 he became editor of Craftsman. From 1903-1904 he was an advertising manager for the Smith Premier Typewriter Company, based in London, England, and in 1905-1906 he worked in the Near East as a correspondent for British and American publications. From 1906-1909 he was a Consular official in Syria and Egypt. Powell worked as a war correspondent during World War I and his position as a neutral allowed him access to both sides of the battle lines, from 1914 onwards. With the entry of the United States into the Great War in 1917, Powell was commissioned as a captain in military intelligence. He was injured in September 1918, and convalesced until the Armistice in November of that year, thereafter returning to the US. He left the US Armed Services with the rank of Major. Powell published his war journalism in newspapers and magazines such as The War Illustrated, New York World and the Daily Mail and his war books were published by Charles Scribner's Sons. Powell then switched from journalism to a successful career as an adventure and travel writer, traveling widely across the globe and publishing some 20 more books between 1920 and 1954. Powell married Jessie Northrup Powell. He died at Falls Village, Connecticut in 1957. His papers are held in the US Library of Congress.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Leonaur Ltd
• Date d'édition: 2012
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1782820205
• ISBN 13: 9781782820208
• Reliure: Relié
• Nombre de pages: 180
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible