Tanks Across the Desert: The War Diary of Jake Wardrop - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0750932538 ISBN 13: 9780750932530

Publisher: Sutton Pub Ltd, 2002

Synopsis

Tanks Across the Desert is a British tank sergeant's personal story of war. It gives an extremely true-to-life picture of fierce armored warfare in the Second World War, vividly recreating the atmosphere of conflict and destruction encountered by one Allied tank crew in the bloody campaigns across North Africa and Italy. Sergeant Jake Wardrop joined the 5th Battalion, Royal Tank Regiment (5RTR) in 1937. He fought in France in 1940; in the Western Desert, Tripolitania and Tunisia; and then, until December 1943, in the invasion of Italy. Wardrop's battalion returned to the UK to prepare for D-Day and Jake took part in the great European campaigns of liberation in 1944 and 1945, only to be killed in action a few days before the end of the war. Wardrop kept a detailed and graphic record of each battle in which he was to take part from 1941 to 1943, compiling a personal diary which had long remained in the possession of his mother to whom he sent back extracts from time to time while on active service. This diary gives a vivid insight into Wardrop's many adventures with 5RTR and also serves as an exciting battlefield record of his battalion.

About this title

About the Author

George Forty OBE served for thirty years as a British army officer in the Royal Tank Regiment before becoming curator of the Bovington Tank Museum, where he was the inspiration for its growth in the 1980s and 1990s. His first book was on the Desert Rats (with whom he served postwar) and were published by Ian Allan in 1976; since then he has written over fifty more, including Patton’s Third Army at War, and handbooks of the World War II armies of Britain, Japan, and the United States.

About this edition

• Publisher: Sutton Pub Ltd
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0750932538
• ISBN 13: 9780750932530
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 224
• Editor: Forty George