Ardennes 1944: Hitler's Last Gamble
Read Ardennes 1944: Hitler's Last Gamble Online
Authors: Antony Beevor
Antony Beevor
Antony Beevor is the author of
Crete – The Battle and the Resistance
(Runciman Prize),
Stalingrad
(Samuel Johnson Prize, Wolfson Prize for History and Hawthornden Prize for Literature),
Berlin – The Downfall
,
The Battle for Spain
(Premio La Vanguardia) and
D-Day: The Battle for Normandy
(Prix Henry Malherbe and the RUSI Westminster Medal). His latest work,
The Second World War,
has been another No. 1 international bestseller. His books have appeared in thirty languages and have sold more than six million copies. A former chairman of the Society of Authors, he has received honorary doctorates from the Universities of Kent, Bath and East Anglia, and is a visiting professor at the University of Kent. In the United States he received the 2014 Pritzker Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing.
with Artemis Cooper
)
For Adam Beevor
1
. US infantry advancing through the Siegfried Line, or Westwall, in October 1944
2
. Fallschirmjäger mortar crew in the Hürtgen Forest
3
. 1st Infantry Division in the Hürtgen Forest
4
. Medics with wounded soldier
5
. French troops in the Vosges
6
. Maastricht meeting with Bradley, Tedder, Eisenhower, Montgomery and Simpson
7
. German prisoners captured in early December in the Hürtgen Forest
8
. Generalfeldmarschall Walter Model, commander-in-chief Army Group B (IWM MH12850)
9
. Field Marshal Montgomery lecturing an increasingly exasperated Eisenhower
10
. General von Manteuffel of the Fifth Panzer Army
11
. Oberstgruppenführer-SS Sepp Dietrich of the Sixth Panzer Army
12
. Oberst then Generalmajor Heinz Kokott
13
. Oberstleutnant Friedrich Freiherr von der Heydte
14
. Briefing panzer commanders before the Ardennes offensive on 16 December 1944
15
. Two SS panzergrenadiers enjoying captured American cigarettes
16
. A Königstiger tank carrying soldiers of the 3rd Fallschirmjäger-Division
17
. Volksgrenadiers advance loaded down with machine-gun belts and panzerfausts
18
. The first killing of American prisoners by the Kampfgruppe Peiper in Honsfeld
19
. SS panzergrenadiers pass a burning convoy of American vehicles
20
. American prisoners taken by the 1st SS Panzer-Division
Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler
21
. The 26th Infantry Regiment arrives to defend Bütgenbach at the base of the Elsenborn ridge
22
. Members of the same regiment manoeuvring an anti-tank gun as the Germans approach
23
. Belgian refugees leaving Langlir as the Fifth Panzer Army advances (IWM 49925)
24
. As the Germans advance on St Vith, the people of Schönberg shelter in caves
25
. American medics turned skis into toboggans to drag the wounded back for evacuation
26
. American troops dig in on the forward edge of a wood (IWM 050367)
27
. As the Germans advance on Bastogne, townsfolk start to flee in farm carts
28
. A platoon of M-36 tank destroyers near Werbomont
29
. Volksgrenadiers taken prisoner in the fighting round Rocherath–Krinkelt
30
. Brigadier General Robert W. Hasbrouck receiving the silver star from Lieutenant General Courtney Hodges
31
. US military police check the identities of Belgian refugees near Marche-en-Famenne
32
. Belgian refugees rush to cross the Meuse at Dinant
33
. A bazooka team from the 28th Infantry Division after three days of fighting in Wiltz
34
. A young SS trooper taken prisoner near Malmédy (IWM EA048337)
35
. Civilians murdered by Kampfgruppe Peiper at Stavelot
36
. Vapour trails over Bastogne
37
. 23 December: the US Air Force send in transport aircraft to drop supplies to Bastogne
38
. American wounded in cellars in Bastogne
39
. Bastogne: paratroopers of the 101st Airborne sing carols on Christmas Eve
40
. Remnants of the 2nd Panzer-Division in a farmyard in Foy-Notre-Dame (IWM B13260)
41
. Bastogne. General Patton with Brigadier General McAuliffe and Lieutenant Colonel Chappuis.
42
. American reinforcements advancing in steeply wooded Ardennes terrain
43
. A patrol from the British XXX Corps in the Ardennes wearing snowsuits
44
. Soldiers from the 26th Infantry Regiment finally advance from Bütgenbach
45
. La Roche-en-Ardenne in ruins
46
. Investigators start the work of identifying the American soldiers massacred at Baugnez, near Malmédy
47
. A very young prisoner from the Waffen-SS
48
. Joachim Peiper on trial for war crimes including the massacre near Malmédy
The majority of the photographs come from The National Archives in the USA. Other photographs are from: 1, 13, AKG Images; 5, Documentation Française; 11, Tank Museum; 12, Bundesarchiv, Koblenz; 6–7, 18, 20, 25–6, 30–32, 34, 36, 38–9, 41, 46–7, US Army (part of National Archives); 8, 23, 26, 40, Imperial War Museum, London; 10, Heinz Seidler, Bonn Bad Godersberg, reproduced from W. Goolrick and O. Tanner,
The Battle
of the Bulge.
The Ardennes: Front line just before German offensive
The Destruction of the 106th Division and Defence of St Vith
The Destruction of the 28th Division
Rocherath–Krinkelt and the Elsenborn Ridge
VII Corps and XVIII Airborne Front