REVIEW by MARC DeSANTIS
Popular memory of the Second World War is inconsistent. Certain events, such as the Battle of Britain, El Alamein, the Atlantic Campaign, D-Day, and Operation Market Garden, loom large in modern consciousness. Other events and fronts, such as the latter stages of the Italian Campaign or the fighting in Burma, too often obtain less mental purchase.
The campaign that saw American forces land in southern France (Operation Dragoon) in August 1944, before driving north and then westwards into Germany, is more like the latter. The invasion of Normandy is justly celebrated, and the Battle of the Bulge is widely recalled, but what about the fierce combat in the Vosges Mountains in autumn 1944 or the Colmar Pocket fighting in early 1945?
Ancient DNA and ‘Anglo-Frisians’