Category: Uncategorized
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303 – The Link Trainer
Before the Second World War, learning to fly by instruments was one of the most difficult and dangerous skills a pilot had to master. Training had to be done in real aircraft, often in poor weather, and accidents were common. In the late 1920s, an American inventor named Edwin Albert Link came up with an…
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301 – A Canadian in Stalin’s Army
How does a Canadian end up fighting in the Soviet Red Army during the Second World War? My guest today is Scott Bury, and we’re going to tell the remarkable story of his relative, Maurice Bury — a Canadian citizen who found himself caught in Eastern Europe when war broke out. Drafted into the Red…
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3810 – The (second) battle of Mantinea (pt.2)
‘Xenophon gives us the remarkable detail that, in preparation for the battle, the Theban cavalry “eagerly whitened their helmets” and the Arcadians “painted clubs upon their shields, as though they were Thebans” (7.5.20), telling us that the Thebans usually had such a blazon on their shields (that is the club of Heracles). All the men…
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3809 – The (second) battle of Mantinea
“At the battle of Leuctra in 371 BC, a resurgent Thebes led by its great statesmen and tactician reformers Epaminondas and Pelopidas defeated the army of Sparta. The defeat was one of the greatest shocks Greece had witnessed – not only did the Thebans defeat the Spartans but the Spartans turned and fled from the…
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296 – British Brigadiers, 1940
For this episode, I am joined by Philip McCarty to discuss his book Point of Failure: British Army Brigadiers in France and Norway, 1940 . It is a study of the brigadiers who served in France and Norway in 1940. Rather than focusing on campaign narratives, Philip examines the men who held this rank. Their backgrounds. Their…
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295 – Inside the Siege of Warsaw
In September 1939, during the German invasion of Poland, American photographer and film-maker Julien Bryan became the only foreign journalist to remain inside Warsaw during the Nazi siege. While other correspondents fled, Bryan stayed in the city, documenting the Siege of Warsaw from the streets, hospitals and civilian shelters as German bombs fell. Bryan’s photographs…
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294 – Churchills Forgotten Generals: Slim, Auchinleck & Savory
Today we are heading back to the Burma campaign, but through a slightly different lens. Rather than focusing on a single battle or operation, we examine three men who shaped how the war in Burma was fought and ultimately won. When people think of British commanders in the Far East, one name usually stands out,…
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292 – The War Chest of Colonel Kreps
In this episode, I talk with Erik Kreps about a remarkable family mystery. Erik’s grandfather, Colonel Kenneth Ray Kreps, served in the Second World War, and after returning home, he sealed his wartime belongings in a chest with the instruction that it was not to be opened until after his death. For decades, the chest…
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3805 – Valour Lost, part 3
“George Ravenhill joined the 1st Battalion of The Royal Scots Fusiliers when he was seventeen, in 1889. He spent six years in India before transferring to the 2nd Battalion in South Africa during the Second Boer War. There, at the battle of Colenso on December 15th, 1899, Ravenhill made several forays to assist the artillery…
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291 – Far East RAF Liberators
RAF Liberator bombing operations in India, Burma, and Thailand remain one of the least explored air campaigns of the Second World War. Flying long-range missions from Bengal, RAF crews attacked Japanese targets across Southeast Asia, including the infamous Thailand-Burma Railway, under demanding and often dangerous conditions. In this episode of the WW2 Podcast, I am…