Brotherhood of the Flying Coffin
The Glider Pilots of World War II
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- $22.99
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- $22.99
Publisher Description
The first major history of the American glider pilots, the forgotten heroes of World War II, by a New York Times bestselling author. A story of no guns, no engines and no second chances.
This book distills war down to individual young men climbing into defenseless gliders made of plywood, ready to trust the towing aircraft that would pull them into enemy territory by a cable wrapped with telephone wire. Based on their after-action reports, journals, oral histories, and letters home, this book reveals every terrifying minute of their missions.
They were all volunteers, for a specialized duty that their own government projected would have a 50 percent casualty rate. None faltered. In every major European invasion of the war they led the way. They landed their gliders ahead of the troops who stormed Omaha Beach, and sometimes miles ahead of the paratroopers bound for the far side of the Rhine River in Germany itself. From there, they had to hold their positions. They delivered medical teams, supplies and gasoline to troops surrounded in the Battle of the Bulge, ahead even of Patton's famous supply truck convoy. These all-volunteer glider pilots played a pivotal role in liberating the West from tyranny, from the day the Allies invaded Occupied Europe to the day Germany finally surrendered. Yet the story of these anonymous heroes is virtually unknown. Here it is told in full – a story which epitomizes courage and sacrifice.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Historian McGaugh (Honor Before Glory) highlights in this vivid and inspiring account the exploits of Allied glider pilots during the liberation of Axis-occupied Europe. Making their combat debut in the invasion of Sicily in 1943, Allied glider pilots carried troops and supplies from bases in Tunisia. Though more than 600 men and officers died in Operation Ladbroke, most of them by drowning, generals Omar Bradley and Dight Eisenhower committed to using gliders to ferry troops and equipment to Normandy on D-Day. McGaugh also documents Market Garden, "the largest glider mission of World War II," when 2,000 gliders supported the Allied offensive across Holland. "The glider pilots knew their mission was to deliver the infantry and their supplies under enemy fire, likely by crashing their gliders, then get back to their base hundreds of miles away, as quickly as possible, and be ready for the next assignment," McGaugh writes. Gliders also played key roles in supplying besieged American forces at Bastogne and winning the Battle of the Bulge. Mothballed after the war, the glider program's tasks were assumed by cargo aircraft and helicopters. Throughout, McGaugh draws on firsthand accounts to convey the terror and thrill of piloting noiseless, fabric-skinned aircraft with no engines, defensive armaments, or parachutes. This WWII history soars.
