The Bedford Boys: One American Town's Ultimate D-Day Sacrifice - Hardcover

Kershaw, Alex

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0306811677 ISBN 13: 9780306811678

Publisher: Da Capo Press Inc, 2003

Synopsis

The poignant story of twenty-one boys who died on the beaches of Normandy and the small town they called home. On June 6, 1944, nineteen boys from Bedford, Virginia--population 3,000--died in the first bloody minutes of D-Day when their landing craft dropped them in shallow water off Omaha Beach. They were part of the first wave of American soldiers to hit the sands of Normandy. Later that day, two more soldiers from the same small town died of gunshot wounds. Twenty-one sons of Bedford killed--no other town in America suffered a greater one-day loss. It is a story that one cannot easily forget--and one that the families of Bedford will never forget. It was, and still is, Bedford's longest day. The Bedford Boys is the intimate true story of these young men and their friends and families in Bedford. It portrays a neighborhood of soldiers before and during the war--from the girlfriends they left behind to the buddies they made in basic training, from anxious barracks in England to the bloody beaches of Normandy. Based on extensive interviews with survivors and relatives as well as on diaries and letters, Alex Kershaw's book focuses on several remarkable individuals and families to tell one of the most poignant stories of World War II--the story of one small American town that went to war and died on Omaha Beach.

About this title

Review:

"The Bedford Boys is written like Sebastian Junger's A Perfect Storm."

About the Author:

Alex Kershaw is the author of the widely acclaimed and bestselling books The Bedford Boys, The Longest Winter, and The Few, and two biographies: Jack London and Blood and Champagne: The Life and Times of Robert Capa. He lives in Williamstown, Massachusetts.

About this edition

• Publisher: Da Capo Press Inc
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0306811677
• ISBN 13: 9780306811678
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288