Overlord (Pan Military Classics) (65 page)

The literature of the north-west Europe campaign in general and of Normandy in particular is vast. I have omitted many battlefield reminiscences, together with the invaluable regimental and divisional histories which are available for almost every British and American formation mentioned in the text. I have also left out a number of books whose accuracy has been the subject of such severe strictures as to make them of doubtful value to students of the period. I am deeply indebted to all those men, British, American and German, who have lent me contemporary letters, diaries, and narratives.

I have learned much about contemporary attitudes to the campaign from the files of
The Times
, the
New York Times
, the
Daily Express
and
Picture Post
, for whom my father served as war correspondent in Normandy. For this as for other books of mine, I must acknowledge the generosity of David Irving in lending documents and files he had assembled for his own researches. Among original sources which have proved especially valuable, I must mention
Current Notes From Overseas
, the weekly British tactical pamphlet circulated to unit commanding officers; the diaries of General Carl Spaatz, General Hoyt Vandenberg, Captain H. C. Butcher; the papers of Sir John Grigg; copies of papers pertaining to General Walter Bedell Smith, General Everett Hughes, Air-Marshal J. M. Robb, General George Patton, General Raymond Barker held in the Eisenhower Library; the personal diary of Brigadier N. Elliott Rodger, Chief of Staff II (Canadian) Corps; the superb after-action reports of US units in France; and of course, the SHAEF, War Office and War Department files in the US National Archive and the Public Records Office in London.