Sons and Soldiers: The Untold Story of the Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned with the U.S. Army to Fight Hitler

Sons and Soldiers: The Untold Story of the Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned with the U.S. Army to Fight Hitler

by Bruce Henderson
Sons and Soldiers: The Untold Story of the Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned with the U.S. Army to Fight Hitler

Sons and Soldiers: The Untold Story of the Jews Who Escaped the Nazis and Returned with the U.S. Army to Fight Hitler

by Bruce Henderson

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Overview

New York Times Bestseller

The definitive story of the Ritchie Boys, as featured on CBS's 60 Minutes

"An irresistible history of the WWII Jewish refugees who returned to Europe to fight the Nazis.” —Newsday

They were young Jewish boys who escaped from Nazi-occupied Europe and resettled in America. After the United States entered the war, they returned to fight for their adopted homeland and for the families they had left behind. Their stories tell the tale of one of the U.S. Army’s greatest secret weapons.

Sons and Soldiers begins during the menacing rise of Hitler’s Nazi party, as Jewish families were trying desperately to get out of Europe. Bestselling author Bruce Henderson captures the heartbreaking stories of parents choosing to send their young sons away to uncertain futures in America, perhaps never to see them again. As these boys became young men, they were determined to join the fight in Europe. Henderson describes how they were recruited into the U.S. Army and how their unique mastery of the German language and psychology was put to use to interrogate German prisoners of war.

These young men—known as the Ritchie Boys, after the Maryland camp where they trained—knew what the Nazis would do to them if they were captured. Yet they leapt at the opportunity to be sent in small, elite teams to join every major combat unit in Europe, where they collected key tactical intelligence on enemy strength, troop and armored movements, and defensive positions that saved American lives and helped win the war. A postwar army report found that nearly 60 percent of the credible intelligence gathered in Europe came from the Ritchie Boys.

Sons and Soldiers draws on original interviews and extensive archival research to vividly re-create the stories of six of these men, tracing their journeys from childhood through their escapes from Europe, their feats and sacrifices during the war, and finally their desperate attempts to find their missing loved ones. Sons and Soldiers is an epic story of heroism, courage, and patriotism that will not soon be forgotten.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780062419118
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: 03/19/2024
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 436
Sales rank: 230,481
File size: 6 MB

About the Author

Bruce Henderson has written more than twenty books, including the national bestseller Hero Found and Rescue at Los Baños. Henderson served aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ranger (CVA-61) during the Vietnam War. He lives in Menlo Park, California.


Bruce Henderson has written more than twenty books, including the national bestseller Hero Found and Rescue at Los Baños. Henderson served aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ranger (CVA-61) during the Vietnam War. He lives in Menlo Park, California.

Table of Contents

Introduction xiii

Prologue: Germany 1938 1

Part 1

1 Saving the Children 13

2 Escaping the Nazis 51

3 A Place to Call Home 85

Part 2

4 Camp Ritchie 115

5 Going Back 149

6 Normandy 168

7 The Breakout 204

8 Holland 227

9 The Forests 251

10 Return to Deutschland 287

Part 3

11 The Camps 325

12 Denazification 346

13 Going Home 361

Dramatis Personae 375

Acknowledgments 383

Sources 385

Appendix: The Ritchie Boys 393

Bibliography 411

Index 419

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