Your Loyal and Loving Son: The Letters of Tank Gunner Karl Fuchs, 1933-1941

by Horst Fuchs Richardson (Editor), Horst Fuchs Richardson (Translator)

Overview

These are the compelling letters of Karl Fuchs, an ordinary German soldier who was completely convinced of the righteousness of his cause and who wrote them free of the recriminations and hindsight arising from the bitterness of defeat. Combining enthusiastic expressions of loyalty to the führer and the Fatherland with messages of love for his family and requests for necessities from home, they provide a personal look at a youth typical of his time, one whose fervent and naive nationalism was of the very sort that later fanned the flames of the Holocaust. Throughout Your Loyal and Loving Son, young Fuchs remains an idealist, confident in his concept of duty. Yet his letters clearly support the general assertion that many Germans who backed the Third Reich did so neither out of opportunistic self-interest nor nihilistic delight in destruction, but instead in the hope for a better future. Killed on the Eastern Front, Fuchs did not live to see his son, the infant to whom he wrote and who as an adult compiled these letters for publication. With an introduction and annotations by eminent historian Dennis Showalter, this collection will help make those early war years more comprehensible to contemporary readers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781574885675
Publisher:	Potomac Books
Publication date:	02/01/2003
Edition description:	1ST
Pages:	192
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Dennis Showalter, Ph.D., has taught history at Colorado College since 1969 and is a former president of the Society for Military History. He also served as a distinguished visiting professor at both the United States Military Academy and the United States Air Force Academy. The first edition of Showalter's Tannenberg won the prestigious Paul Birdsall Prize for best new book of 1992 from the American Historical Association. His other books include Railroads and Rifles and The Wars of Frederick the Great. He lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Table of Contents

Introduction by the Widow
Introduction by the Son
The Soldier's Assignments
Historical Comments by Dennis E. Showalter
The Letters - Footnotes by Dennis E. Showalter
Conclusion by Dennis E. Showalter
Glossary of German Terms
Suggestions for Further Reading

Editorial Reviews

"Provide[s] some highly valuable insights into the mind of a young German at the apex of the Third Reich's power. . . . The outstanding commentary by Professor Dennis Showalter brings special historical meaning to many of the details and nuances of the author's private and premilitary existence, as well as his military experiences. . . . Especially valuable for . . . the student of Third Reich culture and more ardent scholars of World War II German military history."

"For those examining why average Germans followed Hitler, Fuchs' diary provides one impression of Hitler's regime at its zenith--and not a post-defeat expiation."

"Fuchs's interesting letters . . . help reveal combat conditions on the Eastern Front and the Nazi zeal of the soldiers who unflinchingly served in Hitler's war machine."

"It provides an excellent depiction of life in Germany in the Wehrmacht just before World War II. . . . Mr. Showalter's notes are excellent. . . ."

From the Publisher