Books

[StefanM]

These are wonderful drawings Stefan thanks for posting. Mr. Topolski seems to have captured the somber atmosphere of the time. Could you please post more of his drawings of Poles?

Chris.....

Topolski was a brilliant and fluid draughtsman! Will certainly post more illustrations of Poles but if I have time I will scan the whole book as his depictions of Soviet soldiers and the Russian people are also very evocative.

[andrzejku98]

Hi everyone,

I have just received this new book in the post today, it is also signed by the Author and is also numbered with a limited print run of 500 in hardback.



The details for the book are as follows:

Hardcover, 224 pages

Published by Helion & Company (15th November 2012)

I.S.B.N. (10 Digits): 1908916532

I.S.B.N. (13 Digits): 978-1908916532

Diemensions:23.6cm X 15.4 cm x 2.4cm

Author Evan McGilvray

The Author is currently working on a new book , covering the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 to be published in 2014, celebrating the 70th Anniversary of the Uprising.

Best wishes

Andrzejku

[A.J. Zawadzki]

Hi Andrzejku, thanks for the post , my copy is on it's way. It's nice to see Evan McGilvray follow up with another book about the Polish 1st Armoured after "The Black Devils' March - A Doomed Odyssey:

Here's the book description from a seller's site:

General Stanislaw Maczek has been overlooked by most military historians in the West. Unlike most Polish commanders he rocked no boats and after his service was complete in 1947 he retreated into relative obscurity. When he died at the age of 102 he had left a single published book of his war memoirs. This book is an attempt to try to put the historical record right, at least in the English language, and place front and centre into the wartime historiography the story of an extraordinary man. Maczek's story is the story of 20th Century Poland and begins naturally enough with his birth in 1892. Born in the Austrian sector, he was conscripted into the Imperial Austrian Army, with which he served with great credit on the Italian Front, high in the Alps. It was this experience which was to serve Maczek well in his future career in the Polish Army after 1918. Maczek should be remembered for his pioneering use of mixed armour and infantry units as well as the early use of commando-style units during the Polish border wars of 1918-1920. However his work was ignored despite its obvious success.He should also be recognised as being the saviour of the Normandy Campaign, which by August 1944 was seriously bogged down. It was feared that the German forces in Normandy might be able to flee over the River Seine and head eastwards towards Germany. A magnificent, stubborn and costly stand by the Polish 1st Armoured Division during August 1944 prevented this happening, and the Normandy Campaign was able to succeed. This is yet to be credited to the Poles in the imagination of the West. After the war, Maczek, now exiled and stateless and with his homeland seized by the Soviet Union, was stripped of his Polish citizenship by the Communists, and was left to bring up his young family on his wages as a barman. This is the story of a man who changed history, fully researched from archival and printed materials, and with a heavy reliance on original Polish language sources. The text is complemented by over 100 previously unpublished photographs. This book will be produced in a limited-edition hardback printing of 500 copies, all copies individually numbered, and signed by the author.

[andrzejku98]

Hi Everyone,

I have just received this book this morning



Details are as follows:

Author: Halik Kochanski

Published by: Allen Lane (4th October 2012)

Pages: 768

ISBN (10 Digits): 1846143543

ISBN (13 Digits): 978-1846143540

Best wishes

Andrzejku

[Piwo2]

Required reading for everyone interested in Poland's 20th century development.

White Eagle Red Star The Polish-Soviet War 1919-20
by Norman Davies
Originally published in 1972, Softcover in 1983
Republished 2003 by Pimlico ISBN 9780712606943

The most recent book includes wonderful copies of original photographs that were not in the earlier volumes.
This is a most own and read for any serious student of Poland's history.

Professor Davies is one of Poland's strongest supporters and defender of the truth in the face of many historical revisionists
and academics with serious political agendas.

Piwo

[StefanM]

... although IMO Warsaw 1920: Lenin's Failed Conquest of Europe by Adam Zamoyski is written in a more readable style

[StefanM]

Managed to find a copy of this scarce book for less than the £100+ sale price on other online retailers...and signed by "Zibik"








First to Return [Paperback] by Jozef Zabielski "Zibik"
Paperback: 114 pages
Publisher: Garby Publications (1976)

Captain Jozef Zabielski "Zibik" was in the first team of Cichociemni dropped into Poland.

TEAM 0; DROPPED 15/16 February 1941
Stanisław Krzymowski ‘Kostka’, Major. Kielce District staff officer.
Józef Zabielski ‘Żbik’, Captain of Cavalry. Kielce District staff officer. Sent to Great Britain in 1942 as an emissary of AK High Command.
Czesław Raczkowski ‘Orkan’, Bombardier. Political courier.

"......On the evening of the 15th of February 1941 a two-engine Whitley bomber was waiting to take off at RAF Newmarket. It was headed for Poland. Four containers were loaded on board followed by three Polish cichociemni parachutists–Major Stanisław Krzymowski ‘Kostka’ and Captain of Cavalry Józef Zabielski ‘Żbik’, as well as a government courier. ‘Kostka’ jumps first, then go the containers, followed by ‘Żbik’, with ‘Orkan’ jumping last."

[dastier]

Congratulations on your latest acquisition.

[StefanM]

Congratulations on your latest acquisition.

Thanks Mike,

"First to Return" was originally published in London (1946) in Polish under the title of "Pierwszy skok". In 1980 Zabielski self-published a book of poetry about the cichociemni under the title of; "Wrócą orły : cichociemni w poezji" which I also recently tracked down

- - Updated - -

[Piwo2]

ON THE RIVER EBRO-
UGE TO LIVE

by Dr. Boleslaw Wysocki

Cambridge, MA 1986

Printed by Vine Lane Press, 2 Vine Lane, London, SE1 2JP

Again going through things I thought I would share this book with everyone along with a private note from Dr. Wysocki and some photographs of the POW cap he wore at Miranda de Ebro Concentration Camp in Spain.

Piwo




Obit July, 2012
Dr. Boleslaw Wysocki, 91, a Polish expatriate who wrote eloquently about the horrors of life in a Spanish concentration camp during World War II, died Monday at his Cambridge home.
A retired professor of psychology at Boston College, Dr. Wysocki was the author of "Urge to Live," a memoir of the three years he spent in the Miranda de Ebro concentration camp, which was operated by the fascist government in Spain. He said he was inspired to write the book, which was published in 1988 and is now out of print, when he realized most Americans did not even know there were Spanish concentration camps.