Bomber and Tanker Accounts from the Second World War

Hi all,

I hope this is the right place to put this, but was just wondering if anyone has any good sources on accounts by the crews of bombers and tanks during the Second World War? The more personal the better, as I'm more interested in the day to day and emotions of it than the larger theory and battle rigamarole. Can be in any format. Hope it's okay to ask, and thanks in advance! Particularly interested in Superfortress bomber crews and Western Front Allied tank crews, but any will do, at the moment.
 
I should note so far I have watched the documentaries Thunderbolt on Netflix and Allied Airpower 1942-1945 on Amazon Prime to prepare for it and have ordered the book Death Traps to prepare. :)
 
Hi all,

I hope this is the right place to put this, but was just wondering if anyone has any good sources on accounts by the crews of bombers and tanks during the Second World War? The more personal the better, as I'm more interested in the day to day and emotions of it than the larger theory and battle rigamarole. Can be in any format. Hope it's okay to ask, and thanks in advance! Particularly interested in Superfortress bomber crews and Western Front Allied tank crews, but any will do, at the moment.

Tank! by Ken Tout is a fictionalised account of his experiences in Operation Goodwood in Normandy (only likely available from a library, looking how much they are worth I need to hunt down the thieving bugger who nicked my nearly mint copy), there are a number of accounts of RAF Bomber crews in Max Hastings Bomber Command.
 
Tank! by Ken Tout is a fictionalised account of his experiences in Operation Goodwood in Normandy (only likely available from a library, looking how much they are worth I need to hunt down the thieving bugger who nicked my nearly mint copy), there are a number of accounts of RAF Bomber crews in Max Hastings Bomber Command.
Thank you, I'll definitely check out Bomber Command! I was going to the library today so I'll add Tank! to my list too.
 
Further to @Crowbar Six's recommendation of Tank!, here's something from an old thread.

Ken Tout: Tank!

A novelised account written by a Sherman commander in Normandy. I thought it good when I read it many years ago. Apparently available in a condensed version, with two of the author's other works on his campaign experiences in NW Europe, as Tank: D to VE Days.

Peter Elstob's Warriors For the Working Day is a very good 1960 novelisation of the author's experiences in Shermans, and then Comets, in the 11th Armoured Division.
 
I'd like to jump in here for some recommendations as well. In addition to what ToxiStory asked for regarding Allied crews, I was wondering if anyone had any first-hand accounts from Axis tankers or aviators, such as Wehrmacht panzer crews or Luftwaffe pilots, or Japanese pilots or ground troops. I'm working on an AH story involving World War II, and I plan to include narrative segments to give human faces to the alternate history.
 
The imperial War Museum has some excellent books written from diaries and memoirs of veterans.

Look for Simon & Schuster War Diaries series
 
I was wondering if anyone had any first-hand accounts from Axis tankers or aviators, such as Wehrmacht panzer crews or Luftwaffe pilots,
Quite a lot of German pilots wrote memoirs, most famous being Galland's The First and the Last. Others: Macky Steinhoff's The Straits of Messina, and The Last Chance - The Pilots' Plot Against Goering, and Knoke's I Flew for the Fuehrer.

Novels: Spencer Dunmore, Ace, about the career of a Jagdflieger from BoB novice to experte 1944; and Betrayed Skies by Rudolf Braunburg is about an FW190 pilot in the closing stages of the war who is definitely not an ace.
 
'Flak Bait' by Devon Francis has extracts and quotes from many post mission debriefs and historical section interviews during the war. These all concern crews of the B26 medium bomber in the S Pacific, Mediterranean, and mostly NW Europe. A fairly interesting narrative context is provided for the extracts.
 
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