Rating: 
Summary: A Fitting Tribute
Review: In "The Bedford Boys", Alex Kershaw gives a human face to the anonymous soldiers we've seen killed in countless WWII films. I had forgotten that the story of the Bedford soldiers was at least part of the inspiration for "Saving Private Ryan", and I agree with the implication made by some other reviewers that the true story would have made an even more powerful film. "The Bedford Boys" is touching, upsetting, and, when Kershaw describes the tribute finally paid to Bedford's fallen heroes, ultimately uplifting. Without suggesting that the U.S. should not have participated in WWII or the D-Day invasion, Kershaw dramatically points out the sacrifices that have been made by soldiers, their loved ones, and their entire communities to protect freedom in this country, and around the world.
Rating:
Summary: Remembering Virginia town that lost so many on June 6, 1944
Review:
Alex Kershaw's "The Bedford Boys" is about people. It is a history of what war does to individuals and those left behind. We are told that 5,000 Americans died on June 6, 1944, D-Day, but that is a statistic. This narrative is about folks who died trying to cross the beach code named Omaha ' Bloody Omaha. It is the names that make this volume uniquely harrowing, singularly distressing, exceptionally depressing. It is similar to the effect Maya Lin's Vietnam War Memorial in Washington has on people, 58,000 names memorialized in polished stone. Touch a name; contact a soul.
Bedford, Va, lost a higher percentage of its sons on D-Day than any community in America and that is the main reason the National D-Day Memorial was dedicated in the tiny village of Bedford in June, 2001. But 56-years of time and the presence of the president of the United States were not enough to salve the losses on Omaha Beach. Mothers and fathers were emotionally wounded by their losses, siblings permanently disheartened, widows and fiancees everlastingly scarred. Mr. Kershaw's book relentlessly reminds us that war is about humans.
The Bedford boys were shaped by the Depression, and the young men of Company A of the first Battalion of the 116th Regiment of the 29th Division had joined the National Guard in the 1930s for social purposes and also for the essential dollar-a-day they were paid when they were in training once each month and for two weeks in the summer. Many other Bedford inhabitants ' more than 1500 ' served in the armed services during World War II, but Company A was special. These men had grown up, gone to school, played baseball, and worked together, dated each other's sisters, trained and deployed as a group, and were in the first wave to assault Omaha Beach at H Hour on June 6.
Of the 28 troops from Bedford who left the landing craft, 22 were killed, most before they reached the sand, by murderous machine gun fire. Nine others also from Bedford did not reach the beach: five because their landing craft sunk on the way to shore and four others who were in support capacity and did not get ashore on D-Day.
Mr. Kershaw tells of the men trying to swim or wade with packs of more than 60 pounds on their backs, desperate to get ashore while the Germans from barely damaged bunkers and pillboxes laced the beaches with deadly fire: "The Germans had cut Company A to ribbons but they were not satisfied. They now riddled wounded men with arms outstretched in supplication. They peppered soldiers who could not crawl and American teenagers risking their own lives to save them. The . . . machine gunners shot rescuers in the back. Snipers aimed for the forehead." In all,102 men from Company A were killed in the first wave, about one third of the company.
In time, these horrors were brought to Bedford. Back home, the letters stopped a few days before June 6, and when correspondence did not start again soon after the sixth, families agonized over the lack of news.
Elizabeth Teass, one of the town's few telegraph operators, six weeks later "switched on the teletype machine." She read "We have casualties," and read the "first line of copy. 'The Secretary of War desires me to express his deep regret.'" Elizabeth had seen these words before, about once each week, but this time the machine did not stop. "Line after line of copy clicked out of the printer. . . ."
Mothers, fathers, wives learned from Western Union that day, and on other days soon thereafter of the death of Leslie Abbot, Wallace Carter, John Clifton, John Dean, Frank Draper, Jr., Taylor Fellers, Charles Fizer, Nicholas Gillespie, Bedford Hoback, Raymond Hoback, Clifton Lee, Earl Parker, Joseph Parker, Jack Powers, Weldon Rosazza, John Reynolds, John Shenck, Ray Stevens, Gordon White, John Wilkes, Elmer Wright, Grant Yopp. Every name spoke trauma and tragedy.
Understand this about D-Day, dear reader. The air bombardment of German fortifications was crucial, even if not as effective as hoped, and the naval attack on German defenses was essential, even if it did not silence most of the German guns, but at H-Hour when the landing craft lowered their ramps the success or failure of the greatest amphibious attack in the history of warfare, the event upon which the success of the Allied effort in World War II depended, all came down to the Bedford Boys and thousands of men like them scrambling in chest high water, weighed down with equipment and ammunition, and the water they splashed into was crimson with their blood and that of their buddies. And they advanced. Bless them all. Bless them all.
Rating: 
Summary: A Different Side of the Story
Review: Bedford, Virginia had a population of 3,000. During the depression many young men joined the National Guard. The Guard paid a dollar for every day of training, and during the depression in the coal fields this was a great help towards releaving the poverty. By 1941 38 men remained in Company A, 116th Infantry, 29th Infantry Division.
At 6:30 am on June 6th 1944, Company A landed on Dog Green, the western most section of Omaha Beach. Ten minutes later nineteen boys from Bedford, Virginia were dead.
This is the highest percentage of casualties experienced by any town since the Civil War, and is the reason that the National D-Day Memorial is located in Bedford.
This book is not a unit narrative, true it tells what Company A did, but its real point is what happened in the town and to its people. Rarely do stories of World War II cover the home front, and particularly not the stories of those that remain after the losses. Excellent reading.
Rating:
Summary: A small town's tragic loss that is well worth remembering
Review: Dog Green sector at Omaha Beach, D-Day, 6:30 a.m. (Note for those who like visual images: It's the setting for the landing scene in Saving Private Ryan, the scene of the worst carnage on June 6, 1944. Steven Spielberg donated to the Bedford memorial.) The Americans were going to put eleven divisions ashore in Normandy -- ten of which had never seen combat --- most of them after a stormy crossing of the English Channel, the last eleven miles in small, pitching landing craft. Planners estimated casualties of 25%. For the small town of Bedford, Virginia, population 3,000, things were going to get a lot worse, very fast. By noon, 19 young men from Bedford were dead. More would die later in the month. June 1944 was a disproportional tragedy for Bedford.Kershaw takes us from the formation of the company in the 1930s to interviews with the survivors sixty years later. The three years leading up to D-Day earn the most attention. Following the number of men killed makes the story difficult to write and to follow at times. There are so many names, stories, and relationships, and many of the characters are dead and those who remember have fifty- or sixty-year-old memories. Nonetheless, Kershaw brings the people and their stories to life. Kershaw's story and style reminded me of the memorable "Flags of our fathers". The stories of rigorous training, demanding officers (especially Norman Cota and Charles Canham), preparing in England, dying with other heroes -- had the sepia tone of HBO's Band of Brothers. Most of the men of Bedford's Company A enlisted in the local National Guard unit in the Depression. Sharp uniforms and training pay were attractive alternatives for an impoverished time. Few of the men ever expected to go to war. Some of their parents resisted letting the young men join the unit. After D-Day and years later, some questioned as to whether the poor soldiers of Virginia were cannon fodder for war profiteers. Kershaw allows the survivors to wonder or comment about the decision to send young, untested men into battle: Should experienced troops been at the lead? Should, could -- Eisenhower have waited for better weather? Could the navy and air force done a better job of softening up the defense? Should the landing parties have been required to carry sixty pounds of pack? Was the intelligence about the defenses bad (better German units replaced poorer ones only days before) or shaded (some were told it would be 'a cake walk')? And several people offer different perspectives on heroes: Were they all heroes on Omaha Beach? Or was it those who died? Or was it those who returned home and had to live with and explain the memories? Or was it the families of the dead men? Some chose September 11, 2001 as a moment to realize the magnitude of the localized loss. Reading the entire book in one day made me realize how compelling and moving a story could be. We need to read and remember yet also reflect on both the heroics and the humanity of such personal and patriotic history.
Rating:
Summary: A moving tribute to unsung heros
Review: I happened to walk by and saw the cover and bought it! I read it in one sitting. The book is not a highly detailed history book. It is more of an attempt to give you the impression of the people caught up in extraordinary times. The author attempts to give you an idea as to the men who died and what their families went through after. You do get a taste of the Omaha landings and you can see who this group inspired Saving Private Ryan. In fact a couple of the guys mentioned in the book, consulted on the film. You meet an unsung hero in form of a Medic who ran around trying to help as many people he could. The divisional commander who calmly walked around encouring his soldiers during the slaughter. The sacrifice of the men and men who tried to help others.... Probably the sadest part of the book involves the families: The Western Union Girl who had to take the notices of death. The teacher who got a first graders note about the death of her husband. The mothers and fathers who after 30+ years still can't deal with the death of their sons. Again a worthwhile read!
Rating:
Summary: Well written history of a tragedy
Review: June 6, 1944 has been written about extensively by American authors almost from the moment it happened. The invasion to free western Europe has filled perhaps more pages than any other event in history. Beyond books, D-Day has been the subject of more movies than one can count. Among the most famous films about D-Day was The Longest Day and a generation later Saving Private Ryan. What else can be said about the invasion of Europe? Somehow, the story of the young men from Beford, Virginia has been overlooked. When you read the book you'll ask the same question I did....Why didn't Stephen Spielberg make his movie about WWII using this story instead of the fictional story of Private Ryan. When you read the Bedford Boys by Alex Kershaw you'll ask the same question. Bedford, Virginia is a small blue ridge mountain town of 3000. Before WWII jobs were scarce. Most of the men of the town joined the national guard unit to augment their meager incomes. Most earned a dollar a day for the days they trained. When the war started their unit became part of the 116th Infantry, one of the most battered units in Europe. On D-Day twenty-one of Bedford's sons would die on the beaches of Normandy. No other town of any size would suffer such a devastating loss. Twenty-one sons, brothers, fathers, boyfriends all lost; lost as completely as anyone can be lost....erased with the sweep of an hour hand. It boggles the mind even today nearly 60 years later. Alex Kershaw does a wonderful job of bringing these young men to life. These young soldiers aren't just characters on the stage of history. As you learn about them, wome in more detail than the others, they become real people. The book follows them from prewar Bedford, through training, and on the a blood stained beach in France. The book is brutal. The book is poetic. You won't soon forget it. The Bedford Boys is well researched. While Kershaw's coverage of the landings is strong on details it is never the less accurate. He uses the narratives of the few survivors to great effect. If your a student of history you'll most assuredly want to read this book. It is a landmark story.
Rating:
Summary: THE GREAT CRUSADE
Review: Many readers may wonder why so many books about D-day are published and why so much more attention is paid to that battle than other battles in World War II. Certainly we landed on other hostile shores during the war, i.e. Tarawa, Salerno,Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Certainly we had fought the Germans already by D-Day in North Africa, in Sicily and in Italy so why is D-Day so special? The War in the Pacific was a war of self defense and revenge for Pearl Harbor and Bataan. We fought the Japanese for the most part on islands in the Pacific that most Americans had never heard of that were populated with little or no indigenous culture and certainly without a legacy of Freedom and Liberty. In Italy even though most Italians were grateful for us evicting the Germans we still were fighting a country that had at one point sided with Hitler and declared war on us. When we landed in North Africa we were occupying a French colony that had decided to side with the Nazi collaborationist Vichy regime.
Overlord of which D-Day was the first day however was different. Here we were liberating a proud people with one of the most advanced civilizations in the world who had not wanted war and who had been conquered and brutally subjugated by the Nazis. And although ulimately it was in our best interests to beat the Germans we didn't have to storm the shores so quickly to do so. We could have done what so many wished us to do and bomb Germany into annihilation and peck away at their empire on it's fringes while letting the Red Army grind down the Wehrmact. Instead we flung our soldiers against the Atlantic wall and assaulted Festung Europa.
These men were not professional,rather they were Citizen soldiers. They were there because they had been drafted or because they had joined out of a sense of Duty. There were also those who had joined the National Guard before the war because they needed the extra money to survive the Depression and because their friends and brothers had joined also. When the National Guard was inducted into Federal Service in 1940 these men were taken away from their families and their homes and jobs and then eventually sent overseas.
Therefore the unique significance of D-day is the story of a peaceful enslaved people being liberated by a peace loving bunch of citizens with no direct stake in the oppressed people's fate. And these citizen Soldiers undertook this struggle without complaining and with great heroism. President Franklin Roosevelt summed it up in his prayer address to the nation on D-Day:
"...Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity."
"...For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and good will among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home."
The cost of that heroism was very high however, especially on Omaha Beach which was one of the biggest bloodbaths in American history. The cemetery above stands in mute testimony. Now many people have seen Saving Private Ryan which is a great movie. The opening scene takes place on a sector of Omaha Beach called Dog Green. That twenty minute scene is one of the most harrowing in the history of film.
Now imagine that in reality it was far worst than depicted in the movie and lasted not twenty minutes but five hours. That was the real Dog Green. And one of the units that landed on that beach was Company A of the 116th Infantry Regiment of the 29th infantry division. Out of that 192 men that landed that day less than 10 members of the company could report for dinner. The rest had been killed or wounded. Over twenty of the members of Co. A came from the small town of Bedford, Virginia. Within minutes of the beginning of the battle over a dozen of the Bedford Boys were killed and by the end of the day a total of twenty one had been killed.
This book is the story of those men and the town they lived in and how they grew up in the Depression and went to war and how the war affected that town.
It is a great book. It is not necessary to be a knowledgable student of military history to get everything from the book. Indeed the author makes a few very minor factual errors himself in the story which in no way detract from it. (He states twice that the pre-war US army was only 75,000 men. in fact it was about 140,000. He also mentions in one point armor piericng howitzers. Howitzers use indiect fire to lob high explosive, incedniary and smoke rounds, they do not fire armor piericng rounds- anti-tank guns do.) These two errors aside which many will not even notice this book is a highly accurate, emotionally packed well written powerhouse. Although I have read hundreds of books on WW2 and at least 20 on D-day I still could not put this down. Definitely one of my favorites
Rating:
Summary: Heartbreaking, irresistible
Review: Reading about the soldiers from Bedford, Virginia preparing to hit the beaches on June 6, 1944 I found myself sharing their anxiety. They were in the first wave to hit Omaha Beach as part of the allied invasion. They were cannon fodder. That Author Alex Kershaw makes us so empathetic of these men is a tribute to his skillful story telling.
Kershaw masterfully introduces the men of this small US town in the waning days of the great Depression. We then follow them as the United States enters the war and they being serious training, first in the states then for over a year in England.
By the time of D-Day, readers will be quite familiar with many of the soldiers and share their quite understandable fear. The results are predictable, with a disproportionate number from Bedford slaughtered during the invasion, many before reaching the beach.
Kershaw wisely does not spare us the gruesome details. The real story of war is as much in the horrific deaths and injuries as in the battle tactics and formations.
The heartache really sets in as Kershaw returns to Bedford to recount the reactions of the families back home. There is no way to overstate the impact of war on the victim's families. "Beford Boys" shares the heart breaks of the Americans back home.
Many Americans, such as myself, have had strong misgivings about US military actions in our lifetime, but there is no such ambiguity about the efforts to liberate Europe from the Nazis. "The Bedford Boys" is the latest in a long line of excellent accounts of that war. It is rife with bravery, terror, personal tragedy and all that makes war humankind's worst creation.
This book is a must for students of D-Day, World War II, war, U.S. History and that strange and wonderful animal, the human being.
Rating:
Summary: Deeply Moving and Absolutely Unforgettable
Review: Reading this book on the bus going to work I found I had to stop
myself from bursting onto tears several times.There are alot of names mentioned in this book so at times it is hard to remember who is who. I don't think it matters though. The point of this book is the incredible bravery shown by these men in the face of certain death.The book puts a face on D-Day beyond what you see in old newsreels. It is a story to tell your children. If you know anyome who was in D-Day shake their hand and say Thank You.
This is history the way it should be taught in school. Absolutely unforgettable.
Rating:
Summary: Story of the Town that Suffered the Greated D-Day Burden
Review: Rural Bedford, Virginia, suffered the highest per capita D-Day casualty rate of any American town. Nineteen of its residents, or residents of Bedford County, in which the town is located, were killed at bloody Omaha Beach on that longest day, the first day of the Allied Normandy invasion. Three more residents were killed within the next few days. These Bedford soldiers were members of Company A, 116th Infantry Regiment, 29th Infantry Division--the first troops to go ashore on H-Hour at Omaha Beach. The book is well written, a balance of contextualizing historical narrative and oral history of survivors and relatives. This work is not a history of D-Day, nor of the Omaha Beach attack, nor of the Normandy campaign--nor is it designed to be, there are other books which deal with these larger topics. Rather the author skillfully narrates the story of the Bedford boys who joined the National Guard during the Depression to earn a few extra dollars, were called into federal service and endured extended training in the U.S. before deployment to England for the invasion of France. The author portrays an emotionally compelling story of the devastating effects of the loss of so many sons, husbands, lovers, and fellow soldiers by the people of Bedford, reminding us both of the horror of war, its brutal and lasting effects, as well as the unfortunate fact that at times it may be necessary for the liberation of the oppressed and the preservation of freedom. Anne Frank, whose family in hiding learned of D-Day by their radio, entered in her diary that "the best part of the invasion is that I have the feeling that friends are approaching." (Bedford Boys, page 170) Today Bedford is the home of the National D-Day Memorial, a site well worth visiting, as is the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans. The valor and sacrifice of those young men who perished so quickly in the massive D-Day invasion cries out to be remembered by every generation of Americans and citizens of the free world--especially since soon there will be no living survivors of D-Day, with the death each day of thousands of World War II veterans. This book, this D-Day Memorial, this D-Day Museum, and the lives of these brave young men and their families from rural Virginia, deserve a remembrance wherever that perpetual vigilance which is the price of liberty is honored. It was Erwin Rommel who called D-Day the longest day. And it is this day, and every day in which great sacrifices are made for freedom, from the American Revolution to soldiers today bravely defending freedom around the world, that deserves the longest of memories.
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