DIG WWII (ePub)

When the bitter conflict of the Second World War drew to a close, Britain quietly busied herself with getting back to normal. As the men returned from the battlefields of Europe, wartime airfields were deserted, pillboxes guarding strategic Stop Lines were abandoned to nature, and jetties for the convoy escorts were left to rot. Their ghosts linger still, criss-crossing the landscape, and much can be learned from their excavation and examination.

In Dig WW2 Dan Snow takes us on a journey through the Allied Battle for Europe, unearthing a Spitfire buried in the Donegal peat bog, joining a team diving on a tank graveyard off Malin Head, and venturing into a sealed bunker on a D-Day beach. Jean Hood delves more deeply into the stories he uncovers, and explores the themes raised in the TV series to reveal the neglected, forgotten and secretive accounts of the war: Britain's relationship with 'neutral' Ireland and America, the programme of 'starfish sites', and the mystery of the launch ramps pointing at London. Some stories are intensely personal, and others simply celebrate British eccentricity and the art of invention.

The result is a thoroughly engrossing book that takes you to the Liri Valley and Juno Beach, Lough Erne and a Somerset cemetery. With an end section on how we can all get involved and interact with our wartime history, it will awaken the military archaeologist in all of us.