Overview

WINSTON CHURCHILL called it ‘the worst journey in the world’. But was even this telling quote, describing the nightmarish torment experienced while transporting military aid to northern Russia during World War Two, an understatement? As this book’s title implies, Battle of the Arctic tells a unique story. For much of the conflict was complicated by terrific storms, snow, ice, fog, whales and Arctic mirages, so that what is chronicled at times sounds like a cross between the nightmarish torment experienced by both Shackleton in his ship Endurance and Scott of the Antarctic, and an Arctic version of Robinson Crusoe. The action unfolded as Allied naval and merchant seamen, airmen, submariners, soldiers and intelligence officers delivered on their countries’ promise to take arms to Russia notwithstanding the German attempts to hunt them in their aircraft, U-boats and surface fleet spearheaded by Tirpitz and Scharnhorst. When ships were attacked, and went down in seas so cold that a man could die after five minutes of immersion, it triggered events reminiscent of the do-or-die moments during the sinking of the Titanic. Men perished one by one in lifeboats, and as castaways on deserted Arctic islands where they were stalked by polar bears. Frostbitten and wounded survivors ended up in primitive Russian hospitals where amputations were carried out without anesthetics. Others, while stranded for months in the communist state they were aiding, experienced the murky worlds of the NKVD, and the gulag, as well as famine and prostitution. Using new material unearthed in American, British, Russian and German archives, as well as Polish, Norwegian, French and Dutch sources, and a remarkable collection of vivid witness accounts brought together at the passing of the last survivors, Hugh Sebag-Montefiore can at last shine a revealing light on this extraordinary tale that oscillates between the sailors’ eye view on the front line, and the controversies that infuriated world leaders.

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9780008335786

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Reviews

'This confident account of the Arctic convoy battles stretches from the diplomatic bargaining of Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill to the grim, personal stories of death and survival of the crews of the torpedoed and bombed merchant ships. Sebag-Montefiore casts his net wide, with evidence from not only British and American sources, but Russian and German too. This book is original, comprehensive, dynamic and thought-provoking' Roger Knight, author of Convoys: The British Struggle against Napoleonic Europe and America PRAISE FOR HUGH SEBAG-MONTEFIORE’S SOMME 'Having read almost everything that is written on this battle, I can vouch that this is the best account yet. Sebag-Montefiore deserves congratulation for restoring humanity to this battle' Gerard DeGroot, The Times 'Magisterial, exemplary, heartbreaking. So original is the material, and so inventive is Sebag-Montefiore's approach – telling each stage of the fight from the perspective of both the combatants and their families back home – that this well-known tale is rendered strange again. Written with great style and sensitivity, superbly illustrated with many original plates and beautifully drawn maps, Sebag-Montefiore's brilliant new study will set the benchmark for a generation' Saul David, Daily Telegraph 'Sebag-Montefiore's combination of thoughtful analysis with first-hand testimony from army soldiers, cameramen and diarists lends a gritty immediacy' Ian Thomson, Observer 'The best historians of the war have always made good use of the words written by the participants themselves, but few have done so as effectively as here. A moving record' Daily Mail

PRAISE FOR HUGH SEBAG-MONTEFIORE’S SOMME 'Having read almost everything that is written on this battle, I can vouch that this is the best account yet. Sebag-Montefiore deserves congratulation for restoring humanity to this battle' Gerard DeGroot, The Times 'Magisterial, exemplary, heartbreaking. So original is the material, and so inventive is Sebag-Montefiore's approach – telling each stage of the fight from the perspective of both the combatants and their families back home – that this well-known tale is rendered strange again. Written with great style and sensitivity, superbly illustrated with many original plates and beautifully drawn maps, Sebag-Montefiore's brilliant new study will set the benchmark for a generation' Saul David, Daily Telegraph 'Sebag-Montefiore's combination of thoughtful analysis with first-hand testimony from army soldiers, cameramen and diarists lends a gritty immediacy' Ian Thomson, Observer 'The best historians of the war have always made good use of the words written by the participants themselves, but few have done so as effectively as here. A moving record' Daily Mail

Author Information

Hugh Sebag-Montefiore was a barrister before becoming a journalist and historian. He has written for the Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph, Observer, Independent on Sunday, and Mail on Sunday. He is the author of three bestselling history books, two about the 2nd World War (Enigma: The Battle for the Code and Dunkirk: Fight to the Last Man), and one about the 1st World War (Somme: Into the Breach). He also wrote Kings On The Catwalk: The Louis Vuitton Moet-Hennessy Affair.

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