This compelling tale of courage; heroism; and terror is told in the words of ninety-one sailors and officers interviewed by the author about their World War II service aboard fifty-six destroyer escorts. They reveal many never-before-told details of life at sea during wartime and; along with information found in secretly kept war diaries and previously unpublished personal photographs; add important dimensions to the official record. Unseasoned teenage recruits when they first went to sea; these sailors were led by inexperienced college boys more accustomed to yachts than warships. Their ships were untested vessels; designed by a man with no formal training in ship design; and which many viewed as a waste of money. Yet; as Cross points out; these men are credited with helping turn the tide of the war in the Atlantic as they singlehandedly sank some seventy U-boats and captured U-505; the only German submarine taken during the war and the first enemy vessel captured by Americans at sea since the War of 1812. In the Pacific; the destroyer escorts fought in every major battle; side-by-side with Allied battleships and destroyers. But this story is not just about battles. It is also about American genius; hard work; honor and growing up in the Great Depression. The author provides eyewitness details about the historic first step taken to end racial discrimination in the military as African-Americans stepped aboard the destroyer escort USS Mason as full-fledged sailors for the first time and earned a Navy commendation of heroism in the Battle of the Atlantic presented to the surviving crewmen fifty-one years later. Readers also learn about an ingenious invention when a sailor breaks his silence about a secret weapon tested aboard his destroyer escort that rendered a new German radio-controlled glide bomb useless.
#777786 in Books 2001-01-01Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.02 x .55 x 5.98l; .76 #File Name: 1589830156242 pagesISBN13: 9781589830158Condition: NewNotes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Review
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful. A Worthy ReadBy Virgil BrownThe blurb on the back cover of this book says that it is the "first thorough evaluation in English of the theory that the Persian Empire authorized" the formation of the Pentateuch. This is a subject that is of great interest to me. During the early 1990s; I jettisoned the use of the Documentary Hypothesis altogether. Among other things; it was too subjective. There was no agreement upon the number of sources nor even what constituted a source.Instead I adopted a theory that the Pentateuch was amalgamated during the time of Ezra. The Persians found this advantageous for the political stability of the western portion of their empire; and the Judeans found that a common literature preserved and strengthened their culture. Moreover there was a historical parallel to this in the recording of Sumerian literature in the first quarter of the second millenium._P and T_ begins with an article by Peter Frei on the definition of Persian imperial authorization. I will inject here that Frei would not accept my historical parallel. The rest of _P and T_ is a series of papers (or verisimilar papers) delivered at the SBL meeting in Nashville in 2000.Joseph Blenkinsopp questions 1) whether the compilation of the Pentateuch during the Persian Period is a case of imperial authorization as defined by Frei; and 2) whether we are speaking of the Pentateuch as a whole or merely the legal content.Liz Fried argues that if Ezra had a genuine commission; that commission would have been to appoint judges who would have judged according to the "data" (the Persian word for "laws") of the king.Lester Grabbe follows with an essay which I consider to be a good example of bad writing among academics. In this case the reader is asked to read only 18 pages in order to find out what Grabbe has to say. For some reason academics do not often write by presenting their thesis and then substantiating it. In Grabbe's case one must wait until the end of his essay to hear that 1) he does not think there is any evidence to support religious cults within their empire; 2) he questions the validity of any role by Judah in defending the western border of the empire; 3) he finds the approval of the request of Udjahorresne to be a typical reward for services rendered; 4) the Pentateuch was put into shape during the Persian Period; 5) the tradition of Ezra as a lawgiver founders; and 6) if there was any imperial authorization; it would have been permission to teach the decrees of the king. Grabbe does not write with the idea of assertion followed by evidence. These six conclusions derive from three questions at the beginning of his essay.The above should suffice to introduce the reader to _Persia and Torah_ although there are still three fine essays which I have not addressed including one by Donald Redford. Each of these essays is a worthy read by itself. Together they offer diverse approaches to a captivating idea that is finding more acceptance in the Unites States; i.e. the Pentateuch was formulated during the Persian Period.
