Fifty-six years ago today, Winston Churchill passed away, age 90. I’ve written about him before (here, here and here). Like many larger-than-life figures, especially one in the public eye for much of his life, Churchill has his share of supporters (most recently Erik Larson) as well as his detractors. He certainly made his share of …
Seventy-five years ago today World War II ended in Europe. Hitler was dead, and a devastated Germany surrendered unconditionally. In his diary for that day William L. Shirer wrote: “All day I have had to rub my eyes to believe it; to realize that this is really the end of the nightmare that began for …
Civilian casualties in war have existed for as long as war itself—it is happening today in Syria and elsewhere as we speak. World War II, the most violent cataclysm ever, took civilian deaths to new heights. For example, 77 years ago today, Great Britain experienced what would prove to be the worst single loss of …
I don’t generally recycle old blogs I’ve previously written, but in some cases I will make an exception. Two years ago on Memorial Day I wrote about Capt. Robert M. Losey, the first U.S. serviceman to be killed in World War II—it happened in Norway. The full story can be found here.
From Odd Nansen’s dairy, Thursday, July 9, 1942: “At dinnertime I was called down for questioning in the Vermittlung [registration office]. It was Herold who did the questioning. My entire life was unrolled, from the cradle to the present day. . . . Clearly the point was just to get a résumé of my whole …
From the November 2018 issue of Smithsonian Magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/astonishing-holocaust-diary-hidden-world-70-years-resurfaced-america-180970534/?fbclid=IwAR0dSgjl9xk0oeJLVivob9K4hP1azB9iJeJ8psQg5ORxeoOwsvyR_ugWR94
Joachim Ronneberg, the last surviving member of Operation Gunnerside, the daring raid to destroy the heavy water facility at Vemork, Norway, died on Sunday, October 21. Ronneberg was 99. Obituaries from the New York Times and the BBC, respectively, are here and here. In 2016 I was asked by The Norwegian American to review The …
Seventy-seven years ago last Thursday (August 23, 1941), Per Birkevold, Hjalmar Svae and Bjorn Fraser began their ill-fated quest to steal a German boat and escape from Norway to England. I have written about this episode in prior blogs (here and here). I also wrote about the amazing coincidence of meeting Hjalmar Svae’s niece, Siri …
No, not that bomb story. This doesn’t involve the Trinity test site near Alamogordo, New Mexico, where the first atomic bomb was successfully exploded (although there is, as we shall see, a tie-in to that matter as well). No, this story involves the twentieth Earl of Suffolk, otherwise known as Charles Henry George Howard, or …
When we last left Norway in 1940 (here), it was reeling from an invasion by German forces which began on April 9, 1940. The Germans had achieved complete surprise, and quickly seized key ports and airports. Practically the only thing that went well for the defenders was the sinking of the German heavy cruiser Blücher, …
“I want to thank Tim Boyce for this . . . . It would be lost to history if people like Tim Boyce did not devote the effort and time and expense–a good part of his life–to preserve the Odd Nansen story. It is a moving and gripping story. . . .”
–U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal
Hailed by The New Yorker as “among the most compelling documents to come out of the war,” From Day to Day is a World War II concentration camp diary—one of only a handful ever translated into English—secretly written by Odd Nansen, a Norwegian political prisoner. Arrested in January 1942, Nansen, son of polar explorer and humanitarian Fridtjof Nansen (Nobel Peace Prize 1922) was held captive for the duration of the war in various Nazi camps in Norway and Germany.
Nansen’s diary entries detail his palpable longing for his wife and family, his constantly frustrated hopes for release, the quiet strength and sometimes ugly prejudices of his fellow prisoners, and his horror at the especially barbaric treatment reserved for the Jews. The diary brilliantly illuminates Nansen’s daily struggle, not only to survive, but to preserve his sanity and maintain his humanity in a world engulfed by fear and hate.
First published in English in 1949, From Day to Day had been out of print for almost seventy years. The new edition contains entries and sketches never previously available in English. It also features a new introduction and extensive annotations by Timothy Boyce and a preface by Thomas Buergenthal, whose life (as a ten year-old) Nansen saved while in Sachsenhausen, later recounted in his own memoir A Lucky Child: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy.
