‘Smoke rises in the City of Three Spires, the smouldering remnant of the Nazi hate. Coventry and England will remember and repay’. From August 1940, Hitler’s Luftwaffe mercilessly and indiscriminately bombed cities and towns in Britain. The historic West Midlands city of Coventry did not escape the carnage as, night after night, high-explosive and incendiary bombs rained down on the hapless production centre of cars, munitions and aero engines. Today, the iconic shell of Coventry’s once majestic medieval cathedral offers a silent memorial of remembrance to that dreadful night. For the city’s residents of now, it is a poignant echo of a violent and destructive part of their history. With carefully selected photographs, Gerry van Tonder tells the story of Coventry’s blitz through a series of ‘ghost’ photographs, where historic wartime images are blended with their modern counterpart to create a fascinating window in to Coventry’s past. Also drawing from contemporary press accounts of the Coventry Blitz, this book presents a totally unique comparative insight into the Nazi bombing of Coventry in the Second World War. AUTHOR: Born in Zimbabwe, full-time historian and published author Gerry van Tonder came to Britain in 1999. Specialising in military history, Gerry has authored Rhodesian Combined Forces Roll of Honour 1966 1981; Book of Remembrance: Rhodesia Native Regiment and Rhodesian African Rifles; North of the Red Line (South African Defence Forces border war), and the co-authored definitive Rhodesia Regiment 1899 1981. Gerry presented a copy of the latter to the regiment’s former colonel-in-chief, Her Majesty the Queen. Gerry has written a range of British local history titles, and most recently has contributed to Pen and Sword’s Cold War series with Berlin Blockade and Malayan Emergency. 200 illustrations
