As England braced for a life-or-death struggle against Germany in the summer of 1940, most Americans knew more about baseball than the bombs about to fall on London.

Not Phil Leckrone. The tall, handsome and gregarious pilot from a small town in downstate Illinois had a taste for fast cars–and faster airplanes. More than a year before Pearl Harbor brought America into World War II, Leckrone left his wife and two small children–risking loss of citizenship, jail time, and hefty fines–to sneak across the Canadian border and join the Royal Air Force.

Now, for the first time in 80 years, Leckrone’s story has been brought to life in this meticulously researched biography.

Full Measure of Devotion is a scholarly yet vivid portrait that follows Phil Leckrone from his birth in a rural Illinois community to his tragic death in a flying accident near London after the Battle of Britain concluded.

History specialists and generalists alike will appreciate Full Measure of Devotion as a timeless story of one man’s heroic courage and the somber debt owed to those who answer the call to protect free nations from tyranny.