The Monuments Men - Robert M. Edsel

The Monuments Men

The story of "The Monuments Men" has recently been portrayed in true Hollywood fashion in the movie of the same name, starring George Clooney.

The movie for the most part was based upon this book, and though the movie told the basic story, this book tells a much more frustrating and tortuous tale of a group of nine Allied soldiers, American and British who worked their way across Western Europe with the Allied Armies from June 1944 until just after the end of World War Two .

Their goal was simply to find tens of thousands of major art works created over the centuries of civilisation in the West and to return those items to their legal owners, private collectors, museums and churches, Most of the works of art had been stolen and transported to Germany by a systematic plan to rob the major cultural icons from their owners to fill the private homes of Nazi leaders and the cream of the collection to be housed in an enormous museum built for Adolf Hitler in his home city of Lintz, Austria.

For those who have seen the movie, the story is very different than the Hollywood portrayal. The book paints the task as more dangerous and arduous than the Hollywood movie.

The monuments men faced struggles with military authority, the sheer scale of the problem, nine men to search Europe and in the end the turmoil of occupation by Soviet forces in regions holding the most important treasures.

At the beginning of the book Edsel plods slowly through the back story of the Allied realization of the importance of such a group of men. But after the men reach the shores of Normandy the story begins to flow.

Along the way they meet several characters each of whom plays a major part in solving the puzzle. Possibly the most important being Rose Valon, a member of staff at the Louvre Museum, Paris. She had secretly catalogued every art theft from the museums and private collections that passed through her office. Narrowly escaping the wrath of the retreating Germans she faced a mob of howling "patriots: who stormed her office demanding revenge on the "Nazi collaborator."

Read  the book. It tells a fascinating story of intrigue and courage.

Book available here: The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History

You can buy The Monuments Men  on DVD or [Blu-ray   here.

Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies - Ben McIntyre

Ben McIntyre has created  a great series of books in his trilogy of histories of British Intelligence operations during World War Two.

Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies, tells the stories of a small group of spies who operated from the UK and at time the USA for Nazi Germany.

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Unknown to the Germans however all their most prestigious spies were in fact double agents. The information they supplied was given to them by British Intelligence officers working from Room XX (the Roman numeral for 20 and the double cross of the title.)

Among the stories told are those of "Garbo" one of Germany's most important spies, who commanded a network of over twenty recruits to his spy ring. These recruits ranged from Liverpool dock workers to a group of revolutionary Welsh coal miners bent on the destruction of the British Empire. Each one though was really a figment of "Garbo's" imagination. Every character had a life which the ingenious Spaniard created for his Nazi controllers and so convinced them as to their reality that even after D-Day had occured (June 6, 1944) Garbo's reports were avidly awaited in Berlin.

This book also describes the lives of four other major spies, two other men, and two brave women who  risked all to ensure the ultimate success of the Allied cause in World War Two.

Read the story of a female spy, who asked her German handler for a photgraph for a lover's keepsake. Or the spy who when faced with exposure flew to meet his master's and challenged them, accusing them of taking the cream off the top of his espionage allowance.

Ben McIntyre provides us with vivid personalities, he is wonderfully adept at intertwining several stories to allow you to see both detail and the grand picture.

If you have any interest in World War Two in Europe this book will add to your knowledge. If you are fascinated by the world of spies and James Bond stories, this book will enthrall, Ian Flemming worked closely with some of the XX team.

If you have read any of Ben McIntyre's other books in the series "Agent ZigZag  or Operation Mincemeat, this book is a necessary addition to your library.