Tears of glory: The heroes of Vercors, 1944 PDF
Preview Tears of glory: The heroes of Vercors, 1944
TEARS OF GLORY Books by Michael Pearson THE MILLIONAIRE MENTALITY THE SECRET INVADERS ( with Bill Strutton) THE MILLION DOLLAR BUGS THE FIVE POUND VIRGINS (Published in Britain as The Age of Consent) THOSE DAMNED REBELS THE SEALED TRAIN TEARS OF CLORY MICHAEL PEARSON TEARS of GLORY THE HEROES OF VERCORS, 1944 MAPS BY RAFAEL PALACIOS Doubleday 6 Company, Inc., Garden City, New York 1979 Copyright © 1978 by Micfuwl Pe<ttson All fughu Reserved Printed in the United States of America FIRST £DITTON IN TllE UNITED STATES OF AME.RICA Library of Congress Catttl-Oging in Publietttu>n Dttttt Pearson, Michael. Tears of glory. Bibliography. Includes index. 1. World War, 1939-1945-France-Vercors. 2. Vercors, France-History. I. Title. D762.V4P42 940.53'+1'98 78-216 ISBN 0-385-11446-X For Robert List of Maps Vercors Area 1. 11 The Vercors 2. 23 3. Battle of St.-Nizier 8o 4. Battle of Pont Chabert 130 5. The Attack 224 6. TI1e Dispersal: Final Positions 269 ., The Massif The Vercors massif, with its sheer walls thousands of feet tall, dominates the plain of the Rh6ne and Isere rivers like some vast monolithic cathedral. From every direction, those immense gaunt ramparts form a high, often endless skyline. For long stretches they are white, sometimes furrowed into semi-pillars, sometimes darkened by scrub or trees thrust out from the rock face, sometimes enfolded for a few miles within rugged moun tain peaks. Mostly, however, they are stark and monotonous, forming a great natural acropolis that stands isolated, its foot hills washed by four rivers-near, but not linked, to the gyeat Al pine mass that spreads east to Switzerland and Italy. The V ercors is shaped like a gigantic arrowhead, thirty miles long by hventy miles wide- a geological phenomenon, fash ioned by erosion. It is made of limestone-not of granite, like the higher Alps-and bitter weather has combed it into gorges, gouged from it deep gyottoes, and formed within it a huge pla teau that, enclosed within soaring cliffs, is remote indeed. It can be reached from the surrounding plain only by a few steep, narrow roads that have been hewn and tunneled from the mountain, that span deep ravines by way of slender bridges. This enormous natural citadel was designed for drama, yet strangely it was ignored by history until 1944. Io that critical
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