In the weeks following liberation from the Nazis, Paris was struck by a wave of such violent crimes that rivaled the effects of the war itself. These were men that took up the opportunity for self-gain during a time of global chaos. Paris was especially appealing to these men, with the city’s famous cafés and brothels to entertain them.
The book The Deserters: A Hidden History of World War II, by Charles Glass, tells an interesting WWII story that not many have heard – the story of the deserters.
A deserter is a military term used for soldiers who have left their posts without permission. Unlike the term Absence Without Leave (AWOL) used for soldiers who leave their posts temporarily, “deserters” refers to those who have no intention of ever returning to the line of duty. With his book, Glass sheds light on this long-neglected phenomena.
Glass interviewed and surveyed 150,000 American and British soldiers that deserted their posts for good during WWII. He also used army archives, personal diaries, memoirs, and court-martial records to get a clearer picture of the lives of ordinary soldiers fighting in the front lines, and why they abandoned their posts. The Deserters: A Hidden History of World War II tells the story of three deserters in France, Italy and Africa.
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