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HIST 150: Memoirs of World War II Germany (Fall 2025)

Books from the German Perspective

One of the most popular books is 

 

D Day through German eyes : eyewitness accounts by German soldiers of June 6th 1944

Almost all accounts of D Day are told from the Allied perspective. But what was it like to be a German soldier in the bunkers of the Nromandy coast, facing the onslaught of the mightiest invasion in history? What motivated the German defenders, what were their thought processes - and how did they fight from one strong point to another, among the dunes and fields, on that first cataclysmic day? This book sheds fascinating light on these questions, bringing together statements made by German survivors after the war, when time had allowed them to reflect on their state of mind, their actions and their choices of June 6th. We see a perspective of D Day which deserves to be added to the historical record, in which ordinary German troops struggled to make sense of what was facing them, and emerged stunned at the weaponry and sheer determination of the Allied troops. Above all, we now have the unheard human voices of the individual German soldiers - the men who are so often portrayed as a faceless mass

Held by over 100 libraries

4.2/5 stars with over 18,000 reviews on Amazon

Questions

  • since this is not a university press, is this a good source?
    • it was published well after the historic event, but contains first hand accounts -- does that make it a primary source / historic document?
  • who is the author?
  • other considerations:
    • it is held by a lot of libraries, and is extremely widely reviewed on amazon
  • Ultimately, can we use this is a historic source?