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Chateau Thierry - Then and Now, Volume One: Enter the Yanks

Homsher, D
ISBN: 9 78097 0244 3 07 SB 304 pp $39.95
Published by Battleground Productions.

This is the first new guidebook to American Western Front battlefields in many decades and well worth the modest purchase price. It takes the traveler from Charles de Gaulle International Airport east to Chateau Thierry through sites of combat important to our allies as well as to the AEF in 1918 as they countered and then threw back the final desperate German push for victory. This is primarily a geographic guide book (not a chronological narrative history) that cuts through the confusion and disorganization of battle along the Marne around Chateau Thierry in May and June 1918. Using excellent maps, then-and-now photos, contemporary sketch art, and descriptions of the battle provided by the American participants, the author leaves nothing to the reader’s imagination.

Also included is a useful list of recommended readings and information on a number of World War One study groups, facts, figures and the order of battle of the armies engaged. The detailed route instructions will be useful for both experienced and inexperienced battlefield visitors.

This is the first of a planned multi-volume set. The second volume will cover American battlefields at Belleau Wood and the Pas Fini sector northeast of Chateau Thierry in May, June and July 1918. Volume three will tour the Marne battlefields east of Chateau Thierry. Additional volumes are to be announced.

Reviewer - Len Shurtleff