“Packed with historical information, the book also offers travel advice on visiting the 6th Airborne Divisions area of operations in Normandy, including details of museums, memorials, cemeteries, tours and relevant organisations. It also provides GPS data for sat navs or for viewing on Google Earth. A superb guide for battlefield and ancestral tourists or armchair enthusiasts alike.”

Family Tree Magazine, Nov 2011

This is one of a two part guide to the battlefields fought over by the British airborne forces on D-Day, combining a history of the fighting with a series of tours of the area. This volume looks at the attack on the Merville gun battery and operations nearby, while the second focuses on Pegasus Bridge.

The book is divided into six tours, with a general introduction that looks at the invasion planning and the German defenses. Each tour chapter begins with an account of the fighting in the area covered, followed by the detailed tour.

I don't know the area being described, so I can't comment on the accuracy of the guide sections, but they appear to be well researched, and are very detailed. Each tour is illustrated by a clear black and white road marked with chapter numbers to guide the reader to the right part of the text. The guides are very well illustrated, with maps and modern and wartime photographs.

History of War

A very significantly updated second edition to Carl Shilleto's "Pegasus Bridge / Merville Battery" battlefield guide. This first book has now been expanded into two volumes, each comparable in size to the original and so containing a great wealth of additional information. Whilst it possesses all that one would desire from a battlefield guide, it seems unfair to regard this as its only purpose as its historical narrative is not content with a vague overview of events, but quotes from reports, veterans accounts and gives specific details of actions which range from the major to the relatively obscure. It is, therefore, quite a comprehensive historical study in its own right, indeed I must say that the original volume was of very considerable use to me when I was carrying out my own research many years ago.

Pegasus Archive - Mark Hickman