Longmate, Norman,
THE DOODLEBUGS - The Story of the Flying Bombs.
Arrow, London, 1986, 1st in imprint, trade paperback, 549pp, [v] ads., 16pp half tone photo ills., several line illustrations in text, photo pictorial wrappers, covering the early inteligence investigations of the rumours that Germany was developing a rocket bomb, to the first mention of Peenemund and the subsequent photographic reconnaisance, an account of the German flying bomb campaign against England in 1944, the pilotless aircraft with a one ton warhead known in England as the V1 and in Germany as the Fi.103, the destruction caused exceeded that of the 1940/41 Bltitz. The Normandy invasion appeared to signal that the war was reaching its closing stages but the V1 onslought contradicted this and dealt a severe blow to British morale from its launch on 16th June 1944, despite the air-defence measures that were taken. It was difficult to defend against as the aiming of the V1s was haphazard and unpredictable. Deep shelters were made available to only a very small fraction of the population, bickering broke out between governemnt advisors as to how well or otherwise the bombing campaign had been predicted while defence measure from ballons, lines of anti-aircraft gunfire and individual tipping over of the flying bombs by RAF aircraft fast enough rto catch them but there was no real antidote to more than 100 launches a day until the invading troops were able to overrun the last launching site in March 1945, Even after the launch sites were taken some V1s were air-launched from piloted aircraft. Strict censorship at the time meant that details of the fall of the bombs did not get into the local press at the time because that would have been an aid to the enemy so they could correct their aim, so the narrative of the fall of the bombs relies on official records and on eye-witness accounts often recorded in later years, rubbed at extrems., creases to spine and wrappers, edges tanned, spine a little sunned, cnrs. inclined to curl, reading copy only
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A Book for all Reasons
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Keywords: war ww2 vi fi103 flying bomb doodlebug secret weapon home front