An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy
Winner, U.S. Military History Group, 2020 Master Corporal Jan Stanislaw Jakobczak Memorial Book Award.
Winner, Holyer An Gof 2021 Nonfiction Award, Social, Cultural and Political History


This is the incredible story of a Second World War shoot-out between black and white American soldiers in a quiet Cornish town that ended up putting the ‘special relationship’ itself on trial. The subsequent court martial into what tabloids labeled a ‘wild west’ mutiny became front page news in Great Britain and the USA. Three thousand miles across the Atlantic, it mirrored and bolstered a fast-accelerating civil rights movement. At home it caused Churchill himself ‘grave anxiety’ while refracting an extraordinary truth about the real state of Anglo-American relations. For three long days the story raged before the turbulent war-torn world moved on and forgot forever amid ever-escalating D-Day preparations. This account of a shocking drama the authorities tried to hush up has been painstakingly pieced back together for the first time thanks to new archival research. When slotted into its unique context, extracted from wartime cabinet documents, secret government surveys, opinion polls, diaries, letters and newspapers as well as testimony from those who remember it, the story offers a rare and stunning window into a little-known dark side of the ‘American Invasion.’ By breathing new life into a vanished trial, it reveals a rare and surprising insight into the wider story of how Britain reacted to soldiers of the Jim Crow army when they came to stay.
1136483771
An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy
Winner, U.S. Military History Group, 2020 Master Corporal Jan Stanislaw Jakobczak Memorial Book Award.
Winner, Holyer An Gof 2021 Nonfiction Award, Social, Cultural and Political History


This is the incredible story of a Second World War shoot-out between black and white American soldiers in a quiet Cornish town that ended up putting the ‘special relationship’ itself on trial. The subsequent court martial into what tabloids labeled a ‘wild west’ mutiny became front page news in Great Britain and the USA. Three thousand miles across the Atlantic, it mirrored and bolstered a fast-accelerating civil rights movement. At home it caused Churchill himself ‘grave anxiety’ while refracting an extraordinary truth about the real state of Anglo-American relations. For three long days the story raged before the turbulent war-torn world moved on and forgot forever amid ever-escalating D-Day preparations. This account of a shocking drama the authorities tried to hush up has been painstakingly pieced back together for the first time thanks to new archival research. When slotted into its unique context, extracted from wartime cabinet documents, secret government surveys, opinion polls, diaries, letters and newspapers as well as testimony from those who remember it, the story offers a rare and stunning window into a little-known dark side of the ‘American Invasion.’ By breathing new life into a vanished trial, it reveals a rare and surprising insight into the wider story of how Britain reacted to soldiers of the Jim Crow army when they came to stay.
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An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy

An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy

by Kate Werran
An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy

An American Uprising in Second World War England: Mutiny in the Duchy

by Kate Werran

Hardcover

$34.95 
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Overview

Winner, U.S. Military History Group, 2020 Master Corporal Jan Stanislaw Jakobczak Memorial Book Award.
Winner, Holyer An Gof 2021 Nonfiction Award, Social, Cultural and Political History


This is the incredible story of a Second World War shoot-out between black and white American soldiers in a quiet Cornish town that ended up putting the ‘special relationship’ itself on trial. The subsequent court martial into what tabloids labeled a ‘wild west’ mutiny became front page news in Great Britain and the USA. Three thousand miles across the Atlantic, it mirrored and bolstered a fast-accelerating civil rights movement. At home it caused Churchill himself ‘grave anxiety’ while refracting an extraordinary truth about the real state of Anglo-American relations. For three long days the story raged before the turbulent war-torn world moved on and forgot forever amid ever-escalating D-Day preparations. This account of a shocking drama the authorities tried to hush up has been painstakingly pieced back together for the first time thanks to new archival research. When slotted into its unique context, extracted from wartime cabinet documents, secret government surveys, opinion polls, diaries, letters and newspapers as well as testimony from those who remember it, the story offers a rare and stunning window into a little-known dark side of the ‘American Invasion.’ By breathing new life into a vanished trial, it reveals a rare and surprising insight into the wider story of how Britain reacted to soldiers of the Jim Crow army when they came to stay.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781526759542
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Publication date: 05/27/2020
Pages: 256
Sales rank: 1,061,134
Product dimensions: 6.00(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

After reading History at Oxford University, Kate Werran wrote for local and national newspapers before switching to television where she worked for one of Britain’s leading independent documentary makers, producing 20th Century history programmes for Channel 4, Channel 5 and the BBC. Kate is especially passionate about writing this story because it has been a life-long interest. One summer as a child, holidaying in her father’s home town, Kate put her fingers in decades-old bullet-holes left in a war monument one night and asked the question: Why? Finally, she can attempt to answer it.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations ix

Dramatis Personae xi

Maps xiii

Prologue xvi

Part I The Prosecution - Day One: 15 October 1943 1

Chapter 1 Court Opens 3

Chapter 2 Making the Case 10

Chapter 3 Nailing the Ringleader 20

Chapter 4 Turning the Tables 28

Part II The Road to Great Britain 37

Chapter 5 The Relationship Gets Special 39

Chapter 6 Heading South - the 581st Ordnance Ammunition Company Assembles 48

Chapter 7 White Yanks in the UK: Anglo-American Relations 55

Chapter 8 Black Yanks in the UK - First Impressions 66

Chapter 9 The Real Special Relationship 73

Part III Britain at Last 91

Chapter 10 Coming to Cornwall 93

Chapter 11 26 September 1943 103

Part IV Day Two: 16 October 1943 107

Chapter 12 The Body of Evidence 109

Chapter 13 Act I: Defending the Defenceless 125

Chapter 14 Act II: Unfinished Business 135

Chapter 15 Closing Arguments 142

Part V Day Three: 17 October 1943 151

Chapter 16 Hiding in Plain Sight 153

Chapter 17 The Verdict 162

Part VI The Aftermath 177

Chapter 18 Lambs to the Slaughter 179

Chapter 19 And Beyond 190

Epilogue 199

Postscript 213

Acknowledgements / Credits 221

Notes 223

Secondary Reading 235

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