Product Description

"Tanks Across the Desert" is a British tank sergeant's personal story of war. It gives a true-to-life picture of fierce armoured warfare in World War II, recreating the atmosphere of conflict and destruction encountered by one Allied tank crew in the bloody campaigns across North Africa and Italy. Sergeant Jake Wardrop joined the 5th Battalion, Royal Tank Regiment (5RTR) in 1937. He fought in France in 1940; in the Western Desert, Tripolitania and Tunisia; and then, until December 1943, in the invasion of Italy. Wardrop's battalion returned to the UK to prepare for D-Day and Jake took part in the great European campaigns of liberation in 1944 and 1945, only to be killed in action a few days before the end of the war. He kept a detailed and graphic record of each battle in which he was to take part from 1941 to 1943, compiling a personal diary which had long remained in the possession of his mother to whom he sent back extracts from time to time while on active service. This diary provides a vivid insight into Wardrop's many adventures with 5RTR and also serves as a battlefield record of his battalion.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #111398 in Books
• Published on: 2002-11-23
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 224 pages

About the Author
Lt-Col George Forty OBE, FMA, is the author of over fifty books on military subjects. He served in the Royal Tank Regiment before leaving to become curato of the Tank Museum at Bovington in Dorset.

Customer Reviews

Memoirs in a time capsule
Jake Wardrop was a soldier and this book descibes the war from a standpoint of a fighting man, both battles and the life in between. George Forty has compiled Jake's diaries and writes an introduction to each chapter and togeather it all makes for an terrific read.

Jake fought with the 5 Royal Tank Regiment which from the Desert War in North Africa was part of the 7th Division, better known as the Desert Rats. With them he fought at every major confrontation in North Africa, on to Italy and then landed in Northen Europe on D-day and fought until the end. Jake died when there was less than a month left of the war in Europe (for reasons unknown it appears that Jake did not keep a diary in Northern Europe or if he did it was not found. Forty does write how Jake met his end.)

The chapters are: 1. Arrival - 2. Crusader - 3. Gazala - 4. El Alamein - 5. The End in Africa - 6. Homs - 7. Italy - The Last Battle.

The book also has sections explaining troop formations, weapons and equipment and real life characters, all off which are easy to read and informative.

Interesting as this is and a good read, a lot of the quality of the book comes from getting to know Jake himself and in his own words: He was quite a lad.

Reading the book is to travel back in time and see the war through the eyes of Jake Wardrop as well as getting to know the man himself and I was awed by the reading. I don't think Jake intended to have his diary published so he wrote for himself and thereby it is very honest. I will end with a quote, the track has been blown of Jake's tank by artillery during Operation Crusader and they are stranded in no mans land, their squadron continues and the artillery barrage follows them.

Quote Jake Wardrop:

We sat for a minute or two, then I ventured forth to see what damage had been done. The track was lying about twenty yards behind and in coming off it had ripped the ration box clean off the tank and the tins of stuff were all smashed. The cruellest blow of all was the smashing of a bottle of whisky belonging to the commander.
It wasn't a very healthy position to be in, but it could have been worse: it wasn't raining.