The biography of Germany's Naval Commander Karl Donitz includes information from reports by his superiors, accounts by U-Boat survivors, and details of the testing of the U-Boat wolf-pack tactics from 1937 to 1939

Donitz: The Last Fuhrer

Padfield, Peter

Biographies & Memoirs

Harpercollins

The lion's claw

Literature & Fiction

Genre Fiction

Hutchinson

‘A bright new star rises on the ocean waves.’ Sunday Telegraph  Lieutenant Guy Greville of HMS Dulcinea and the corvette’s diehard sailing captain, the Earl of Saxmundham, who cannot abide engines or engineers, were last met off East Africa in The Lion’s Claw.  Here they sail into a deeper mystery: arriving in Bombay, commercial capital of British India in the 1890s, they learn that one of the ships on the station, HMS Curlew, has disappeared without trace.   Greville meets the seductive wife of her captain and is smitten. Talking to her of her husband he gains the impression that the ship’s disappearance may not be accidental, and the search for the Curlew becomes an intellectual and emotional quest leading Greville via the profundities of Buddhist thought and chases at sea to the jungle-grown temples of the ‘lost cities’ of nineteenth century Ceylon.   This is a story told with all the pace and descriptive power that distinguishes the work of Peter Padfield.  ‘Crisp action in a lush setting’ Sunday Telegraph

The Unquiet Gods

Contemporary

Hutchison

Beneath the house flag of the P & O

Business & Money

Industries

Hutchinson and Co.

Gold Chains of Empire

Arrow (A Division of Random House Group)

This is the dramatic story of the deadly competition in dreadnought battleship construction between Great Britain and Imperial Germany in the years before the First World War. It is a story of two great Empires set on a collision course, climaxing in the Armageddon of 1914.\nBut was 1914 the inevitable result of the armaments race? Historians have long argued the point, and now Peter Padfield – with the aid of documents from both British and German archives – argues forcibly that the major causes of the First World War were not the armaments themselves, but rather the personalities involved, especially Kaiser Wilhelm II, with his obsessive dreams of imperial destiny\nThe Great Naval Race is a clear and compelling narrative of those fateful years and vividly portrays the leading protagonists in the drama.\nOn the German side, Kaiser Wilhelm and Admiral Tirpitz, who launched the challenge to British naval supremacy; and on the British side, the statesmen who responded to that challenge – Admiral Fisher, who dragged the British Navy into the twentieth century, Edward Grey and Winston Churchill.\n’A favourite on this topic, it is concise but brilliantly written, capturing the passion and urgency of these events with a Kiplingesque energy’ - Goodreads review\n‘Indispensable for those who want to understand the roots of the Great War’ - Amazon review\nPeter Padfield lives in Woodbridge, Suffolk. He worked with P&O and sailed with Alan Villiers in Mayflower II in commemoration of the journey of the Pilgrim Fathers. The Titanic and The Californian won him international recognition as a writer. He is also the author of classic biographies of Hess, Donitz and Himmler and has written widely on the sea, including a work on naval gunnery.

The great naval race: The Anglo-German naval rivalry, 1900-1914

History

Europe

Hart-Davis, MacGibbon

‘Has the authentic tang of the sea, salty, sharp, refreshing.’ Yorkshire Post  ‘Viewing Trafalgar as the fitting finale to twelve years of hard fighting at sea, Peter Padfield selects and fights over again six crucial battles fought under four great admirals, Howe, Jervis, Duncan and Nelson, and shows them to be a series of battles in one outstanding war, which is quite rightly regarded as Nelson’s.’ Daily Telegraph  ‘Clear, authoritative, readable and well-illustrated… The main interest of the book lies in its presentation of tactics in vivid, accurate and thought-provoking contexts… may be cordially recommended.’ The Mariner’s Mirror  ‘Mr Padfield analyses each action and its outcome in a fresh and perceptive manner, salting all with glimpses of the social side of sea service. This easily readable work is generously illustrated.’ The Scotsman  In a series of major victories at sea against the French, the Spanish and the Dutch during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, the Royal Navy gained for Great Britain what later historians termed the ‘Empire of the Seas’, that complete dominion over the seas and oceans of the world that allowed Britain to build a world empire.  This period culminating in the battle of Trafalgar, 1805, was notable for the emergence of several outstanding admirals, Howe, Jervis, Duncan and Nelson. Between them they revolutionised fleet tactics. Although very different in character, all were united in their determination to exploit the superior gunnery and seamanship of British ships’ companies over that of their enemies and press in close for the kill whatever the consequences.  Peter Padfield describes the great battles resulting: The Glorious First of June, St Vincent, Camperdown, the Nile, Copenhagen and Trafalgar, and shows how traditional, usually indecisive line of battle tactics were discarded, to become in Nelson’s hands tactics of contempt. And he paints a lively picture of the sailors whose skill and phenomenal disregard for danger delivered these famous victories – together with one very dangerous mutiny.  Generously illustrated, Nelson’s War brings to life in fascinating detail the admirals, men and ships of the golden age of the Royal Navy and its inspiring genius, Horatio Nelson.

Nelson's war

HarperCollins Distribution Services

Hess: Flight for the Führer

Leaders & Notable People

Weidenfeld&Nicolson

In a small museum in Munich lies a photograph of a man who looks for all the world like a harmless, myopic clerk. But, his peaked cap, bearing the death's-head insignia of the SS, exposes the truth: the man is Heinrich Himmler, and this is the chilling record of his rise to prominence in Hitler's Third Reich. As both SS police and Gestapo chief, and the person in charge of the camps in Eastern Europe, he presided over an empire of death. How could a man have such a disregard for human life? Through an exploration of Himmler's aberrant psychology, and the inner workings of the Nazi elite, some compelling and shocking conclusions emerge. A chilling study of the abuse of absolute power. "A thorough, conscientious and compulsively readable investigation."--A. L. Rowse, Sunday Telegraph.

Himmler: Reichs Fuhrer-SS (Cassell Military Paperbacks)

Military

UNKNO

"Padfield's compellingly readable book conveys a flavor of Nazi leadership unmatched by anything outside the memoirs of Albert Speer. It is difficult to frame higher praise."--John Keegan. A distinguished naval historian and biographer paints a riveting portrait of Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz, the Supreme Commander of the German Navy and mastermind of World War Two's devastating submarine war. As Padfield so eloquently proves, dedicated officer Dönitz was corrupted by his inner need for a cause and for a leader to serve--both of which he found in Adolf Hitler. As Germany slid inexorably toward defeat in 1945, the Führer duly rewarded his most loyal supporter and confidant by appointing Dönitz his successor: the last leader of the Third Reich.

Dönitz: The Last Führer

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