For Free India: Indian Soldiers in Germany and Italy during the Second World War - Martin Bamber & Aad Neeven
SCARCE!
Superb book!
Absolutely fascinating book about the volunteers of the Indian Legion who agreed to join an all-Indian unit to fight against their British oppressors. As far as I know, there hasn’t been a comprehensive examination of the Free Indian soldiers since the David Littlejohn book on Foreign Legions of the Third Reich back in the 1980s. The book is a most timely addition to our understanding of the foreigners who fought for Hitler, and will be a great addition to your library containing as it does many previously unseen photos, and a wealth of detailed information from two authors who have studied the subject for many years. Outstanding!!
Here’s the official product info:
The book presents the history of the "Free Indian" volunteers in the German and Italian armies during the Second World War.
It is the story of a group of patriotic Indian Nationalist soldiers, who, after volunteering to fight with the British Indian Army after the outbreak of the Second World War, found themselves fighting the Axis forces in the North African Desert.
After their capture by Rommel's Afrika Korps, as well as Italian forces, a number of these men were inspired by the charismatic Indian Nationalist leader Subhas Chandra Bose to join a German Army regiment composed of Indians dedicated to the cause of the freedom of India from British colonial rule. Doomed never to fight for their homeland, the Free Indian Legion served as part of the German "Atlantic Wall" garrison until its retreat across France to Germany and eventual surrender in the Austrian Alps. Regarded as traitors by the British authorities for breaking their oaths of allegiance to the British "King-Emperor"; the soldiers of the Free Indian Legion were incarcerated in camps in India before their release in 1946 prior to the independence which they had sought for India.
456 page hardcover published 2010