This entertaining book tells the story in words and pictures of the impact on the local Leicestershire community when the battle-hardened paratroops of US Army’s 504 Parachute Infantry Regiment (504 PIR), of the 82nd Airborne Division were stationed in their midst in 1944 as they awaited their orders to take part in D-Day.
Excerpt from the author's introduction:
This book is not essentially a military history; there are lots of excellent publications that do justice to the 504 PIR’s fine combat record during the Second World War. What I have attempted to do is to tell the story of the five-month period in 1944 when the men of the 504 PIR, battered and bruised from campaigns in North Africa, Sicily and Italy, found themselves neighbours – and in a lot of cases good friends – to the villagers of Evington, Stoughton and Oadby in Leicestershire, England.
It is respectfully dedicated to all those who served with the 504 Parachute Infantry Regiment during World War Two and to the memory of those who didn't come back.