An evening with Max Hastings

We are thrilled to welcome celebrated author and historian Max Hastings back to Chorleywood where he'll be discussing his latest book, Sword.

On 6 June 1944 when the allied armies landed on D-Day, the Second World War had already lasted almost five years.  Yet many of the British and American troops who invaded Normandy had never been to battle. Within hours of leaving England, they were faced with a storm of machine-gun and mortar fire.  They witnessed scenes, above all of sudden death, such as no exercise had prepared them for.   

In Sword, veteran chronicler of war Max Hastings explores with extraordinary vividness the actions of the Commando brigade, Montgomery’s 3rd Infantry and 6th Airborne divisions on and around a single British beach.  He describes their frustrations, hopes, loves and fears through the apparently interminable years training and preparing in England, then their triumphs and tragedies on the beach and beyond.