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Overview
On the night of 7 December, 1942, five canoes were launched off the mouth of the Gironde river, each containing a pair of British commandos tasked with slipping into the port of Bordeaux and destroying as many of the merchant ships docked there as possible. Only two of the canoes made it to the target, but it was enough. Five enemy ships were badly damaged in the attack. It then became a game of cat and mouse for the surviving commandos in their attempt to get back to Britain. Some of the men made it to Gibraltar; others were caught and executed. Author Ken Ford gives a blow-by-blow account of one of the most daring raids of World War II, which badly upset the flow of materiel into Germany, and which gave the British public a much-needed victory to celebrate.
Synopsis
By the end of 1941 Germany was desperately in need of essential raw materials. Vital supplies from Japan were shipped to Germany by 'blockade runners' using the port of Bordeaux as their main base. Allied forces needed an undertaking to interfere with the work of these lone merchant ships at the port, leading to the formation of plans that ultimately became known as the Cockleshell Heroes Raid, in which a unit of Royal Marine Commandos mounted a raid via canoes launched from a submarine.
In this new addition to Osprey's RAID series, author Ken Ford explores the history of what is perhaps the bravest and imaginative raids of the entire war. The book details the original plans of the raid, along with the various complications and challenges faced by the Commandos, and explores the outcome of the raid.