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I bought this book a few years ago on the recommendation of someone from another website, i am pleased i did. Denis Edwards was an Airborne sniper who spent 3 months in Normandy, 2 months in the Ardennes and 6 weeks in Germany.
Here is a taster of the book which i was given years ago that helped me in my decission to buy it!!
"At the time of the first visit by the first enemy gunboat, Corporal "Bill" Bailey and some of his section were in the concrete emplacement that housed the German gun. I had found a well constructed German trench nearby and, conscious of enemy snipers, had crawled over to see how things were going with them. "Bill" was sitting in the bottom of the gun pit with his mess kit filled with water, into which he had placed a "Mixed Monkey" tea cube.....
While he had been quietly squatting in the bottom of the pit watching over his brew, Wally Parr, Gus Gardner and Bill Gray had been examining the captured gun. They were deep in discussion about how it might work and if it was safe to put such and old weapon to the test. As they were working out how to aim it, by pure chance the enemy gunboat appeared. Their excitement and furious activity when the gunboat appeared did not deflect Bill from his brewing-up, and eventually Gus Gardner pulled or pushed whatever it was that fired the thing. There was a blinding flash and a great crash like a clap of thunder, accompanied by clouds of smoke. It was evidently a rather old gun and had probably not been fired for many years, and the gun pit was immediately showered with dirt and concrete dust.
As the dust and smoke began to clear the surprised silence was shattered by a loud howl of anguish from Bill Bailey. Just at the very moment the gun had fired, his can of water was on the verge of coming to a boil (or as near as it was likely to get). He was furious, "Yer bloody idiots - look what you've bleedin' done - it took me over 'arf an hour 'ter get this bloody tin of water 'ot, and just as I'm about ready ter make a brew of tea yer 'ave ter find out 'ow that bloody gun works - look at me mess can."
What had been almost a passable imitation of a brew of tea was now more like a can of porridge, having been half filled with dirt and cement dust. He looked a sorry sight, sitting in the base of the gun pit, his can of tea ruined, and his face, thinning hair and clothing coated in dirt and dust."
Synopsis taken from Amazon
With the fine disregard for orders from the highest level that soldiers were strictly forbidden to keep diaries, Denis Edwards managed to record his experiences throughout nearly all his time in Europe in 1944-45. Since he was one of the first both to land on D-day and was among the first to join up with the Russians bear the Baltic in the Spring of 1945, his record covers the entire period of the fighting after the landings in Normandy. And a very remarkable record it is too. After a brief account of his upbringing and early training under the command of the indomitable Major John Howard, he goes on to describe the airborne landings at Pegasus Bridge and the events of each day thereafter. His account of the nearly disastrous Rhine Crossing is particularly important. The Devil's Own Luck brilliantly conveys what it was like to be facing death day after day, night after night, month after month, with never a bed to sleep in nor a hot meal to go home to. This is warfare in the raw - brutal yet humorous, immensely tragic but, sadly, all true. Denis Edwards' diary was brought to a wider audience when the hardback was published in 1999. Having sold out in a few months it is now being printed in paperback for the first time.
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