For much of the 20th century, Barbara “Babe” Paley was considered the most elegant woman in America, a figure whose taste, composure, and social authority made her an icon long before the term was widely used. She appeared on international best-dressed lists for so many consecutive years that she was eventually inducted into the list’s … Read more
Erwin Rommel remains one of the most recognizable commanders of World War II. He is still famously known as the Desert Fox for his daring initiative on the battlefields of North Africa. Rommel's legacy and ultimate destiny lay in his willingness to do something very few other generals would even consider. He spoke the brutal … Read more
A 23-year-old combat medic with a shrapnel wound bleeding through his own field dressing ordered a three-star general out of his forward aid station in the winter of 1945, and General George S. Patton left without saying a word. The medic never looked up. He never turned around. He did not know who he had … Read more
In May 1945, Bavaria was a landscape of rubble and hunger. The war in Europe had ended with Germany's surrender, and American occupation forces were moving through towns and villages to assess conditions and begin the work of military government. General George S. Patton, commander of the Third Army, was inspecting the region when his … Read more
Gail Gordon’s voice was one of the most recognizable in American entertainment, even when his name was not. From radio in the 1920s to television in the 1980s, he played the pompous authority figure whose dignity collapsed into magnificent comic rage—Ozgood Conklin on *Our Miss Brooks*, Theodore Mooney on *The Lucy Show*, and Harrison Carter … Read more
In a quiet house in Scotland lives a man born closer to the British throne than almost anyone of his generation. He answers, by his own choice, to plain mister. James Ogilvy carries no title. He keeps no royal diary, draws nothing from the crown, and works instead with a camera and a small magazine … Read more
For 30 years, federal authorities searched for the man who allegedly buried 19 U. S. Marshals alive in the mountains of eastern Kentucky. They never found him. He was hiding in caves beneath the very land the marshals had come to seize, and his full account of what happened would not surface until nearly a … Read more
On the morning of July 11, 1882, the citizens of Alexandria woke to a terrifying sight. The horizon, usually dotted with fishing boats and merchant vessels, was filled with the dark iron shapes of the British Royal Navy. Eight massive ironclad battleships, including the HMS Inflexible and the HMS Monarch, were moving into battle formation, … Read more
In May 1945, in Bavaria, the war in Europe was four days from ending when SS commander Anton Vogel was brought to a forward command post to sign the formal surrender of his division. Vogel had led the division since 1943. He had fought on the Eastern Front and was transferred west in the final … Read more
FRANCE — A 22-year-old military policeman stood in the middle of a French road in November 1944, his hand raised, and watched a speeding Jeep roll to a stop. What he found in the passenger seat would have made most men step back and wave the vehicle through. Instead, Corporal Henry Aldrich of Springfield, Ohio, … Read more