SCARCE IN THE DUSTWRAPPER.

GERLACH, Heinrich; Richard GRAVES [Trans.] ~ The Forsaken Army.

FIRST UK PRINTING. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London: 1958.

8vo., yellow publisher's boards, lettered in black to spine; complete in the original photographic dustwrapper showing a black and white image by John Hedgecoe; THE BOOK very good, boards a little grubbied with some pushing and light nicking to spine tips; lightly spotted with a couple of stains to the fore-edge; THE WRAPPER also very good with some spotting and shelf wear to the lower panel; rubbed along folds; some nicks and chips to edges and spine, particularly affecting the head of the backstrip, with 0.5cm of loss just touching the edge of text. The wrapper is protected in a removable Brodart archival cover. FIRST EDITION, first issue of this classic WW2 title, seldom found in the dustwrapper. Heinrich Gerlach was a German soldier who served in the 14th Panzer Division during the Second World War as a divisional intelligence officer, assessing the enemy situation, deploying subordinate units of defense, and censoring letters of subordinate units of the secret field police. Wounded and taken as a prisoner of war in 1943, he was taken to a series of prisons including Stalingrad and Lefortovskaya Military Prison in Moscow, and later put under solitary confinement. He was threatened with 25 years of forced labour due to alleged war crimes, and was even sentenced to death, but eventually agreed to conspiratorial cooperation with Soviet intelligence, and was later repatriated in Germany. After the war, he became a Latin and German teacher. Gerlach had begun to write about his experiences at Stalingrad in 1943, but the manuscript was confiscated by the Soviets. After hearing about the benefits of hypnosis for memory recovery, Gerlach undertook treatment with Dr Karl Schmitz, and he was subsequently able to publish this novel in German in 1957 under the title 'The Betrayed Army' . When the original manuscript (entitled 'Breakout at Stalingrad') was discovered in 2012, it was published in its original form in 2016 as a comprehensive epilogue. Scarce as a first issue.

BINDING: Hardcover
CONDITION: Very Good
JACKET: Very Good