Pen & Sword - Images of War

Rommel’s Ghost Division, Victory in the West

Pen & Sword Publishing’s Images of War series of books cover a wide and ever expanding array of subjects of interest to military history enthusiasts, as well as military subject modelers. The series includes a wide range of specific military vehicles or classes of vehicles, military campaigns or specific battles, and other related military subjects. The emphasis in these volumes is primarily on the photographs, with a good amount of text content typically provided, and sometimes maps as well.

This title is one of two new titles from Pen & Sword that address the German blitzkrieg across France and the Low Countries in May / June of 1940, with Erwin Rommel and his 7th Panzer Division at the forefront of the charge to the English Channel. This particular title seems to be a companion title to the previously reviewed “Rommel’s Ghost Division - Dash to the Channel, 1940”.

Long before he became a well known master of mobile combat in North Africa at the head of the famed Afrika Korps, Erwin Rommel was a gifted soldier in World War I, winning the coveted Pour le Mérit (aka the Blue Max) for gallantry at the Battle of Caporetto. Rommel was one of just 4,000 officers retained to serve in the post WWI Reichswehr. He lobbied hard at the beginning of WWII to be given command of a panzer unit, and to the dismay of many officers senior to him, Hitler gave him command of the 7th Panzer Division. The 7th Panzer Division earned the nickname “Ghost Division” for its unexpected speed and movements across France. 

As suggested by the title, this volume is focused mostly on the end game of the German blitzkrieg across France, and the immediate aftermath including propaganda efforts focused on the German victory over the French and British.

Vital Statistics

Format - softcover, portrait format

Page Count - 211 pages

Size - 7.5” x 9.75”

Photos - Black and White images

Tables / drawings / diagrams - maps, some period documents

All text and photograph captions are in English

What’s between the covers?

As can be seen by the table of contents, the early stages of the conquest of France is addressed in a relatively quick manner, with the bulk of this volume addressing actions taken after Rommel’s 7th Panzer hit the Channel coast and then turned south. 

Above - a simple but effective map showing the invasion route of the 7th Panzer Division and the dates. This book contains several maps of various styles.

The book follows the progress of Rommel and his 7th panzer south along the Channel coastline, taking Le Havre and St. Valery, and then moving further South crossing the River Somme, the scene of so much carnage in WWI. It’s worthy of note that Rommel, perhaps the most aggressive of the German panzer leaders, wasn’t given freedom of action at Dunkirk. The history of WWII might have been considerably different had he been.

Above - this volume has images of knocked out or captured French and British vehicles and guns. Some images are a bit dark, grainy or slightly blurred.

Above - this volume makes considerable use of stills from German propaganda newsreels and films. Other images came from Rommel’s personal collection of images complied throughout his campaigns, taken by Rommel himself or his aides.

Above - examples of the aforementioned stills from the propaganda films being shown to the German populace giddy from the quick victory over the French and British. Some of these newsreel stills are unfortunately just a bit dark, but are still of good interest.

Image sizes range from 1/8 page up to full page images such the one above right side. There are not quite as many “in action” style images in this volume as there were in the “Dash to the Channel” volume, due to the nature of the book.

This volume contains a good number of photos obviously taken by Rommel’s aides, as they are carefully taken, well composed of Rommel taking surrenders from enemy officers, etc., such as the excellent images seen above. Based on the number of images such as the above, Rommel’s aides must have been quite busy taking photos of their photogenic boss.

The author provides well written text and photo captions to accompany the images in this volume. His text work is fluid and easily followed.

By June 24th, the the 7th Panzer had advanced all the way down to the port city of Bordeaux, ending their “tour de France” as Rommel called it, when the French aigned the armistice with Germany. The final chapter of this book looks at the surrenders made to Rommel, the victory parades, and the German propaganda machine, which was taken very seriously.

Above - great efforts were made to promote the image of a massive, well armed, invincible German Army. The German’s made incredible efforts for these propaganda films, using vast numbers of vehicles and manpower, re-staging invasion formations and battle scenes, even burning enemy vehicles and structures for the films. The above images were staged for propaganda films, it’s quite clear to see how extensive the efforts were for these films.

Above - the final chapter of this volume concerns itself with post-armistice events and actions; the newsreels and other propaganda efforts.

Conclusions

As the title suggests, this volume has a fairly heavy emphasis on the aftermath of the blitzkreig across France, rather than the blitzkreig itself. There are a considerable number of pages filled with carefully posed images of Rommel accepting enemy surrenders and then the extensive coverage of the German propaganda machine. That said, these things were the logical result of such a campaign as the invasion of France turned out to be. So, this volume is an appropriate mate and companion volume to the “Dash to the Channel” book which covered the lightning advances across France by Rommel’s Ghost Division”.

The author’s text and photo captioning is very solid, being quite “readable” and interesting.

Some of the images are a bit less than perfect, but given the circumstances under which some of them were taken, this isn’t terribly surprising. The images are well chosen for interest.

Combined with the author’s other volume on Rommel’s Ghost Division ( Dash to the Channel ), you have a good, complete look at the role that Rommel and his 7th Panzer Division played in the France 1940 campaign.

Highly Recommended

Thanks to Casemate Pub. for the review copy

Reviewed by Chuck Aleshire, AMPS Chicagoland

AMPS 2nd Vice President, Midwest Region

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