INTO THE VALLEY, THE UNTOLD STORY OF USAAF TROOP CARRIER IN WORLD WAR II
by Colonel Charles H. Young (PrintComm Inc., 615 pages, $43.00). The author–who as commanding officer of the 439th Troop Carrier Group led 81 aircraft into Normandy shortly after midnight on D-Day, June 6, 1944, and who flew on many other major combat missions in France, Italy, the Ardennes, and Germany–has assembled a collection of journal entries, pilot logs, letters, official records, and newspaper clippings to recount the story of the heroic men of the United States Army Air Force’s Troop Carrier Command. Members of troop carrier units generally stayed together for their division’s entire tour of duty, resulting in the development of a closeness between air and ground hierarchies not usually experienced by other military personnel. Young provides an inside look at the realities of life in the flying units that airlifted the troops into battle through accounts given by combat pilots, nurses who worked alongside the flight crews, enlisted soldiers, commanders, and even a few German frontline soldiers.
