Sixty years ago, Europe lay at Hitler's feet. Britain faced its darkest hour - outnumbered, friendless, its abandoned tanks and heavy guns rusting on the French beaches. Defeat or capitulation seemed inevitable. But instead a legend was born.
Taking its readers on a breath-taking journey from the decks of ice-bound destroyers to the cockpits of burning fighter-planes, and through cities devastated by the Blitz, 'Finest Hour' recreates the terror, the tragedy and the triumph of the Battle of Britain.
Sir Martin Gilbert, Churchill's official biographer, introduces this powerful account of the events of 1940, told through the voices, diaries, letters and memoirs of the men and women who lived, loved, fought and died during this terrible yet inspiring year. These searing personal testimonies, taken from over a hundred original interviews, are combined with a fresh and often controversial account of the elaborate political intrigues and betrayals of the period - the Royal Navy assault on the French fleet, the hushed-up catastrophe of the SS Lancastria, and America's secret plans to cope with the expected Nazi occupation of the British Isles.
This gripping book blends original historical research with the true-life experiences of desperate people in desperate times. Cutting through the nostalgic haze, 'Finest Hour' is dramatic "present-tense" history, enabling readers to experience something of a time - still within common living memory - when a nation's darkest hour became its finest.
A major (4-part) BBC TV series.
