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Review to follow......;)And here it is.....07/23/2016This book presents an event of WWII, close to American shores. German U-boats lurked, eager to sink American vessels. The 'Heredia', a merchant ship carrying coffee and bananas, is torpedoed in the Gulf of Mexico. Aboard ship is the Downs family; mother, father, and two children. They are returning from Central America where the father was employed. As the boat sinks, the family members are separated. Their battle to survive, as well as detail...
So Close to Home by Michael J. Tougias and Alison O'Leary is a riveting account of the amazing, providential survival and reunion of a family after the ship they are travelling on was torpedoed by a German submarine. In 1942, the Downs Family, consisting of Ray and Ina Downs and two of their children, Lucille and Sonny Downs (their oldest son Terry was already in the U.S.), were making their way back to the United States from an eleven month stay in Columbia where Ray had taken a job with the Un...
Won in a Goodreads giveaway.I love when authors tell history in a entertaining way, and that's what this book did. Similar to Devil in the White City, the each chapter alternates between two perspectives, happening in the same timeline. There's the Downs family who is just a regular American family who's ship gets sunk by a German U-Boat and then there's the U-Boat story line full of facts and multiple stories about wrecks and rescues. The beginning was a bit slow, but once we get to the sinking...
Loved this book. About a husband, wife, son age 6 and daughter age 11 who were returning to the States from Costa Rica on a United Fruit Company vessel in 1942. The vessel was torpedoed 40 miles from New Orleans by a German Uboat submarine during World War II. It is about their amazing resilience surviving. They lost all their money they had saved for a year, their car, their clothes but managed to survive. The book tracks the activities of two Uboats, the U-506 and the U-507. The U-506 sunk 12
I have read and enjoyed many of Michael J. Tougias' books. I couldn't put this one down. I have read many books on WWII and Germany, but this was a whole new experiences. This book is about U-boats and their penetration and destruction of many ships in the coast off of America. Also involved is the incredible family of 4, who happen to be returning from work in South America to reestablish their lives in Texas. The boat they are on is torpedoed and sunk just miles from docking to start their new...
This work is a great historical work worthy of the time to read it and the price. The author obviously labored diligently to provide an accurate and thorough account of a little known piece of World War II history for his readers. It is delivered in a most interesting narrative form which has me looking for more of his work to enjoy.
Before the United States became involved in World War II, Ina and Ray Downs and two of their children had been living in South America while Ray was employed by the United Fruit and Steamship Company. Now, in 1942, with the U.S. participation in the war, the Downs family decided it was time to return home. Their passage had been booked aboard the Heredia, a freighter which carried coffee and bananas. They were bound for the port of New Orleans sailing by way of the Gulf of Mexico. Around the sam...
This was a thrilling and surprising true account of German U-boat warfare in American waters. Researched with detailed accounts from submarine commanders' war diaries and interviews with survivors, this story reads like historical fiction. Mr.Tougias and Ms. O'Leary treat the reader to detailed perspectives from friends and foes, and the curiosity and compassion they display. I found the chronicle of the young family who literally is blown apart by a Nazi torpedo, particularly compelling - civil...
As noted by the authors, this is a piece of WWII history that not many people have heard. This book tells the true story of a family returning to Texas from South America where the father had been working. As they traveled through the Gulf of Mexico, their boat was torpedoed by a German U-boat and the family was separated, struggling to survive. The authors clearly researched the material to not only tell the family's story, but also that of some of the crew, the U-boat captains and some of the
Tougias provides exactly what he says he's going to provide. It's a surprisingly arduous tale of a family surviving a torpedo from a German submarine sinking their ship and somehow ending up together and relatively unharmed. There's a great deal of history provided to catch us up on, including the German mindset when targeting these ships and why it took so long for rescue. It was pure luck in a lot of respects, and it's a fabulous time rooting for each individual family member. The only thing I...
Who knew? Who knew that Nazi Germany brought World War II so close to America’s shores? This is a part of that great global conflict that rarely gets mentioned in middle and high school history classes. That’s why this “true story of an American family’s fight for survival during World War II” came as a shock to this reviewer.You may have heard about the German saboteurs who were dropped off by a U-boat on Long Island, or the Nazi spies who were dispatched off the coast of northern Florida. Thos...
I saw a presentation on this book by one of the Authors, Michael Tougias, at my local museum in central Florida so I bought it.Very enjoyable book about a topic I was rather unfamiliar with. I had no clue that German submarines were attacking random ships off our coasts in the early days of WWII. This book tells the survival story of one such family traveling on a ship that was sunk by a German submarine. The book includes stories about the submarine captains and some of their crew as well. That...
This book reinforces my belief that when it's your time to go, it's your time to go. What an amazing story of an incredible event. Not only does the book highlight what I would arguably say is not common WWII knowledge that German U-Boats came scary close to American shorelines but a family who against all odds survived.
A very well written and thoroughly researched historical account of The Heredia that was bombed and sunk by the Germans in the Gulf of Mexico during World War II that had civilians on board.Mr. Tougias and Ms O'Leary detailed the military aspects and described all scenes so vividly that you could feel the cold and dampness and the fear all crew members and the Downs family was experiencing as they escaped from the wreckage.You could actually put yourself with the survivors as they clung to a sma...
So Close to Home is a fascinating, well-researched book about an American family who survived a torpedo strike to the merchant ship they were traveling on in 1942. The family's story is interwoven with that of the German submarine captains that were trawling the Gulf of Mexico looking for targets. I had heard that there had been attacks off of the East Coast of the U.S. during World War II, but I had no idea that there had been U-boats in the Gulf as well. For me, this book was easy to read--det...
On May 19, 1942, a German U-boat, captained by Erich Wurdemann, in the Gulf of Mexico just fifty miles from New Orleans, set its sights on the freighter Heredia. Among the 62 passengers, most were merchant seamen, but there were also a handful of civilians, including the Downs family: Ray and Ina, and their two children, Sonny (8) and Lucille (11). On their very last night aboard the merchant ship, the U-boat attacked and sank the Heredia. The four members of the Downs family amazingly survived,...
Fascinating and true story about German U-Boats sinking non-combat related ships during World War II. This book centers around a sinking within 40 miles of New Orleans in the Gulf of Mexico, and of the lives of a family who lived through that nightmare.
The title of the book doesn't hint at the large dose of U-boat history included, so I was annoyed at first that the two German subs were getting more print than the family. But, having studied some about U-boat history because of an uncle (Delbert Wilson) on the crew of the USS Maumee (AO-2), who survived fuel runs up and down the East Coast in 1942, a trip across to Casablanca to fuel small craft after Operation Torch (and even a fire after a hurricane), then the East Coast again in 1943, I was...
Like much of America, this wasn't taught in my grade school education; we know so little about the happenings of WWII and older wars, due to the absence of reporting technology. We only know what we are told, unless we take the job of digging to find more. I was shocked to learn about how many civilian and military lives were lost within sight of our shores. This was a fascinating read, loaded with history. Reading about the different sub "aces" on the German side was really interesting as well,...
3.5 stars. This book follows 2 story lines—the life of a uboat and an average American family struggling to get by who survive a uboat attack. The first 25% of the book was slow, subsequent parts were at times riveting and others detailed and plodding as the 2 story lines diverge. Good history lesson