Packs On!: Memoirs of the 10th Mountain Division in WWII

"Packs On!" is a collection of individual memoirs by soldiers who served in the 10th Mountain Division during the Second World War. Author A.B. Feuer provides an introduction and timeline on the Division's service; the rest of the book contains stories from soldiers about themselves, their buddies and their service. The individual memoirs have been edited by Feuer and are arranged in rough chronological order. The 10th Mountain Division was organized in 1943 out of a percieved need for troops who could fight in mountainous and wintery conditions, on skis if necessary. The division probably benefited from an extended if unsystematic train-up. One regiment, the 87th, served in the Aleutians campaign in Alaska. The entire division deployed to Italy in January 1945. There, it earned a reputation as a hard-hitting, fast-moving outfit, excelling in the mountain warfare that characterized the closing months of the war in Northern Italy. The stories themselves capture individual snapshots, from terrifying experiences of being under fire to the discomfort of wet, cold foxholes to the perpetual scrounging of creature comforts. Some of the accounts include wry references to the Italian civilians caught in the war zone; others reflect on the maddening inefficiences of a mass army. "Packs On!" is not a systematic history of the 10th Mountain Division; it does offer a fascinating look at service in a unique division. This book is highly recommened to students of the American experience in World War II.

Author A. B. Feur skillfully puts a collection of personal combat stories together into his book "Packs On! Memoirs of the Mountain Division in WWII". The author is one of the more prolific chroniclers of WWII history and this book may be his best to date. The Foreword is written by Senator Bob Dole and adds a real touch of class to the telling of this unit. Feur takes us through the unit's campaigns after a well written introduction that gives us insights on the way the unit was put together and how they trained. He then takes us to Alaska and the Kiska Campaign. That campaign turned out to be a fight for an island that the Japanese had already abandoned and left. There were causalities and deaths due to "friendly fire" in the fog and the confusion of the battle that had no opposing forces. We follow the unit onward to Italy and Europe and into the mountains and snow. The author allows us to see each battle area through the eyes of the different veterans who wrote their memories of the events. This enhances the story telling format and enriches the final over-all story of the unit. The many different and diverse voices make the book entertaining as well as educational. It feels more personal then any straight telling of historic events would have. Feur expertly weaves all these individual stories together and connects them with facts, data, maps and old photos to make this whole book a first class reading experience. This is book captures the essence of what this unit was all about. The author realizes that strength of this story was to allow the men who were there to tell it--and he does that well! The Military Writer's Society of America gives this book its highest rating of FIVE STARS!

In the style of Ernie Pyle, the author relates the experiences of members of the 10th Mountain Division who fought the veteran fighters of the German Army in the mountains of northern Italy during World War II.