The Unknown Dead: Civilians in the Battle of the Bulge

What did I know about the Battle of the Bulge before I read this book? Well, not very much, even though I read about war and warfare all the time. Watching Band of Brothers I got the impression that Easy Company more or less saved the day for everybody involved in the Allied offensive, and well, that was it. No more Hitler and no more WWII. Not so. And that's quite clear after reading The Unknown Dead. However, I didn't learn that much about the war per se, even though quite a few pages talk about different battles and offensives and personal experiences et cetera. What I did learn, however, was that there were more people on the battlefield than just the Allied forces and the stubborn Germans. There were regular people present as well, and the sufferings these people who happened to be in the middle of the fighting were, to say the least, extremely horrific. This becomes very clear throughout the book, and Schrijvers does an amazing job telling the stories about these somewhat forgotten people. From time to time it might feel a little repetitive, but then again, the sufferings they had to endure WERE repetitive. And the only way to make the reader aware of how it really was is to tell it all, so this isn't really much of an issue. However, what I liked the most about the book was the honesty, or in other words, the fact that Schrijvers never hesitates to - sometimes in quite gruesome detail - describe scenarios where not just the Germans and especially the Waffen SS and Gestapo executed people in cold blood or committed other mindless atrocities. The GIs too could be ruthless killers and totally lacking any sense of moral or discipline in the ways they interacted with the horrified civilians. This might be extremely uncomfortable to some, but hey, that's the way it was, and if you cannot deal with the fact that not all Allies were good and honest heroes, then the problem is with your look on reality, and not with Schrijvers' book. All in all The Unknown Dead is as interesting as it is necessary, and I really do hope that Peter Schrijvers decides to write other books such as this one about other important battles in the WWII.

This book is a must read for everyone intrested in the Battle of the Bulge! It is about a "forgotten" fact of this battle, the suffering of the civilians. Untill now in every book about this Battle, hardly any information can be found about the Belgian population and how they suffered. Most historians and writers wrote untill now that there were only very limited casualties among the civilians. This book proves that this is not correct! The Belgian people did not only suffer from the Germans in this Battle, also due to the military action of the American and British armed forces many civilians died! Bombings by the American forces caused terrible suffering. In this book - which is a must read - we get another picture of the Battle of the Bulge and the suffering is has caused.