Overview

Triumph or disaster? After Daybreak brilliantly investigates the emergency operation following the British liberation of Belsen. When British troops entered Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945, they uncovered scenes of horror and depravity that shocked the world. But they also confronted a terrible challenge - inside the camp were some 60,000 people, suffering from typhus, starvation and dysentery, who would die unless they received immediate medical attention. After Daybreak is the story of the army stretcher-bearers and ambulance drivers, medical students and relief workers who attempted to save the inmates of Belsen - with the war still raging and only the most primitive drugs and facilities available. Drawing on their diaries and letters, Ben Shephard reconstructs events at Belsen in the spring of 1945 - from the first horror of its discovery, through the agonising process of trying to save the survivors. In doing so he addresses the question of whether we should regard the relief of the camp as an epic of medical heroism - as the British believed - or see the failure to plan for Belsen and the undoubted mistakes that were made there as further evidence of Allied indifference to the fate of Europe's Jews - as some historians now argue. The result is a powerful and dramatic narrative, full of extraordinary incidents and characters, and an important contribution to medical history.

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9781844135400

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Reviews

* 'In his excellent and lucid account, Shephard fully makes his case that the aftermath of the liberation of Belsen was an episode in which the British can take pride...a powerful and dramatic narrative.' - Frank McLynn, Independent * 'A solidly researched, scrupulously balanced and sensitive account of the liberation that will serve as a fitting tribute and a guide to future generations about how best to remember Belsen.' - David Cesarini, Guardian * 'A moving story.' - Times Literary Supplement * 'Contributors to the ever-growing opus of Holocaust historiography have been accused by some of creating an industry. However, Shephard's contribution is not superfluous and he negotiates his harrowing material surefootedly.' - Katrina Goldstone, Irish Times

Author Information

Ben Shephard read History at Oxford University. He was a producer on the television series The World at War and The Nuclear Age and has made numerous historical and scientific documentaries for the BBC and Channel Four. He is the author of the critically acclaimed A War of Nerves- Soldiers and Psychiatrists 1914-1994 and The Long Road Home- The Aftermath of the Second World War. He lives in Bristol.

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