How marvelous it is when history can be made to come alive, as it is in Marcus A. Nannini’s biography MIDNIGHT FLIGHT TO NUREMBERG: The Capture of the Nazi Who Put Adolf Hitler Into Power. In it, the captivating World War II experiences of First Lieutenant, C-47 pilot Harry E. Watson Jr. are relayed in full living, breathing color, accompanied often by black/white photographic illustration of the characters and combat that peopled Watson’s life. Pictures of a narrow road filled with slaughtered horses, as German armies endeavored to retreat without air support or adequate tree line cover, are heartbreaking and touching letters to Watson Jr.’s first wife and son add just the right amount of emotional content. The highlight of Watson’s adventures, as encapsulated by the book’s title, was perhaps the secret mission behind enemy lines to Nuremberg where he was required to land in a deserted meadow, in the dark, in order to pick up U.S. soldiers and prisoners-of-war including Franz von Pappen; a gentleman who once convinced President Hindenburg to appoint first himself, and then later Adolph Hitler, Chancellor of Germany. If not for von Pappen — a spy indicted by a U.S. Federal Grand Jury in 1916 — General Kurt von Schleicher (who, unlike von Pappen, opposed industrialists profiting from the rearmament of Germany) would likely have been Germany’s Chancellor. But von Pappen supported industrialists, and he supported things like the Nazi Sturm Abteilung (SA) who had their own particular manner of eliminating political opposition.
Accompanied by over 100 other key figures, Von Schleicher gets brutally murdered during Germany’s Night of Long Knives. All of which is stirring to read about, though really, the pages of this biography are jam-packed with plenty of other hair-raising adventures, as young Watson joins other American military men seeking to do right by serving and protecting their country and the world. Watson delivers Army nurses with supplies where they are needed at great personal risk to himself. He manages to evacuate a field hospital just moments before the SS arrive, opening fire. Along the way, he loses friends, and sometimes even the belief that he will survive long enough to return to civilian life. Yet unlike many bittersweet tales of just how difficult it can sometimes be for war veterans to eventually return home, Watson’s ultimate next life chapter as a Continental Airlines pilot is quite satisfying. A bit dryly factual in spots, mostly this biography is a riveting read throughout.
Marcus A. Nannini’s MIDNIGHT FLIGHT TO NUREMBERG: The Capture of the Nazi Who Put Adolf Hitler Into Power, is an emotional true story and an enthralling political rollercoaster ride.
~C.S. Holmes for IndieReader