Love, War, and the 96th Engineers (colored): The World War II New Guinea Diaries of Captain Hyman Samuelson - Tapa dura

"A superb collection of diaries and letters... Although the war provides the essential background for the script, this is much more than letters and diaries from the front. It is a love story--with Dora, with the Army, with the troops, with New Guinea, with America... The book is a literary achievement." -- Stephen Ambrose, author of D-day, June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II "[Samuelson] provides insight into race relations within the military as well as documenting the psychological, emotional, and physical demands of long-term service in the Pacific theater... This is an illuminating account of the underside of the 'good' war." -- Library Journal "Hall has fashioned a discerning portrait of the World War II experience, as well as the culture of the American soldier. [This is] a welcome addition to the literature on the African American experience in World War II... [A] compelling, and personal, look at an important aspect of American history." -- Paul D. Gelpi Jr., Southern Historian

These candid diaries and letters present with striking immediacy the experiences of Captain Hyman Samuelson, a young, white, Jewish officer in command of African-American troops in New Guinea, during World War II. His detailed, on-site account of issues rarely touched on in wartime literature - especially the dynamics between black troops and white officers and the unsung work of military engineers - unfolds side by side with the poignant, ultimately tragic, love story of Samuelson's wartime marriage and his wife Dora's fight against cancer. Expertly edited by Samuelson's niece, the award-winning historian Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, these diaries tell a moving story of personal sacrifice under difficult circumstances that included not only enemy attack, but also a segregated and unequal military structure.