While moving at the pace of erosion (or so it seems to me) towards finishing my new book, the “Winterline Stories“, I continue to find interesting pieces of information or in the case here, just a terrific video summary of events that occurred during my Grandfather’s tenure in the war.

It is because of the wealth of good stuff related to the topic, that the book will be published on a brand new cloud-based service so items such as this YouTube video can be part of the real-time footnotes; hopefully enhancing the reading experience (more about “PubWriter” e-publishing service forthcoming in another blog post). I won’t go so far as to make the book dedication to Google and YouTube, but they certainly will be in the Acknowledgements.

Fear-not the Luddite’s preference for a properly bound hard-copy. The Winterline Stories will be available in print as well.

This documentary is produced from an American Army perspective but is a surprisingly candid and accurate account of the Italian Campaign from September, 1943 to June of 1944. Note the “Winter Line” was also referred to as the “Gustav Line” as it is in this film (“Gustavline Stories” just doesn’t have the same ring to it). This is highly recommended viewing to gain some understanding of the extraordinary conditions that defined the “Forgotten Front” of WWII and the backdrop of my Grandfather’s stories.

Michael Hotchkiss – August 10, 2016