British contributions to the successful decryption of German Enigma messages at Bletchley Park and elsewhere are well known. Lesser known, but of equal importance, were German achievements in decrypting ‘secure’ transatlantic voice circuits between the White House and Whitehall. In August 1941, to address common concerns, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Churchill first met aboard warships at the U.S. Naval Operating Base at Placentia Bay, Newfoundland. Guarded references to the proposed meeting had been intercepted, and the German High command had ordered that the meeting be prevented or disrupted at all costs. Noted naval author J. F. (Jack) Leahy recounts events leading to the historic meeting, especially the morning of Sunday, August 10, 1941, when the two leaders met aboard HMS Prince of Wales. The story unfolds through many perspectives: that of Roosevelt’s staff; Churchill and his colleagues; the German High Command and the U-boats crews deployed to intercept Prince of Wales enroute; and focuses upon a small team of U.S. Navy communications specialists, who inadvertently and with limited support from their superiors intercepted vital communications between German coast watchers and a team of saboteurs landed by U-boat on the island’s south coast. Fleet Admiral William (Bull) Halsey remarked after the war: “There are no great men. There are only ordinary men, such as you and I, who are forced by circumstances to overcome great challenges. There are no great men.” This lightly fictionalized book is the story of ordinary men and women, of both the Allied and Axis forces, and their efforts to overcome extraordinary challenges at a critical “hinge point” of modern history. It contains twenty-six black and white photographs and eleven maps and navigation charts.
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