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The Wartime Journals of Charles A. Lindbergh

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Every so often my reading leads me to another book of the past that is out of print. I almost always find the book on Amazon.com, and if I am lucky, the book will be a forgotten jewel. Wartime Journals of Charles A. Lindbergh is just such a book. This is a magnificent journal, 1000 pages of narrative, that takes the reader from March, 1938 to June, 1945. The journal immerses the reader in Lindbergh's daily life as well as the history of the time, yielding a facinating narrative of events leading to WWII as well as Lindbergh's combat experiences in the South Pacific during approximately 1 year in the course of WWII. Lindbergh writes well, and he frequently spends a substantial amount of time on a daily entry, explaining what he was doing on that day and what his thoughts were about the situation. He has a number of entries concerning his wife, Anne, and the 4 children that they had prior to the end of the book (Reeve was yet to be born). There is much discussion about the family's life prior to the war while living in England as well as France. I was particularly interested in his many entries with regard to his experiences at Ford Motor Company during 1942 and 1943. His work there is not universally known; however, it was quite interesting and chronicles his continued position of being on the cutting edge of aviation.

I found this book facinating, well written, and a real contribution to my historical reading. This is not necessarily a book exclusively for scholors of this period of history. It is a very readable, real world journal. There are many photographs, and a substantial number of noteable, historical figues move through the daily entries.

Normally in reviewing a book, I exclusively address my comments to my thoughts about the book. However,I will mention that I think the review posted from the previous reviewer is a disservice to potential readers of this outstanding document. I strongly suspect that this reviewer did not read the book. His gloss over lightly is inaccurate and essentially is a criticism of Lindbergh's America First position prior to December 7, 1941 as opposed to a review of the book. One of his major points was that Lindbergh became a man without a country after his activities as a speaker for America First. This is not close to the truth. I might point out that Lindbergh's most successful book, The Spirit of St. Lewis, published in 1955, was a Pulitizer Prize Winner as well as a No. 1 seller on the New York Times best seller list for a number of months. This is generally not how the work of a washed up has-been is treated.

By the time WWII began Charles Lindbergh was firmly entrenched in the Isolationist movement and no friend of FDR's. He was confident Germany would defeat all of her opponents and rule Europe. He didn't figure on the Japanese however and once the war began however he wanted to contribute but not in uniform (afraid of Roosevelt ordering him to a cubby hole somewhere) so he found jobs testing aircraft and giving flying advice to pilots in the South Pacific. A brilliant but also incredibly naive man, Lindbergh basically found himself a man without a country only two decades after his remarkable achievements.