Plus, receive recommendations and exclusive offers on all of your favorite books and authors from Simon & Schuster.
LIST PRICE $20.00
Free shipping when you spend $40. Terms apply.
Buy from Other Retailers
Table of Contents
About The Book
Cultures and relationships are intertwined to become BRAIDED IN FIRE in Sommocolonia, a medieval Tuscan village in the Apennines directly on the highly fortified Third Reich’s ‘Gothic Line’ stretching across northern Italy. Only at Sommocolonia did attacking German troops break through that formidable line, with dire consequences to the inhabitants and their defenders, a handful of black GIs, who were outnumbered three to one by the Axis troops. In the desperate fight, Lt. John Fox sacrificed himself with supreme heroism. (He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor 52 years later.) Although the military action, (and tragic inaction of certain senior white officers), is described in detail, BRAIDED IN FIRE is not just military history, but tells of the human toll of war: the drama, the folly, the heartache – all present in grand measure for two peoples marginalized over the years for reasons of race and economic circumstances.
BRAIDED IN FIRE is a celebration of human dignity in desperate circumstances. This book is painted in a narrative befitting the beauty and rich hues of the Tuscan hills and its people, juxtaposed by the toils of a segregated America in black versus white, even while in Army green. Together these two worlds are BRAIDED IN FIRE with all of the passion, heartbreak, and violence of war, ultimately providing the reader with a redemptive peace, and cultural harmony.
Praise for BRAIDED IN FIRE
Braided in Fire tells the story of Lieutenant John Fox, a forward artillery observer and posthumous Medal of Honor recipient, who directed friendly artillery fire on his own position as German troops overran Sommocolonia, Italy, on December 26, 1944. Fox’s selfless sacrifice went unrecognized by the U.S. government for half a century simply because he was black. Solace Wales has invested decades in researching this instance of forgotten valor, producing a rich tapestry that interweaves the experiences of the black GIs and Italian villagers caught in the hellish maelstrom that engulfed Sommocolonia the day John Fox died. The result is a moving meditation on the cost of war and a tribute to the African Americans who fought for a country that treated them like second-class citizens. ~ Gregory J.W. Urwin, Professor of History, Temple University, author of Facing Fearful Odds: The Siege of Wake Island
Braided with Fire vividly recounts the intertwined histories of the small Italian town of Sommocolonia and the black 366th Infantry Regiment, which intersected during the German Winter Storm Offensive in December 1944. At the center of Solace Wales’ story are the brave Biondi family and forward artillery observer Lieutenant John Fox, who won the Medal of Honor for his heroism in Sommocolonia. Thoroughly researched and dramatically retold, Braided with Fire adds a valuable new page to our understanding of the Second World War. ~ Ian Ona Johnson, P.J. Moran Assistant Professor of Military History, the University of Notre Dame
Solace Wales contributes a remarkable, unique account which is not available anywhere else. . . Because of her gracious literary style, she vividly captures the ways in which the African American soldiers and the Italians of Sommocolonia’s lives became intertwined. The book breaks new ground. ~ Carolyn Ross Johnston, author of My Father's War: Fighting with the Buffalo Soldiers in World War II
Excerpt
The Biondi family had been sleeping in a Sommocolonian neighbor’s basement for two months. Straw mattresses covered the dirt floor. Twenty-six people slept in a ten-by- twenty-eight- foot room, with barely enough space to inch by the mattresses. Two people shared each mattress, though the four littlest Biondi brothers slept on one. A rectangular slit five inches by fifteen inches, cut into the stone wall two-feet-thick, let in a sliver of light. The lack of air made for stale odors in the dank room, even though they left the door open during the day.
Irma had been told that this basement was safer than the one in their house. But wouldn't the three stories of stone and bricks above crash down on top of them if bombs arrived on its roof? Yet her father insisted that it was the safest spot. German mortar shrapnel had hit the exterior of the Biondi house several times but had never struck this one. This house was protected by an adjacent taller building on its northern side.
“Besides, with American soldiers upstairs at our house, their mortar cannon planted right in front, and a million telephone wires coming into our place from all directions, you aren't safe at home if the Germans arrive!” he argued.
Irma hated sleeping in the basement, and she especially hated making the beds in the morning. It pained her to see the hemp sheets her mother had taken so much trouble to make—from planting the hemp to combing it, weaving the fabric and then finishing it with beautiful embroidery—so grimy and spotted with dirt. They could not wash and dry the sheets. She never dreamt she would long for the village's public laundry with its freezing cold spring water. She used to complain bitterly about her many hours there, chilled to the bone, her hands red and wrinkled, knuckles raw. Now that they could hardly go outside, that exhausting chore seemed like a privilege.
Two of Irma's six brothers were missing from the basement—Berto and Mario. Seventeen-year-old Mario slept in the basement of the family he worked for as a handyman. Berto's situation was more worrisome. Irma knew that as a partisan fighter he was now involved in all sorts of dangerous missions.
Though only the tiniest thread of light entered the room, Irma was suddenly wide awake. “What was that?” she asked, poking Anna.
“It's too early, go back to sleep,” Anna said. Then she added, “It's the GIs, can’t you hear them marching?”
“No,” Irma objected, “American boots don't make that noise!”
All the villagers coveted the silent rubber-soled American boots. This was a sharp sound of metal hitting stone as many heels made contact with the street. Irma whirled around to see her brother, Adelmo sitting bolt upright in his bed too. Soon everyone whispered in alarm. Only the normally rowdy, wide-eyed children remained quiet. Adelmo leapt across the mattresses, stepping on someone's shin and someone else's arm in the process. He positioned himself like a sentry at the window with its minimal view of the house to the south, just across the narrow alleyway.
It was a long minute before he whispered, “I see an Austrian hat!”
“With all the Americans in this village, that cannot be!” someone objected.
“There's no doubt,” Adelmo confirmed. “He's gone now, but he was wearing the Alpine beret with an edelweiss.”
“Get out of that window!” ordered his mother. “They might see you!”
“No, Mamma, they can't see anything looking into this dark hole.”
But he moved away from the opening. The past months had taught him to be invisible. He often hid to avoid risking being taken by the Germans for slave labor.
Irma's great aunt was wailing in a raspy, throaty way. “What's going to happen? What's going to happen!” she cried over and over. No one answered. Everyone knew that with so many enemy soldiers in the same village, there could be only one result.
Irma’s mother, Irene, began to say Hail Marys. Her low voice had a soothing effect on Irma who knew her mother's unwavering focus when involved in prayer. Irma remained silent, concentrating on slowing her own racing heartbeat. A few other women's voices joined Irene's. This did not stop the old woman's unnerving wailing, but it provided a counter to her desperation.
A knock came at the basement door, three quick raps followed by a strong bang. Someone opened the door for Vittorio Biondi, the father of the Biondi clan. He was returning from his night watch at the Vincenti’s. He had witnessed Marina Vincenti and her mother, Dina, walk the few doors down the street to join their relatives’ basement hideout. At least twelve other gatherings of villagers were crammed into basements.
“Are they exchanging fire yet?” someone asked.
“You'll know when it starts,” Vittorio Biondi answered. Then he turned to Irma's wailing great aunt and roared, “Quiet!” Irma knew he would also like Irene to stop praying, but he could not ask that of his wife. The great aunt did stop for a few moments. When she started again, her plaintive voice joined jarringly in the Hail Marys.
“Looks like we are going to be stuck in this hellhole for some time,” said Vittorio. “Let's not make it even more unpleasant with a lot of screeching.” He glared again at the offending aunt, but there was no pause in her wailing prayer.
“I have to pee” said Bruno, pounding his big sister's arm.
Irma turned to the child. “I have to pee too,” she said.
Normally, when morning came, they went home to use their own chamber pots.
If someone had to pee at night, he or she just slipped outside the basement for a moment. But though the marching boots had passed, no one was going outside this morning.
“What shall we do?” Irma asked of no one in particular.
“We'll have to use the leaves in the back corner,” answered her father. “At least they're clean.”
Nearly all the village houses had such a pile of leaves in the basement, located directly under the commode seat above. When leaves became saturated, they were shoveled into a wheelbarrow and taken down to fertilize crops. Like many things, this chore became more difficult to accomplish while living on the front. And with the occupying soldiers, many more people were using the commodes, making for dubious hygiene and unpleasant smells. Because their basement was being used as sleeping quarters, this household had not been using the commode above it and the leaves were clean. Today that would change. But before anyone could move, they heard the jarring noise of a machine gun. The very walls around them seemed to be reverberating. The gun was answered by two rifle shots.
“We’re all going to die,” said Anna, Adelmo’s fiancé, in a strangely calm voice.
“No, no, shhh,” said Adelmo. “We just need to stay quietly hidden, and we’ll be okay.”
It was not long before several machine guns fired simultaneously. Then came a nearly continuous sound of rifles. Bullets bouncing off walls created echoes in the narrow alleyway. The fire seemed to be coming from every direction, as if their hiding place were at the very fulcrum of the action.
Then came the scream of someone hit, followed by a long, low moan that sickened all who heard it. Lt. John Fox was less than seventy-five yards away from the Biondi family and the others sharing the basement, but at a very different elevation. His outpost was on the third and top floor of Sommocolonia’s enormous tenth century tower. The Romanesque tower had been built at one end of the elevated oval of the La Rocca castle field which was supported all the way around by twenty-foot stone walls. This meant that Fox’s location was approximately twenty-five yards higher up than that basement.
Fox saw the enemy troops shortly after they infiltrated the village. Hearing a few distant rifle shots, he peeked behind the black-out cloth covering the tower east-facing window to look in the direction the sound came from. It was unmistakable — there were Germans on Sommocolonia’s eastern path. As the forward observer for this Apennine mountain garrison, Fox exclaimed in frustration to his radio operator, “We can’t call in artillery fire onto that position!” They both knew it would not only endanger villagers in the houses nearby, but also fellow soldiers of their all-black 366th Infantry Regiment, some of whom were occupying those houses.
Earlier, well before it was light (around 5 am), Fox had been effective in directing artillery fire to the north of the village and had succeeded in scaring off German soldiers who had attacked the Italian partisans defending Sommocolonia from that end. He knew that his artillery fire alone would not have accomplished that mission because some of the enemy were too close to the village for him to fire on. His binoculars had helped him see the few partisans guarding the village’s northernmost little hillock, scrambling about, firing nonstop at the intruders. He was happy to have those effective gate keepers in that critical spot.
Along with the other GIs stationed in the village, Fox had been told that the enemy would never enter from the east, only from the north. Looking behind the curtain on the south-facing window, he saw that not only had they entered from the east, but in less than two minutes a few German soldiers had advanced to the street directly below his tower! Though the street was far below, he said quietly “We’re in for trouble now.”
His alarmed radio operator said, “Maybe Jenkins’ gunners will spot ‘em and fire directly down on ‘em.” Fox shook his head. He figured no one in Jenkins platoon knew Germans were anywhere nearby.
A machine gun sounded on a parallel street. Immediately, answering shots echoed loudly. That put an end to the unnerving silence as all hell broke loose, the firing occurring in several areas near the tower, the sound amplified by the narrow stone streets and buildings. Fox noticed that the Germans on the street below had dispersed, clearly looking for more protected positions. The GIs of the 366th inside the buildings were firing out of windows and doors hiding behind the frames of the openings in order to expose themselves as little as possible. But many on both sides were hit and the cries of the wounded were heart-wrenching.
Required to stay in his forward observing outpost and unable to enter in the battle, Fox felt impotent just standing there, paralyzed. He could see his friend, Lt. Graham Hervey Jenkins, in the field below preparing his platoon for battle, but all other action was now hidden by adjacent buildings. Only his ears registered what was happening. Finally, at just after 8:30 am, he had a chance to contribute. He spotted a train of thirty mules approaching Sommocolonia from the north, clearly attempting to resupply the Germans engaged in the battle with ammunition. He flew into action. He did quick calculations and called the battery in the valley below with his coordinates. Shortly, after the boom of the cannons, it was reassuring to hear his buddy’s voice over the crackly phone line: “Good hit! We can see heavy casualties, and most of the animals are down.”
But the German forces did not appear to lack ammunition and the battle raged on.
Later in the morning, the inevitable happened —pairs of enemy machine gunners raced up La Rocca’s narrow southern steps, two soldiers at a time, while many other German soldiers managed to scale the twenty-foot wall from the northern side, a seemingly impossible feat. Feeling suddenly faint, Fox said under his breath, “Oh my God! There are swarms of them!” He saw that his friend’s platoon holding La Rocca field was surrounded and far outnumbered.
At the time the Sommocolonia battle raged on December 26, 1944, I had just turned six and was asleep with my Christmas rag doll in a comfortable house in Washington, DC. I shared no war-related traumas with the protagonists in this book. But in the mid-1970s, my husband and I bought a house in the little medieval village and our neighbors began telling us snippets of their daunting war experiences. Over the years, my interest in the events grew until I became obsessed with the agonizing village battle that irrevocably changed the lives of everyone involved. I needed to learn about what the lives of the villagers, the Italian partisans and the African American soldiers had been like in the years leading up to the compelling moment when they found themselves the brunt of one of the last attacks of the Wehrmacht. I was privileged to hear first-hand about the agony and the heroism from people of all three groups who lived through the events. I learned of extraordinary bravery among the young black GIs who were defending the little garrison against far superior numbers of German troops. I discovered what happened to the people present for the fateful battle who became forever braided in fire. This is their story.
Prologue
The Biondi family had been sleeping in a Sommocolonian neighbor’s basement for two months. Straw mattresses covered the dirt floor. Twenty-six people slept in a ten-by- twenty-eight- foot room, with barely enough space to inch by the mattresses. Two people shared each mattress, though the four littlest Biondi brothers slept on one. A rectangular slit five inches by fifteen inches, cut into the stone wall two-feet-thick, let in a sliver of light. The lack of air made for stale odors in the dank room, even though they left the door open during the day.
Irma had been told that this basement was safer than the one in their house. But wouldn't the three stories of stone and bricks above crash down on top of them if bombs arrived on its roof? Yet her father insisted that it was the safest spot. German mortar shrapnel had hit the exterior of the Biondi house several times but had never struck this one. This house was protected by an adjacent taller building on its northern side.
“Besides, with American soldiers upstairs at our house, their mortar cannon planted right in front, and a million telephone wires coming into our place from all directions, you aren't safe at home if the Germans arrive!” he argued.
Irma hated sleeping in the basement, and she especially hated making the beds in the morning. It pained her to see the hemp sheets her mother had taken so much trouble to make—from planting the hemp to combing it, weaving the fabric and then finishing it with beautiful embroidery—so grimy and spotted with dirt. They could not wash and dry the sheets. She never dreamt she would long for the village's public laundry with its freezing cold spring water. She used to complain bitterly about her many hours there, chilled to the bone, her hands red and wrinkled, knuckles raw. Now that they could hardly go outside, that exhausting chore seemed like a privilege.
Two of Irma's six brothers were missing from the basement—Berto and Mario. Seventeen-year-old Mario slept in the basement of the family he worked for as a handyman. Berto's situation was more worrisome. Irma knew that as a partisan fighter he was now involved in all sorts of dangerous missions.
Though only the tiniest thread of light entered the room, Irma was suddenly wide awake. “What was that?” she asked, poking Anna.
“It's too early, go back to sleep,” Anna said. Then she added, “It's the GIs, can’t you hear them marching?”
“No,” Irma objected, “American boots don't make that noise!”
All the villagers coveted the silent rubber-soled American boots. This was a sharp sound of metal hitting stone as many heels made contact with the street. Irma whirled around to see her brother, Adelmo sitting bolt upright in his bed too. Soon everyone whispered in alarm. Only the normally rowdy, wide-eyed children remained quiet. Adelmo leapt across the mattresses, stepping on someone's shin and someone else's arm in the process. He positioned himself like a sentry at the window with its minimal view of the house to the south, just across the narrow alleyway.
It was a long minute before he whispered, “I see an Austrian hat!”
“With all the Americans in this village, that cannot be!” someone objected.
“There's no doubt,” Adelmo confirmed. “He's gone now, but he was wearing the Alpine beret with an edelweiss.”
“Get out of that window!” ordered his mother. “They might see you!”
“No, Mamma, they can't see anything looking into this dark hole.”
But he moved away from the opening. The past months had taught him to be invisible. He often hid to avoid risking being taken by the Germans for slave labor.
Irma's great aunt was wailing in a raspy, throaty way. “What's going to happen? What's going to happen!” she cried over and over. No one answered. Everyone knew that with so many enemy soldiers in the same village, there could be only one result.
Irma’s mother, Irene, began to say Hail Marys. Her low voice had a soothing effect on Irma who knew her mother's unwavering focus when involved in prayer. Irma remained silent, concentrating on slowing her own racing heartbeat. A few other women's voices joined Irene's. This did not stop the old woman's unnerving wailing, but it provided a counter to her desperation.
A knock came at the basement door, three quick raps followed by a strong bang. Someone opened the door for Vittorio Biondi, the father of the Biondi clan. He was returning from his night watch at the Vincenti’s. He had witnessed Marina Vincenti and her mother, Dina, walk the few doors down the street to join their relatives’ basement hideout. At least twelve other gatherings of villagers were crammed into basements.
“Are they exchanging fire yet?” someone asked.
“You'll know when it starts,” Vittorio Biondi answered. Then he turned to Irma's wailing great aunt and roared, “Quiet!” Irma knew he would also like Irene to stop praying, but he could not ask that of his wife. The great aunt did stop for a few moments. When she started again, her plaintive voice joined jarringly in the Hail Marys.
“Looks like we are going to be stuck in this hellhole for some time,” said Vittorio. “Let's not make it even more unpleasant with a lot of screeching.” He glared again at the offending aunt, but there was no pause in her wailing prayer.
“I have to pee” said Bruno, pounding his big sister's arm.
Irma turned to the child. “I have to pee too,” she said.
Normally, when morning came, they went home to use their own chamber pots.
If someone had to pee at night, he or she just slipped outside the basement for a moment. But though the marching boots had passed, no one was going outside this morning.
“What shall we do?” Irma asked of no one in particular.
“We'll have to use the leaves in the back corner,” answered her father. “At least they're clean.”
Nearly all the village houses had such a pile of leaves in the basement, located directly under the commode seat above. When leaves became saturated, they were shoveled into a wheelbarrow and taken down to fertilize crops. Like many things, this chore became more difficult to accomplish while living on the front. And with the occupying soldiers, many more people were using the commodes, making for dubious hygiene and unpleasant smells. Because their basement was being used as sleeping quarters, this household had not been using the commode above it and the leaves were clean. Today that would change. But before anyone could move, they heard the jarring noise of a machine gun. The very walls around them seemed to be reverberating. The gun was answered by two rifle shots.
“We’re all going to die,” said Anna, Adelmo’s fiancé, in a strangely calm voice.
“No, no, shhh,” said Adelmo. “We just need to stay quietly hidden, and we’ll be okay.”
It was not long before several machine guns fired simultaneously. Then came a nearly continuous sound of rifles. Bullets bouncing off walls created echoes in the narrow alleyway. The fire seemed to be coming from every direction, as if their hiding place were at the very fulcrum of the action.
Then came the scream of someone hit, followed by a long, low moan that sickened all who heard it. Lt. John Fox was less than seventy-five yards away from the Biondi family and the others sharing the basement, but at a very different elevation. His outpost was on the third and top floor of Sommocolonia’s enormous tenth century tower. The Romanesque tower had been built at one end of the elevated oval of the La Rocca castle field which was supported all the way around by twenty-foot stone walls. This meant that Fox’s location was approximately twenty-five yards higher up than that basement.
Fox saw the enemy troops shortly after they infiltrated the village. Hearing a few distant rifle shots, he peeked behind the black-out cloth covering the tower east-facing window to look in the direction the sound came from. It was unmistakable — there were Germans on Sommocolonia’s eastern path. As the forward observer for this Apennine mountain garrison, Fox exclaimed in frustration to his radio operator, “We can’t call in artillery fire onto that position!” They both knew it would not only endanger villagers in the houses nearby, but also fellow soldiers of their all-black 366th Infantry Regiment, some of whom were occupying those houses.
Earlier, well before it was light (around 5 am), Fox had been effective in directing artillery fire to the north of the village and had succeeded in scaring off German soldiers who had attacked the Italian partisans defending Sommocolonia from that end. He knew that his artillery fire alone would not have accomplished that mission because some of the enemy were too close to the village for him to fire on. His binoculars had helped him see the few partisans guarding the village’s northernmost little hillock, scrambling about, firing nonstop at the intruders. He was happy to have those effective gate keepers in that critical spot.
Along with the other GIs stationed in the village, Fox had been told that the enemy would never enter from the east, only from the north. Looking behind the curtain on the south-facing window, he saw that not only had they entered from the east, but in less than two minutes a few German soldiers had advanced to the street directly below his tower! Though the street was far below, he said quietly “We’re in for trouble now.”
His alarmed radio operator said, “Maybe Jenkins’ gunners will spot ‘em and fire directly down on ‘em.” Fox shook his head. He figured no one in Jenkins platoon knew Germans were anywhere nearby.
A machine gun sounded on a parallel street. Immediately, answering shots echoed loudly. That put an end to the unnerving silence as all hell broke loose, the firing occurring in several areas near the tower, the sound amplified by the narrow stone streets and buildings. Fox noticed that the Germans on the street below had dispersed, clearly looking for more protected positions. The GIs of the 366th inside the buildings were firing out of windows and doors hiding behind the frames of the openings in order to expose themselves as little as possible. But many on both sides were hit and the cries of the wounded were heart-wrenching.
Required to stay in his forward observing outpost and unable to enter in the battle, Fox felt impotent just standing there, paralyzed. He could see his friend, Lt. Graham Hervey Jenkins, in the field below preparing his platoon for battle, but all other action was now hidden by adjacent buildings. Only his ears registered what was happening. Finally, at just after 8:30 am, he had a chance to contribute. He spotted a train of thirty mules approaching Sommocolonia from the north, clearly attempting to resupply the Germans engaged in the battle with ammunition. He flew into action. He did quick calculations and called the battery in the valley below with his coordinates. Shortly, after the boom of the cannons, it was reassuring to hear his buddy’s voice over the crackly phone line: “Good hit! We can see heavy casualties, and most of the animals are down.”
But the German forces did not appear to lack ammunition and the battle raged on.
Later in the morning, the inevitable happened —pairs of enemy machine gunners raced up La Rocca’s narrow southern steps, two soldiers at a time, while many other German soldiers managed to scale the twenty-foot wall from the northern side, a seemingly impossible feat. Feeling suddenly faint, Fox said under his breath, “Oh my God! There are swarms of them!” He saw that his friend’s platoon holding La Rocca field was surrounded and far outnumbered.
At the time the Sommocolonia battle raged on December 26, 1944, I had just turned six and was asleep with my Christmas rag doll in a comfortable house in Washington, DC. I shared no war-related traumas with the protagonists in this book. But in the mid-1970s, my husband and I bought a house in the little medieval village and our neighbors began telling us snippets of their daunting war experiences. Over the years, my interest in the events grew until I became obsessed with the agonizing village battle that irrevocably changed the lives of everyone involved. I needed to learn about what the lives of the villagers, the Italian partisans and the African American soldiers had been like in the years leading up to the compelling moment when they found themselves the brunt of one of the last attacks of the Wehrmacht. I was privileged to hear first-hand about the agony and the heroism from people of all three groups who lived through the events. I learned of extraordinary bravery among the young black GIs who were defending the little garrison against far superior numbers of German troops. I discovered what happened to the people present for the fateful battle who became forever braided in fire. This is their story.
Product Details
- Publisher: Knox Press (June 30, 2020)
- Length: 478 pages
- ISBN13: 9781948496032
Browse Related Books
Raves and Reviews
"Braided in Fire tells the story of Lieutenant John Fox, a forward artillery observer and posthumous Medal of Honor recipient, who directed friendly artillery fire on his own position as German troops overran Sommocolonia, Italy, on December 26, 1944. Fox’s selfless sacrifice went unrecognized by the U.S. government for half a century simply because he was black. Solace Wales has invested decades in researching this instance of forgotten valor, producing a rich tapestry that interweaves the experiences of the black GIs and Italian villagers caught in the hellish maelstrom that engulfed Sommocolonia the day John Fox died. The result is a moving meditation on the cost of war and a tribute to the African Americans who fought for a country that treated them like second-class citizens."
– Gregory J.W. Urwin, Professor of History, Temple University, author of Facing Fearful Odds: The Siege of Wake Island
"Braided in Fire tells the story of Lieutenant John Fox, a forward artillery observer and posthumous Medal of Honor recipient, who directed friendly artillery fire on his own position as German troops overran Sommocolonia, Italy, on December 26, 1944. Fox’s selfless sacrifice went unrecognized by the U.S. government for half a century simply because he was black. Solace Wales has invested decades in researching this instance of forgotten valor, producing a rich tapestry that interweaves the experiences of the black GIs and Italian villagers caught in the hellish maelstrom that engulfed Sommocolonia the day John Fox died. The result is a moving meditation on the cost of war and a tribute to the African Americans who fought for a country that treated them like second-class citizens."
– Gregory J.W. Urwin, Professor of History, Temple University, author of Facing Fearful Odds: The Siege of Wake Island
Resources and Downloads
High Resolution Images
- Book Cover Image (jpg): BRAIDED IN FIRE Trade Paperback 9781948496032