The entire purpose of my websites and blogs for the past 25 years has been to collect and share the amazing work of the U.S. Army rail units of WWII and Korea. 

Both my father and uncle were officers and served in rail units in both wars. I've felt this unique service was being lost and forgotten. Luckily, so did the British author, Christian Wolmar. He contacted me about 2 years ago with his idea for this book and  I've worked with him as his research assistant on this project.  I am beyond thrilled to present:

The Liberation Line: The Untold Story of How American Engineering and Ingenuity Won World War II (U.S. Title)

The epic story of the railwaymen who ensured Allied victory in World War Two, published to coincide with the eightieth anniversary of D-Day.

As the Allied forces advanced through France following the Normandy landings, just behind the frontline the US Military Rail Service and their counterparts in the Royal Engineers were at work, ensuring that crucial supply lines were up and running – without them the liberation of France and the invasion of Germany would founder. 

Based on original research, The Liberation Line thrillingly reveals how the railwaymen overcame enemy attacks, sabotage and booby traps to repair many hundreds of miles of destroyed railway tracks and dozens of bridges and tunnels in order to deliver victory. Packed with tales of individual heroism, this is one of the last great untold stories of the war. 

The book will be published in May 2024 in conjunction with the 80th anniversary of D-Day. You can
per-order Amazon here: https://amz.run/76Q4 

 Christian will be doing a US tour with the book if you'd like him to speak to your organization email me. If you are interested in an autographed book or to have Christian speak to your group email me at militaryrailwayservice@gmail.com    Thanks, Nancy  (UK cover top left - US bottom right)

If you have any information on a soldier railroader I would love to hear from you! If your father, grandfather or other relative served let me know something about them. I would love to do a blog post about them. Nancy  email: militaryrailwayservice@gmail.com

You can order a signed copy from me here  

Christian Womar April 4th, 2024 promotional video!  

This is an amazing biography and first hand account by Army railroader D.M.(Bing) Quimby serving with the 711th ROB during WWII in Iran. Thanks to his son, Russ Quimby and the Quimby family for sharing this amazing book with us,

Russ wrote ... Nancy, I just finished reading Christian Wolmar's "The Liberation Line" where I discovered your name and website. As a Class of 1974 West Point graduate who spent most of my working life in railroading, and as the son of a railroad engineer who was in the 711th ROB in Iran during WWII, I am gratified that you are preserving the Military Railway Service history and memories. Four of 13 chapters of my father's self published autobiography "One of the Last" by D.M. (Bing) Quimby (1995 Vantage Press) deal with his experiences in the 711th ROB in Iran. Only 200 copies were published, but I would be glad to send you a copy for reference. I think that you might find his story of some interest.

Fascinating autobiography of Bing Quimby, one of the last engineers to run a steam locomotive in the United States. A quintessential small town boy, the author describes his youth growing up in Nebraska in the 1920s, bumming his way to California in his teens (and getting into scrapes along the way), working as a fireman for the railroad, serving in the Army during World Ward II where his locomotive delivered supplies to the Russians from Iran, and then the years as an engineer of steam locomotives back home before making the transition to diesel. Illustrated with black and white photos. 232 pages. 

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Vantage Press; First Edition (January 1, 1995) 

Language ‏ : ‎ English Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 232 pages 

ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0533111544 ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0533111541 

 

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 Interested in trains used in WWI ? ( many were still in use when we got to France in '44) Pick up a used copy or check you library 

The Men, Locomotives and Tracks That Took the Armies to War 1914-18
by Roden, Andrew 

Without the railways for the Great Powers, the most terrible conflict the world has ever known would have taken a very different form - if it had happened at all. In a remarkable historical railway journey through Britain and Europe, author Andrew Roden tells the story of the men and women who manned the tracks and the trains, and who relied on them to get them to battle and back home again. Drawing on diaries, memoirs and archive material he reveals the personal stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things, and pays tribute to their overlooked contribution.  He looks at defining moments of railway history on both sides of the Great War.

 

Railways at War Part 1

  

Part 2 https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BpXsOUAKH8OtQYnnbvDkPmH2o8AV21nA/view?usp=sharing 

Part 3 https://drive.google.com/file/d/15xAKQ4a_gjCOXMn2mPUfmmoF5x8Ryxl0/view?usp=sharing

Book Of Interest – John Bushby 

Although not a railway history volume the book ‘Oxwich To Omaha, American GIs in South Wales’ by Phil Howells (self-published, no ISBN, revised edition 2021) has much to recommend it on a num-ber of counts. Firstly, it is more about South Wales and the Bristol Channel/Severn Estuary area as a whole with Avonmouth, Sharpness etc. so it is more a case of South Wales plus. Secondly, a lot of information concerning rail movements and US Army locomotives can be found although this requires searching through the text, nor are the maritime/shipping aspects neglected which is of major relevance as the major South Wales docks were owned by the Great Western Railway. Perhaps most important is that the book is based on extensive research in the US National Archives. Consequently, it is a who, what, where, when and how book rather than the more usual anecdotal accounts of the ‘Yanks’ derived from ‘oral history’ and ‘family tradition’ which are often recorded decades later, uncorroborated and of doubtful provenance. This book contains masses of detail based on documentary evidence and should interest anyone interested in Britain’s railways in WW2 and/or the US Army presence in Britain during the same period. Copies of the revised 2021 can be obtained through Amazon for £12.99 which is extremely good value given the sheer amount of data included. South-west England and South Wales were the main concentration areas for US ground forces under the BOLERO programme in the build-up to D-Day and they were critically dependent on the railways. Nothing comparable seems to be currently available elsewhere. MILITARY RAILWAY STUDY GROUP https://www.mrsg.org.uk/ 

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Oxwich To Omaha: American GI's in South Wales Paperback – May 29, 2020 by Phil Howells Early on the sixth of June 1944, as the Normandy Beaches were under assault and Force ‘L’ and Force ‘B’ were converging in the English Channel, another US armada with Royal Navy escort was ploughing its way around Lands End. Yet despite the passage of 76 years, very little has been written about the Bristol Channel Pre-Loaded Build-Up Force and the 42,000 troops transported to Omaha and Utah - until now. Included in the overall 5,000 ship tally of vessels taking part in the biggest amphibious operation of all time, the fleet carrying among others the 2nd and 90th Infantry Divisions and major parts of the PESBG and the 5th and 6th ESB’s plus seaborne elements of 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions has never featured highly in the extensive narratives that have gone before. But now having drawn on the detailed NARA archives in Maryland plus many original unit histories, Phil Howells has been able to detail this much overlooked part of the D-Day story. Moreover, through researching this element of ‘Operation Neptune’, the author has been able to lay before the reader the extensive Concentration, Marshalling and Embarkation plans in South Wales and the twelve months of ‘Operation Bolero’ that preceded the sailing, including the construction of camps, depots and hospitals in the six counties; the formation and training of the 5th Engineer Special Brigade on Gower and the Provisional ESB Group – plus recording the huge amount of troops and cargo that poured into the ports of the Bristol Channel. Utilising aerial photographs and US Corps of Engineers plans, 'Oxwich to Omaha' is a valuable addition to any library devoted to D-Day specifically and the Second World War in general. https://www.amazon.com/Oxwich-Omaha-American-South-Wales/dp/B089CSNFSL

Railroading in Eighteen Countries: The Story of American Railroad Men Serving in the Military Railway Service, 1862 to 1953 Kindle Edition by Maj.-Gen. Carl R. Gray (Author) Part I  

Part II

 

Part I

 

 Part II

 

Thanks so much to author, Michael Heinzel for providing to the blog an English translation of a chapter pertaining to MRS units from his new book, Buch Eisenbahn in Ostbelgien nach dem 2. Weltkrieg: Besetzung - Befreiung - Wiederaufbau (Railway in East Belgium after World War II: Occupation - Liberation - Reconstruction) 

Reports from a German, American and Belgian perspective The railways in the Belgian-German border area served as deployment lines for the German invasion of Belgium in the First and Second World Wars. 

During the First World War they were only slightly destroyed, but then mostly ceded to the kingdom. During the Second World War, the destruction was serious. The local events of the years 1940-59 can be reconstructed using original documents from the Federal Archives, diary reports by American railway pioneers and official SNCB files from the Belgian train station Weywertz, and interesting insights into the political upheavals of that time can be gained. 

You can purchase in German here you can purchase in German here: Softcover 14.7 x 21cm 103 pages : https://bityl.co/B7jj 

 

If you can't see image click here : https://drive.google.com/file/d/165mOKwCNngH8q7hrAjwgEaQJGOWIOzK9/view?usp=sharing

 

 A Railroader in World War II: Gerald Harbaugh and the 3rd Military Railway Service

 (The Virginians at War Series)  April 6, 2017 by Col Greg Eanes (Author)

Gerald Harbaugh was railroad mechanic from the railroad town of Crewe, Va. When World War II erupted, he volunteered for the U.S. Army only to discover the Army needed experienced railroad men to move Lend Lease supplies across Iran to Russia then desperately fighting Nazi Germany. 

Harbaugh was assigned to Company A, 754th Railway Shop Battalion, 3rd Military Railway Service of the Persian Gulf Command. 

 Now available on Amazon https://amz.run/51xN

part 1

part 2

The Transportation Corps :movements, training, and supply / by Chester Wardlow.

Rail Transport and the Winning of Wars Paperback – January 1, 1956 by James A. Van Fleet (Author)

Great new book ! The Military Railroad Journey of Chicago & Northwestern Locomotive Engineer Frank Pelletier 1942 To 1945 And Beyond 

There aren’t many, if any, personal histories of combined railroad military training and railroad operations in wartime told by the person who lived the experiences between 1942 and 1945 on the Chicago & Northwestern, the Santa Fe and the White Pass & Yukon Railroads. 

This book does just that and more via the thoughtful and witty pen and photos Frank Pelletier left us. It is a collation and presentation of his historic original diaries, letters, photos and even an original poem by a multitalented railroad engineer, held, preserved and now presented by his nephew. 

More here and purchase the book: https://www.ironhorseimage.org/

Great book of you know someone who served in this unit ..

Yardbird is how Ed Johansen referred to himself in some of the letters he sent home to the family from boot camp in 1942. At the time the definition fit him: yardbird. n. Slang. An untrained military recruit. This is a book of letters and photos that Ed sent home to his family and fiance. As I read them, I was enchanted with the world that my dad described...a world at war, his hopes of making it as an officer in the Army, his description of the training he went through: "...a section of land we have to crawl over with land mines exploding all around us and machine guns firing over us," his worries about his younger brother who is serving in the Air Force and his life in the 755th Railway Battalion. Illustrated with his own photographs of the country and the men he served with in war-torn Europe.

Buy one here https://amzn.to/3oZ7nZr  

 

America's Fighting Railroads: A World War II Pictorial History Paperback by Don DeNevi 

 

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