Category: Bibliographies

This prize-winning work has a scattering of information on naval poems and poets of WWII.

A Bibliography of Japanese Books on the Burma Campaign: War in Burma 1942-1945. xv, 112p. Tokyo: All Burma Veterans Association of Japan, 2000.

A comprehensive guide covering everything from official histories to personal accounts. Although most of the text is in Japanese, titles and many details are also given in English. There is some peripheral material on naval matters.

GRAHAM, Gordon, & COLE, Frank. The Burma Campaign Memorial Library: A Collection of Books and Papers about the War in Burma 1942–1945. ix, 100p.  London: School of Oriental and African Studies, 1999. ISBN: 0728603055.

The collection was assembled over the previous five years and donated to SOAS. This annotated catalogue contains little naval material but is useful on commando and combined operations and points to what will be an important and growing resource. A second revised and expanded edition was published in 2001 (ISBN: 0728603306).

Convoys in World War II (World War II Commemorative Bibliography No 4). 14p. Washington: Navy Department Library, 1993.

One of 10 planned bibliographies, this covers selectively the literature of books and journals held by the Library, with over 150 entries, mainly for the Atlantic and Arctic theaters.

Another line!

COLEMAN, Arthur & NEEL, Hildy. Great Stories of World War II: An Annotated Bibliography of Eyewitness War-Related Books Written and Published Between 1940 and 1946. viii, 133p., bibliog. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2007. ISBN: 9780810850491.

The first personal narrative about World War II was published two months after America formally entered the war in 1941. Between then and 1946, over 500 of these books were published. These eyewitness accounts, written by war correspondents, service men and women, home front civilians, and defence workers, were very different from the stark military dispatches printed in the daily press. Each entry includes citations for any reviews the work received in any of six major American reviewing journals. Although an American work there is some relevant naval material.

SPIER, Henry O. World War 2 in Our Magazines and Books, September 1939 to September 1945: A Bibliography. 96p. New York: Stuyvesant, 1945.

A list arranged by country or by general topic of 1,500 books and the relevant articles from 35 journals. Useful if limited. A smaller edition was published in 1941. A facsimile reprint was published by Reink Books in 2017.

BAYLISS, Gwyn M. Bibliographic Guide to the Two World Wars: An Annotated Survey of English Language Reference Materials. xv, 578p., index. London: Bowker, 1977. ISBN: 0859350134.

The Librarian of the Imperial War Museum provides a treasure trove of information on reference works, from dictionaries to chronologies and from maps to theses.

ANDERSON, Frank John. Submarines, Submariners, Submarining: A Bibliography. xii, 140p. Hamden, Conn.: Shoestring, 1963.

A checklist of submarine books, principally of the twentieth century, arranged by author, title and subject. The author list has full bibliographic details then uses coded appendices and short entries for the other lists. It covers some 450 titles in English and has 200 foreign language titles in an appendix. A new edition was published by Archon in 1975 as: Submarines, Diving and the Underwater World: A Bibliography, (ISBN: 0208015086) containing some 1500 entries.

ENSER, A. G. S. A Subject Bibliography of the Second World War: Books in English 1975-1983. 225p., index. Aldershot: Gower, 1985. ISBN: 0566035146.

An updating volume, which also rectifies some omissions from the earlier work. A second edition covering the period 1975-1987 was published in 1990.

Some 4,500 books are divided into fairly general subject groupings. Although it has its inevitable crop of errors and an enormous number of omissions, this early attempt is still rewarding.

Some 3,465 entries which add to the earlier work.

The three volumes of this work are, 1: European Theater, 2: Pacific Theater, 3: General Works and Special Studies. Each is subdivided into half a dozen broad headings which are further subdivided into topics; each volume has an index, the third being cumulative; each topic has a brief historical introduction. Some of the 10,000 entries are annotated briefly. The bibliography includes books and journal articles, some government documents and unpublished theses. It is an enormous and essential tool, but betrays its American origins in some obvious howlers concerning British items, nor is it comprehensive, being weak in wartime and immediately post-war publications.

An excellent guide which also has useful lists of ministers and other appointees, operation names and lists of acronyms. Essential for anyone using primary official records. A second edition was published under the authorship of John D. Cantwell in 1993 (ISBN: 011440254X ) and a revised edition in 1998 (ISBN: 187316260X).

A quite excellent work, covering many rare items published during and just after the war. It has four sections of souvenir books on: ships; naval aviation units; Seabee units; and miscellaneous groups. A second edition was published in 2004 (ISBN: 1889901326).

Despite its imperfections, this labour of love is probably the most comprehensive and accurate work to date. A second edition was published by Scarecrow Press in 2003 (ISBN: 0810845342). A third edition may be produced at some future date.

Some 700 unit histories are listed. When used with the two works by Maurer on the USAAF, it is possible to identify any works on units operational in the same areas as the RN.

A model bibliography. New Zealand has a surprisingly large aviation literature and many New Zealanders saw service in Coastal Command and the Fleet Air Arm.

Although now dated, this is an essential starting point for those wishing to study the foreign language sources relevant to WWII. It records the then state of activity country by country and lists the official war histories from Afghanistan to Yugoslavia.

Several chapters cover naval history and one is specifically on WWII, by an authority on the field, Peter Kemp. It includes an annotated bibliography of 140 books. A supplement was published by Garland in 1988, edited by Gerald Jordan. (ISBN: 0824084500.)

A valiant attempt at a complete list. Arranged under a large number of alphabetically ordered subject headings with author and subject indices. Obviously compiled largely from standard sources, without reference to the original items, it both creates and perpetuates errors and ascribes some works to subject headings either arbitrarily or wrongly. Nevertheless, it is useful for most items.

A bibliography of items in Western European languages. Excellent and wide-ranging background; especially good on maps.

The first edition was published in 1976 and had some 2,000 entries. This has more than doubled by the third edition, one swollen by a substantial number of publications celebrating fiftieth anniversaries of events in WWII. A good professional work, particularly strong on privately published and locally published materials.

A working bibliography that "encompasses the published writings that teaching experience shows are relevant and should be among the holdings of the average university library." This worthy, if limited, aim produces 1200 books, articles, dissertations, and documents on WWII.

A checklist of and guide to a basic and extensive resource.