The following are examples of publications that have received support from The Gerry Holdsworth Special Forces Charity.
Official SOE Histories
May 2014 sees the publication of Dr Roderick Bailey’s Target: Italy – The Secret War against Mussolini (Faber & Faber). Commissioned by the UK Cabinet Office, this is the official history of the war waged by Britain’s Special Operations Executive against Mussolini’s Fascist Italy. Support from the Charity assisted Dr Bailey with research in Italy and the United States.
Funding from the Charity also supported the preparation of Professor David Stafford’s official history of SOE operations in German-occupied Italy, Mission Accomplished: SOE and Italy 1943-45 (The Bodley Head, 2011).
A series of official histories of SOE have reached publication since 1966. Professor M.R.D. Foot’s seminal SOE in France was the first. Other volumes have examined SOE’s work in the Far East, Scandinavia and the Low Countries.
Other publications
Other publications that have received assistance from the Charity:
- Continuing contribution to the development of the Library at the Special Forces Club.
- Translation grant for Rod Baileys’ Albanian publication of “The widest province: SOE in the Land of the Eagle”.
- The Trust provided financial support for the publication of Professor W.J.M. Mackenzie’s Cabinet Office history of SOE. Written originally in 1946, it was finally published in 2000.
- Dr Tony Insall- a research project undertaken leading to the publication, in 2019, of a book Secret Alliances Special Operations and Intelligence in Norway 1940-1945 reappraising Anglo-Norwegian resistance cooperation during the Second World War.
- Dr Rob Johnson University of Oxford grant to assist the production of a new volume about Lawrence of Arabia on War: The Campaign in the Desert 1916-18. Published in 2020.
- Dr Roderick Gildea (University of Oxford) “A Transnational Approach to Resistance in Europe, 1936-48″ published in 2020.
- The Life and Times of Lieutenant General Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart author Alan Ogden – Published in 2021 by Bloomsbury Academic.
- Translation of the Albert Brown-Bartroli memoirs F Section SOE by The Secret WW11 learning network.
- Secret Operations over Occupied Europe the Barter Crew 138 Squadron, RAF Tempsford – Published in 2022 by Nigel Atkins main text Jan Christensen.
- A Suspicion of Spies – Risk, secrets and Shadows – the Biography of Wilfred “Biffy” Dunderdale Author Tim Spicer OBE
The wonderful tale of the extraordinary Wilfred ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale. Dunderdale was an intrepid, diabolically creative and exceedingly effective intelligence officer whose contribution to winning World War 11 has often been overlooked and underestimated. Tim’s splendid biography will do much to get Dunderdale the recognition he deserves for what Dunderdale described as his 40 years of licensed thuggery. – Published in 2024 by Barbreck Publications