Black May: The Epic Story of the Allies' Defeat of the German U-Boats in May 1943

After a year of terrorizing ships off the coast of the United States, the tide turned against the U-boats in May 1943 when Allied forces sank 41 vessels and damaged 37 others. This frenzy of activity essentially reopened the North Atlantic to merchant shipping and helped clear a path for the Allies' final assault on Europe the following year. Michael Gannon tells his story with wonderful anecdotes from all perspectives--in one scene, he describes a surfaced U-boat crew standing on deck and watching automobile headlights shine through the blackness of night from the New Jersey shore. Few people realize that German naval vessels actually came so close to the United States, but they did--until, as Gannon tells the story, they were finally pushed away, once and for all, in a single hectic month of combat. Although Black May is something of a sequel to Gannon's extraordinary Operation Drumbeat, which described the German's initial successes, it stands on its own as a brilliant work of naval history. --John J. Miller