Eight Hours From England – Anthony Quayle

One of them’s urgent.” “Come on in, Drake. We’ll decipher it together.” “It’s good to be on the air again,” he said, as we settled round the fire with paper and pencil. “This time last night I didn’t reckon I’d be hearing the old da-di-da for quite a while!” The urgent signal was a short one and we soon had it finished. Nigel read out: “Bad weather has prevented sortie but will try again to-night February twelve Stop Stand by period twenty hundred hours to twenty-three hundred hours.”

I looked at my watch. “Well, it’s five-past eight now,” I said to Drake. “You’d better go straight off and organise a flashing-party. There’s not a hope of a sortie to-night in this sea, but we’d better be on the safe side.” Drake crawled out of the hut and Nigel and I settled down to the next priority signal, but we had hardly begun it when there was a shout from the corporal outside.

“Major Overton, sir. They’re here!” “What!” “The boat’s here now. Down in the bay. Flashing like blazes.” “All right, Drake,” I shouted back. “Signal them to come ashore. Then get down on to the beach with all the men you can collect.” Nigel was already pulling on his boots, while from outside came the sound of shouting and men running towards the cliff path. “Damn it!”

exclaimed Tank. “I must finish a report I’m sending out. I think I could get it done in half an hour. Can you cope with the reception?” “Of course we can,” I said. “And take it easy. We’ll be at least two hours unloading and getting the Italians on board. Stay here quietly and finish your work.” My own written report was all but finished. In five minutes I had it sealed up in an envelope with my personal mail, then Nigel and I were plunging and slipping down the track.

As we reached the beach and rounded the shoulder of the cliff the bay became visible, and there—a mere dark shape on the tossing waters—was the little ship. But there was no time to stand and look; shaded torches were shining in the middle of the beach, and it looked as though a boat had already come ashore. We lunged on over the shifting pebbles. A heavy wooden dinghy was drawn up on the beach with a small knot of men standing round it.

Drake was there with Nigel’s operator, Cooper, and I could make out Alpino in the dark. Slightly apart from the rest was a tall man, standing by himself. When he saw me he moved towards me. “Are you Overton?” . . . American voice.

‘If poetry was the supreme literary form of the First World War then, as if in riposte, in the Second World War, the English novel came of age. This wonderful series is an exemplary reminder of that fact. Great novels were written about the Second World War and we should not forget them.’ WILLIAM BOYD ‘It’s wonderful to see these four books given a new lease of life because all of them are classic novels from the Second World War written by those who were there, experienced the fear, anguish, pain and excitement first-hand and whose writings really do shine an incredibly vivid light onto what it was like to live and fight through that terrible conflict.’

JAMES HOLLAND, Historian, author and TV presenter ‘The Imperial War Museum has performed a valuable public service by reissuing these four absolutely superb novels covering four very different aspects of the Second World War. I defy you to choose which is best: I keep changing my mind!’ ANDREW ROBERTS, author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny OceanofPDF.com PRAISE FOR EIGHT HOURS FROM ENGLAND ‘Eight Hours from England is much more than a novel. Its author may be remembered today as a distinguished actor on stage and screen, but during the Second World War he had served gallantly as an officer in Britain’s elite Special Operations Executive, and this book, which first appeared in 1945, is a faithful evocation of his searing experiences in Nazi-occupied Albania after he was sent there to assist the Resistance.

One of the earliest accounts to be published by any ex-SOE officer, it remains a powerful study not only of the desperate dilemmas faced by occupied populations but also of the challenges faced by outsiders inclined to help.’ RODERICK BAILEY ‘I loved this book, and felt I was really there.’ LOUIS de BERNIERES ‘As well as being one of our greatest actors, Anthony Quayle was an intrepid war hero and his autobiographical novel is one of the greatest adventure stories of the Second World War.

Beautifully written and full of pathos and authenticity, it brings alive the terrible moral decisions that have to be taken by soldiers under unimaginable pressures in wartime.’ ANDREW ROBERTS, author of Churchill: Walking with Destiny OceanofPDF.com EIGHT HOURS FROM ENGLAND ANTHONY QUAYLE OceanofPDF.com About the Author Anthony Quayle (1913-1989) ANTHONY QUAYLE was a successful British actor and theatre director, well known for his roles in classic plays on the stage as well as his film career.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 0dbe612ac6c49f6d
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 1,383,198 bytes (1.319 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 229
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 433.88 minutes
• Total Words: 86,776
• Total Characters: 468,709
• Average Words per Page: 378.93
• Average Characters per Page: 2046.76

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