SOPOCKO, Eryk. 'Gentlemen, the Bismarck Has Been Sunk'
SOPOCKO, Eryk. ‘Gentlemen, the Bismarck Has Been Sunk’. With a foreword by Admiral Sir Martin E. Dunbar-Nasmith. London: Methuen. 1942. 8vo. First edition. Publisher’s green cloth lettered in yellow to the spine, in the dust jacket. With 12 half-tone plates. An about fine copy, the cloth clean and bright, the binding tight and square, the contents clean and fine throughout, with a few very minor spots to the textblock top edge. The dust jacket unclipped (5s net) and complete, very sharp with just a handful of minor marks and stains. A pleasing copy.
A depiction from an outsider ‘action with the British Fleet; a visit to Canada, to Iceland; the rescue of survivors of a Gneisenau victim. Then, an epic climax, the chase and sinking of the Bismarck’. A striking and important account of wartime naval life from the perspective of a talented Pole. Sopocko was born in 1919 and his first major taste of naval warfare came when serving on the ORP Orzel, a Polish submarine. On the outbreak of war, the sub came under German minesweeper attacks and fled to Tallinn, Estonia. Estonian officers interned the crew and planned to disarm the sub in accordance with the German authorities, but the Polish crew—Sopocko included—conspired, launching a daring escape to Britain. Sopocko wrote about this—aged just twenty—in his book, Orzel’s Patrol (1941). On his entry to the UK, he was assigned to HMS Rodney as a cadet—his aim was in essence to learn the ropes of the Royal Navy, then the most competent naval force in the world—and it is during this time the diary begins, culminating in the remarkable sinking of the Kriegsmarine’s Bismarck. Only a year after, Sopocko was serving on the Polish ORP Orkan when it was torpedoed by German subs, and the promising author perished, aged 24.
SOPOCKO, Eryk. ‘Gentlemen, the Bismarck Has Been Sunk’. With a foreword by Admiral Sir Martin E. Dunbar-Nasmith. London: Methuen. 1942. 8vo. First edition. Publisher’s green cloth lettered in yellow to the spine, in the dust jacket. With 12 half-tone plates. An about fine copy, the cloth clean and bright, the binding tight and square, the contents clean and fine throughout, with a few very minor spots to the textblock top edge. The dust jacket unclipped (5s net) and complete, very sharp with just a handful of minor marks and stains. A pleasing copy.
A depiction from an outsider ‘action with the British Fleet; a visit to Canada, to Iceland; the rescue of survivors of a Gneisenau victim. Then, an epic climax, the chase and sinking of the Bismarck’. A striking and important account of wartime naval life from the perspective of a talented Pole. Sopocko was born in 1919 and his first major taste of naval warfare came when serving on the ORP Orzel, a Polish submarine. On the outbreak of war, the sub came under German minesweeper attacks and fled to Tallinn, Estonia. Estonian officers interned the crew and planned to disarm the sub in accordance with the German authorities, but the Polish crew—Sopocko included—conspired, launching a daring escape to Britain. Sopocko wrote about this—aged just twenty—in his book, Orzel’s Patrol (1941). On his entry to the UK, he was assigned to HMS Rodney as a cadet—his aim was in essence to learn the ropes of the Royal Navy, then the most competent naval force in the world—and it is during this time the diary begins, culminating in the remarkable sinking of the Kriegsmarine’s Bismarck. Only a year after, Sopocko was serving on the Polish ORP Orkan when it was torpedoed by German subs, and the promising author perished, aged 24.
SOPOCKO, Eryk. ‘Gentlemen, the Bismarck Has Been Sunk’. With a foreword by Admiral Sir Martin E. Dunbar-Nasmith. London: Methuen. 1942. 8vo. First edition. Publisher’s green cloth lettered in yellow to the spine, in the dust jacket. With 12 half-tone plates. An about fine copy, the cloth clean and bright, the binding tight and square, the contents clean and fine throughout, with a few very minor spots to the textblock top edge. The dust jacket unclipped (5s net) and complete, very sharp with just a handful of minor marks and stains. A pleasing copy.
A depiction from an outsider ‘action with the British Fleet; a visit to Canada, to Iceland; the rescue of survivors of a Gneisenau victim. Then, an epic climax, the chase and sinking of the Bismarck’. A striking and important account of wartime naval life from the perspective of a talented Pole. Sopocko was born in 1919 and his first major taste of naval warfare came when serving on the ORP Orzel, a Polish submarine. On the outbreak of war, the sub came under German minesweeper attacks and fled to Tallinn, Estonia. Estonian officers interned the crew and planned to disarm the sub in accordance with the German authorities, but the Polish crew—Sopocko included—conspired, launching a daring escape to Britain. Sopocko wrote about this—aged just twenty—in his book, Orzel’s Patrol (1941). On his entry to the UK, he was assigned to HMS Rodney as a cadet—his aim was in essence to learn the ropes of the Royal Navy, then the most competent naval force in the world—and it is during this time the diary begins, culminating in the remarkable sinking of the Kriegsmarine’s Bismarck. Only a year after, Sopocko was serving on the Polish ORP Orkan when it was torpedoed by German subs, and the promising author perished, aged 24.