Harvey Solomon

Such Splendid Prisons (eBook, ePUB)

Diplomatic Detainment in America during World War II

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

2021 Independent Publisher Book Awards, Silver Medal Winner 2020-21 Reader Views Literary Awards Bronze Medal Winner In the chaotic days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Roosevelt administration made a dubious decision affecting hundreds of Axis diplomats remaining in the nation's capital. To encourage reciprocal treatment of U.S. diplomats trapped abroad, Roosevelt sent Axis diplomats to remote luxury hotels-a move that enraged Americans stunned by the attack. This cause célèbre drove a fascinating yet forgotten story: the roundup, detention, and eventual repatriation of more than a thousand German, Japanese, Italian, Bulgarian, and Hungarian diplomats, families, staff, servants, journalists, students, businessmen, and spies.Such Splendid Prisons follows five of these internees whose privileged worlds came crashing down after December 7, 1941: a suave, calculating Nazi ambassador and his charming but conflicted wife; a wily veteran Japanese journalist; a beleaguered American wife of a Japanese spy posing as a diplomat; and a spirited but naive college-aged daughter of a German military attaché. The close, albeit luxurious, proximity in which these Axis power emissaries were forced to live with each other stripped away the veneer of false prewar diplomatic bonhomie. Conflicts ran deep not only among the captives but also among the rival U.S. agencies overseeing a detainment fraught with uncertainty, duplicity, lust, and romance. Harvey Solomon re-creates this wartime American period of deluxe detention, public outrage, hidden agendas, rancor and racism, and political machinations in a fascinating but forgotten story.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Potomac Books
• Erscheinungstermin: 1. Januar 2020
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781640122871
• Artikelnr.: 72428129

Autorenporträt

Harvey Solomon is a freelance writer based in Washington, DC. He is the author of three nonfiction books, including Book of Days: ’60s: A Day-by-Day Look at the Pop Culture Moments That Made History. He has written articles for dozens of publications, including the Boston Herald, the Los Angeles Times, the Hollywood Reporter, and Variety.   

Inhaltsangabe

List of Illustrations
Dramatis Personae
Author’s Note
Prologue
1. On the Diplomatic Front Lines
2. Rivals and Arrivals
3. Soirees to Spies
4. Inactive Vigilance
5. Reverberations of War
6. Isolation versus Intervention
7. War Wary
8. Full Speed Ahead
9. Executing an Exodus
10. Fenced Inn
11. Moving Daze
12. (Not So) Happy New Year
13. Watched While Waiting
14. Quiet Desperation
15. Life at the Homestead
16. “But Still They Complain . . .”
17. Twice Removed
18. A Feud Renewed
19. Homeward, Unbound
20. Perplexing Passage East
21. Home Aghast
22. Vichyswap
23. Last Grasp
Afterword
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index