With the fall of Singapore to the Japanee in February, 1942, the Allies lost more men than at Dunkirk. Most of these men were taken, under the most terrible conditions, to the prison camps in Thailand where they were forced to build a system of road and railway through the jungle from Bankok to Moulmein.

This is one man's account of the privations and hardships suffered by these men during their captivity. Thousands of men died of dysentry, malaria and cholera during the construction of this railway, every sleeper of which cost a man's life.

Their pride and their courage made the long, endless years of captivity into a feat of unimaginable fortitude. The misery and inhuman atrocities they endured during those years were worse than anything else in the entire history of war. As a novel, this book is an indication of the heights to which the spirit of man can rise in the face of adversity; and a condemnation of a whole race of people.

At dawn, on November 18th, 1941, the British attacked against Rommel's positions west of the Egyptian frontier and achieved complete surprise. The Tobruk garrison was to break out south-east, and link up with the advancing columns. The next day, the vital Sidi Rezegh area had been taken, only to be recaptured by the enemy two days later. The advance from Tobruk had come unstuck and Rommel was on the offensive. Then swinging in against the rear of the New-Zealand forces who had pushed beyond Gambut, he was worsted in a tank battle which forced him to retreat. The link up with the Tobruk defenders was successful.

This is the dramatic story of this battle. Of the New-Zealand division which hurled back Rommel's troops and tanks in a rain of steel, refusing to yield an inch of ground, and of the subsequent advance and retreat as Rommel burst out of the El Agheila position and began the long advance which was to carry him to El Alamein and the borders of Egypt.

Throughout the whole of this desert campaign, the men of the New-Zealand division wrote, in blood and steel, one of the most heroic chapters in their long and glorious history.