The Face of Courage: The 98 Men Who Received the Knight's Cross and the Close-Combat Clasp in Gold

by Florian Berger

Profiles of the 98 German soldiers--out of millions--who received both the Knight's Cross (for extreme bravery) and the Close-Combat Clasp in Gold (for at least 50 days of hand-to-hand fighting) during World War II.

Genres: World War II, Military Fiction, War, Military History

627 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 1, 2009

Reviews

[JD · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very well researched book and written to the point about the 98 recipients of Nazi Germany's two highest awards for combat. Each man has his own chapter of about 4-5 pages complete with a picture so as to ad a face to a name, that covers their wartime service and events that lead to them being decorated with the Knight's Cross. Some of the profiles is more interesting than others.

Some interesting take outs from this book is that the large majority of the men were officers, and that most survived the war. The large part of the group also fought the Russians on the Eastern Front, with only a handful earning theirs fighting the western allies.

It is hard to imagine that only 98 men were so decorated as the German forces were almost in constant action, but the author does mention that tracking someone's close combat days, and how it was interpreted must have been difficult towards the end of the war, with the high amount of casualties. And also the award was only established end of 1942, by then much fighting has happened. It does not matter who's side these men were on, they truly were brave and would have received high honors in any other army of the time.

[Patrick Belair · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book that I happened upon on this site and it peaked my interest.So I ended up buying it at full price which I don't normally do, but any ways. It took me a time to read but was very much intrigued.The bio's were very blunt and to the point.It is the story of 98 men ,who weather you believe in the vision of the Fatherland or not,Put it on the line day in and day out.They fought for their country and for their survival.
They achieved more than was humanly possible under conditions we can only wonder about.LIKE THEM OR NOT THEY ARE HERO'S.

[Lesley Oddi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good read

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. It was very interesting to see the author's perspective on this issue. However I find his Audie Murphy usage for his argument a stretch.

[Jeff Cherpeski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kind of a choppy book, with 98 little chapters.