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Due to Enemy Action
Due to Enemy Action tells for the first time a World War II story that spans generations and straddles two centuries, a story that begins with the dramatic Battle of the Atlantic in the 1940s and doesn't conclude until an emotional Purple Heart ceremony in 2002. Based on previously classified government documents, military records, personal interviews, and letters between crew members and their families, this is the saga of the courageous survival of ordinary sailors when their ship was torpedoed and their shipmates were killed on April 23, 1945, and the memories that haunted them after the U.S. Navy buried the truth at war's end. It is the story of a small subchaser, the Eagle 56, caught in the crosshairs of a German U-boat, the U-853, whose brazen commander doomed his own crew in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to record final kills before his country's imminent defeat. And it is the account of how one man, Paul M. Lawton, embarked on an unrelenting quest for the truth and changed naval history.Author Stephen Puleo draws from extensive personal interviews with all the major players, including the three living survivors (and a fourth who emerged as the book went to press); a senior U.S. naval archivist who worked with German historians after the war to catalog U-boat movements; and the son of the man who commanded America's sub-tracking "Secret Room" during the war. Due to Enemy Action also describes the final chapter in the Battle of the Atlantic, tracing the epic struggle that began with shocking U-boat attacks against hundreds of defenseless merchant ships off American shores in 1942 and ended with the sinking of the Eagle 56, the last American warship sunk by a German U-boat.Read less
404 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 23, 2012
About the author
Stephen Puleo
9Ìýbooks110ÌýfollowersStephen Puleo is an author, historian, teacher, public speaker, and communications professional. His eighth book, The Great Abolitionist: Charles Sumner and the Fight for a More Perfect Union, was published by St. Martin’s Press in April, 2024.
Follow Steve on Facebook () and Instagram () or visit his website () for current news and events.
Steve's previously published books are:
� Voyage of Mercy: The USS Jamestown, the Irish Famine, and the Remarkable Story of America’s First Humanitarian Mission (2020)
� American Treasures: The Secret Efforts to Save the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysburg Address (2016)
� The Caning: The Assault That Drove America to Civil War (2012)
� A City So Grand: The Rise of an American Metropolis, Boston 1850-1900 (2010)
� The Boston Italians: A Story of Pride, Perseverance and Paesani, from the Years of the Great Immigration to the Present Day (2007)
� Due to Enemy Action: The True World War II Story of the USS Eagle 56 (2005)
� Dark Tide: The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919 (2003)
All of Steve’s books have been Boston regional bestsellers and have received national recognition. His work has been reviewed favorably by the Wall Street Journal, the New Yorker, the Boston Globe, the New York Post, Parade magazine, The National Review, Forbes.com, C-SPAN, the Associated Press, the Portland Press Herald, the Providence Journal, the Hartford Courant, Kirkus Reviews, Barnes and Noble Review.com, Library Journal, Booklist, History.com, and Publishers Weekly. Numerous national media outlets have interviewed Steve, including NBC, the New York Times, Parade magazine, History.com, C-SPAN, the History Channel, the Associated Press, and regional and national radio and television outlets.
An experienced, dynamic, and in-demand speaker and presenter, Steve has made nearly 700 appearances before thousands of readers � including bookstore signings, keynote addresses, library presentations, historical societies, industry events, book clubs, and appearances at universities and public and private schools. His showcase appearances include: speaking events at both the National Archives and the National Constitution Center; as a keynote for the 150th Anniversary Celebration of the Massachusetts Superior Court; and as a participant with Italian-American and Jewish-American scholars on a panel entitled, Italy and the Holocaust, presented at UMass-Boston. If you would like more information about having Steve appear at your event, please contact him at [email protected].
A former award-winning newspaper reporter and contributor of articles and book reviews to publications and organizations that include American History magazine, Politico, the Boston Globe, and the Bill of Rights Institute, Steve has also taught history at Suffolk University in Boston and at UMass-Boston. He has developed and taught numerous writing workshops for high school and college students, as well as for adults who aspire to be writers. His books have been woven into the curricula of numerous high schools and colleges, and more than 30 communities have selected his books as “community-wide reads.� Steve also conducts book-club tours of Boston’s North End, one of the nation’s most historic neighborhoods.
Steve holds a master’s degree in history from UMass-Boston, where he received the Dean’s Award for Academic Achievement and was the Graduate Convocation keynote speaker. His master’s thesis, From Italy to Boston’s North End: Italian Immigration and Settlement, 1890-1910, has been downloaded nearly 30,000 times by scholars and readers around the world.
Steve and his wife Kate live south of Boston and donate a portion of his book proceeds to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF).
Follow Steve on Facebook () and Instagram () or visit his website () for current news and events.
Steve's previously published books are:
� Voyage of Mercy: The USS Jamestown, the Irish Famine, and the Remarkable Story of America’s First Humanitarian Mission (2020)
� American Treasures: The Secret Efforts to Save the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Gettysburg Address (2016)
� The Caning: The Assault That Drove America to Civil War (2012)
� A City So Grand: The Rise of an American Metropolis, Boston 1850-1900 (2010)
� The Boston Italians: A Story of Pride, Perseverance and Paesani, from the Years of the Great Immigration to the Present Day (2007)
� Due to Enemy Action: The True World War II Story of the USS Eagle 56 (2005)
� Dark Tide: The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919 (2003)
All of Steve’s books have been Boston regional bestsellers and have received national recognition. His work has been reviewed favorably by the Wall Street Journal, the New Yorker, the Boston Globe, the New York Post, Parade magazine, The National Review, Forbes.com, C-SPAN, the Associated Press, the Portland Press Herald, the Providence Journal, the Hartford Courant, Kirkus Reviews, Barnes and Noble Review.com, Library Journal, Booklist, History.com, and Publishers Weekly. Numerous national media outlets have interviewed Steve, including NBC, the New York Times, Parade magazine, History.com, C-SPAN, the History Channel, the Associated Press, and regional and national radio and television outlets.
An experienced, dynamic, and in-demand speaker and presenter, Steve has made nearly 700 appearances before thousands of readers � including bookstore signings, keynote addresses, library presentations, historical societies, industry events, book clubs, and appearances at universities and public and private schools. His showcase appearances include: speaking events at both the National Archives and the National Constitution Center; as a keynote for the 150th Anniversary Celebration of the Massachusetts Superior Court; and as a participant with Italian-American and Jewish-American scholars on a panel entitled, Italy and the Holocaust, presented at UMass-Boston. If you would like more information about having Steve appear at your event, please contact him at [email protected].
A former award-winning newspaper reporter and contributor of articles and book reviews to publications and organizations that include American History magazine, Politico, the Boston Globe, and the Bill of Rights Institute, Steve has also taught history at Suffolk University in Boston and at UMass-Boston. He has developed and taught numerous writing workshops for high school and college students, as well as for adults who aspire to be writers. His books have been woven into the curricula of numerous high schools and colleges, and more than 30 communities have selected his books as “community-wide reads.� Steve also conducts book-club tours of Boston’s North End, one of the nation’s most historic neighborhoods.
Steve holds a master’s degree in history from UMass-Boston, where he received the Dean’s Award for Academic Achievement and was the Graduate Convocation keynote speaker. His master’s thesis, From Italy to Boston’s North End: Italian Immigration and Settlement, 1890-1910, has been downloaded nearly 30,000 times by scholars and readers around the world.
Steve and his wife Kate live south of Boston and donate a portion of his book proceeds to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF).
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