Unknown Valor

A Story of Family, Courage, and Sacrifice from Pearl Harbor to Iwo Jima

Martha MacCallum, Ronald J. Drez

• Publisher: Harper
• Year: 2020
• eBook ISBN:
  9780062853875
• Print ISBN:
  9780062853868
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies

New York Times Bestseller. The popular primetime Fox News anchor pays tribute to the heroic Americans who sacrificed everything at Iwo Jima during WWII.
Admiral Chester Nimitz spoke of the "uncommon valor" of the men who fought on Iwo Jima, one of the bloodiest and most brutal battles of World War II. In thirty-six grueling days, nearly 7,000 Marines were killed and 22,000 were wounded.
Martha MacCallum takes us from Pearl Harbor to Iwo Jima through the lives of these men of valor, among them Harry Gray, a member of her own family.
In Unknown Valor, she weaves their stories—from Boston, Massachusetts, to Gulfport, Mississippi, as told through letters and recollections—into the larger history of what American military leaders rightly saw as an eventual showdown in the Pacific with Japan. In a relentless push through the jungles of Guadalcanal, over the coral reefs of Tarawa, past the bloody ridge of Peleliu, against the banzai charges of Guam, and to the cliffs of Saipan, these men were on a path that ultimately led to the black sands of Iwo Jima, the doorstep of the Japanese Empire.
Meticulously researched, heart-wrenching, and illuminating, Unknown Valor reveals the sacrifices of ordinary Marines who saved the world from tyranny and left indelible marks on those back home who loved them.
"Even though we all know how the war ends, what we gain from the book is a deeper appreciation for the scope and scale of the patriotism, dreams, and heartache that lived on. Unknown Valor is a triumph." —Dana Perino, #1 New York Times–bestselling author

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Map
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Contents
• Introduction: War Plan Orange
• Prologue: Peekskill, 1971
• 1. Arlington, Massachusetts, 1938
• 2. Infamy
• 3. Outrage
• 4. The Changing Tide
• 5. What Hirohito Knew
• 6. The First Step: Say a Prayer for Your Pal on Guadalcanal
• 7. 1943
• 8. Cracking the Inner Ring
• 9. Willing to Fight
• 10. D-Day: From Normandy to Saipan
• 11. Japan’s Doorstep
• 12. “A Ghastly Relentlessness”
• 13. “An Island of Sulphur: No Water, No Sparrow, and No Swallow”
• 14. “Hell with the Fire Out”
• 15. The Badlands
• Epilogue
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Photo Section
• About the Authors
• Copyright
• About the Publisher