Colin Burgess

From the author of bestselling Sisters in Captivity, seven remarkable stories of men who served from WWI to Korea – their wartime exploits and achievements through aviation. Based on personal interviews conducted by the author over many years, Australia’s Aviation Heroes celebrates the achievements of extraordinary men in extraordinary times. Meet Jack Treacy, the WWI fighter pilot who came perilously...

The incredible account of Sister Betty Jeffrey OAM and the Australian war nurses who survived the bombing of evacuation ship SS Vyner Brooke in February 1942, and subsequently spent three years in Japanese prison camps in Sumatra. During those perilous years surviving in squalid conditions, Sister Jeffrey kept a secret diary of day-to-day events which, after the war, was turned...

The Diggers of Colditz takes you inside Colditz Castle, Nazi Germany’s infamous ‘escape-proof’ wartime prison, where hundreds of the most determined and resourceful Allied prisoners were sent. Despite having more guards than inmates, Australian Lieutenant Jack Champ and other prisoners tirelessly carried out their campaign to escape from the massive floodlit stronghold... by any means necessary. In this riveting account—by...

A truly comprehensive account of 617 Squadron, RAF, who carried out one of the most dangerous and audacious aerial bombing raids of World War II. It was the evening of 16 May 1943. Nineteen modified Lancaster bombers from 617 Squadron RAF, under the command of youthful Wing Commander Guy Gibson, roared into the night sky from their Lincolnshire base. They...

The harrowing story of the Allied airmen who experienced the true horrors of Nazism firsthand. It was the summer of 1944, as liberating Allied forces surged towards Paris following the D-Day landings. For a large group of downed airmen held in the city’s infamous Fresnes Prison, they were about to face evacuation into the blackest, bloody heart of Germany and...

In this deeply researched chronology, Colin Burgess describes the Soviet Union's extraordinary success in the pioneering years of space exploration. Within a decade, the Soviets not only launched the world's first satellite but were the first to send an animal and a human being into Earth orbit. More than that, their ground-breaking missions sent a woman into space, launched a...

The space race was perhaps the greatest technological contest of the 20th century. It was a thrilling era of innovation, discovery, and exploration, as astronauts and cosmonauts were launched on space missions of increasing length, complexity, and danger. The Greatest Adventure traces the events of this extraordinary period, describing the initial string of Soviet achievements: the first satellite in orbit;...

The heroic accounts of Australian Army Nursing Sisters Margaret Anderson and Vera Torney who survived the perilous evacuation of Singapore in 1942. The nursing profession is one historically filled with everyday heroes; men and women engaged in challenging work that can often prove the difference between life and death. Nursing Sisters Margaret Anderson and Vera Torney of the 2/13th Australian...

The incredible account of Sister Betty Jeffrey OAM and the Australian war nurses who survived the bombing of evacuation ship SS Vyner Brooke in February 1942, and subsequently spent three years in Japanese prison camps in Sumatra. During those perilous years surviving in squalid conditions, Sister Jeffrey kept a secret diary of day-to-day events which, after the war, was turned...