D-Day Hero: CSM Stanley Hollis VC Book

D-Day's only Victoria Cross winner, Company Sergeant Major Stanley Hollis was, uniquely, twice recommended for this coveted award on 6 June 1944. A tough Teesside, working-class rebel, Hollis was no model soldier. Earlier in the war he was forever being 'busted' to corporal for various misdemeanours, only to win his sergeant's stripes back again.

Few soldiers saw more close-quarter action than Hollis, who killed more than 100 enemy soldiers in combat during the Second World War. He served with the Green Howards at Dunkirk, in the Western Desert and in Sicily, as well as on D-Day, and led by example throughout the critical Normandy campaign. In North Africa, he was wounded and taken prisoner by the Afrika Korps and was personally congratulated by Rommel for his valour, then made a daring escape. In Sicily, he was recommended for the Distinguished Conduct Medal and Mentioned in Despatches for superlative acts of bravery.

D-Day saw Hollis create history with his inimitable brand of raw courage, being involved in two blistering VC actions. During the vanguard of the primary assault on Gold Beach, he single-handedly stormed a hidden German pillbox, saving his company from certain death and enabling them to open up the main beach exit. Later that day, he saved the lives of two more comrades trapped by heavy enemy gunfire.

Fully illustrated with rare archive photographs, this biography of a great British Second World War soldier shows the real man behind the heroic image. Mike Morgan has received the Hollis family's and The Green Howards' full cooperation and draws exclusively on personal papers, records, interviews and other memorabilia.