ILL Met by Moonlight by Moss, W. Stanley - 1950

London: George G. Harrap & Company. Good/Fair. 1950. Hard Cover. 8vo Fifth impression. Dust jacket large chunks missing to edges, unclipped, now in a clear protective sleeve. Original cloth boards with bright gilt titling on spine, some marks. Name on ffep. Photographs on plates. A few foxing spots mainly to page edges. 192 pages. On the 26th of April, 1 y44, Major-General Karl Kreipe of the 22nd Panzer Grenadier Division, Commander of the German forces on the island of Crete, left his H.Q. for his personal quarters a short distance away. But General Kreipe never arrived at his villa. Instead he rode in his car past twenty-two of his military posts, receiving full salutes from the guards-and with the gun of a kidnapper pressed closely into his side. His abduction will surely rank as the capture of the Second World War, and the exploit extracted the grudging admiration of the Germans, in addition to exciting the praise of the whole Allied Press. The expedition was led by Major "Paddy" Leigh-Fermor and the author (then -Captain Moss of the Coldstream Guards), and it was carried out mainly for its psychological effect on the enemy, in showing that their most exalted military men could not rest secure even when surrounded by their own forces. The British soldiers were accompanied by ten guerillas (including members of the Greek Andartes or Partisans). They laid their plans carefully, watching every movement of the General, and studying his day-to-day routine. The most perilous and exciting part of the operation was the transportation of the distinguished captive to Egypt once he had been taken, with the enraged Germans scouring the island in search of their General and his abductors. The photographs reproduced are of great interest in themselves, especially those taken in remote hideouts during the hazardous operations described. Ill Met by Moonlight has earned for its author a Fellowship of the United Services' Book Contest, and advance interest aroused in the book has been so great that the first already expanded printing has had to be supplemented by this second large impression before publication day. .