Drive

Kirkus Review These private papers reveal many different aspects of a public figure, for the author was Patton's aide-de-camp for three years, 1942-1945, and so knew him during exciting, trying, active and waiting times, saw him as a person as well as an officer and lived with him with admiration that grew into reverence. Godman, whose business was wines and real estate, who had been in the Air Force in WWI, was whisked out of the retread class when he was attached to the Western Task Force (Operation Torch), knew Fedala, Casablanca, Rabat, the conference at Hotel in liaison work; with Patton he went through the invasion of Sicily, on to England and then France where waiting for the Third Army to become fully operational in the invasion created a merry hell. On to Paris and then frustration when they were kept a defensive arm, but finally the Bulge, the Rhine and Germany. Throughout, the magnetic field of Patton's personality and capabilities, his leadership and high voltage behavior are revealed, as are the emotion and commotion he aroused; throughout the tempo and feel of the war, military strategy and delicate policy questions become part of these letters to Codman's wife at home. He plays back for her scenes of meetings with transatlantic relatives and friends, incidents of his travels with Patton, episodes in action and at rest, that shade from humor to violence, from anger to moments of despair. A book that need not depend on Patton's name alone for here is an illumined, informed and intimate war diary.