Philip Hamlyn Williams

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Dunkirk to D Day is to be launched next month, with the reveal of the book cover. It tells the story of the lives of those who led the RAOC supply of the army in WW2 Now under contract, is How Britain Created the Manufacturing World. This began as an exploration of the many companies […]

Some of the characters in Dunkirk to D Day – Jack Omond

Dunkirk to D Day is about some of the leaders of the RAOC who together achieved the astonishing supply success of the D Day landings. It follows the lives of some twenty men and one woman caught up in war. Most of the men served in two world wars, many came together on a course […]

How Britain Changed the Manufacturing World

I am thrilled that Pen & Sword have agreed to publish my latest work in progress, How Britain Changed the Manufacturing World. The peoples of the British Isles gave to the world the foundations on which modern manufacturing economies are built. This is quite an assertion, but history shows that, in the late eighteenth century, […]

VJ Day 75

The expectation of a long and gruelling land war against Japan was firmly in the minds of British soldiers fighting in the Forgotten Army, but also those wrestling with the massive problems of how such a war might be supplied. I wrote about this in the final chapter of my 2016 book, War on Wheels. Over […]

Dunkirk to D Day printer’s proof

The book is progressing well. Proof reading done. Index compiled. Foreword received (and it is lovely)

Dunkirk to D Day – progress

My forthcoming book, Dunkirk to D Day has gone through first proof stage at Pen & Sword. Very exciting. Can’t wait to see the cover design.

War on Wheels and Ordnance are still selling and a third volume is on the way

I had always hoped that War on Wheels and Ordnance would be of continuing interest. So it is heartening to see Amazon putting both back to full price, nearly four years after War on Wheels came out. Heartening too since the proof of third book, Dunkirk to D Day, has arrived from Pen & Sword, […]

The soldiers who supplied the army on D Day

Daily Telegraph journalist, Joe Shute, together with photographer, David Rose, visited me to explore my mother’s albums of my father’s war and preparation for D Day. Joe had read War on Wheels. They were both fascinated by what they found not least in terms of the numbers: people involved (250,000), items packed (350 million), vehicles and troops crossing to […]

VE Day 75 and the RAOC

The Controller of Ordnance Services, Bill Williams’s Victory message paid particular tribute to the non-regular officers, women of the ATS and civilians who worked so hard and well with regular officers and men. He welcomed the even closer links welded with the Ordnance Corps of the British Empire: India, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South […]

Changes in UK jobs over two centuries help to show what happened to British Industry

The table below was taken from data provided by the Office for National Statistics and shows the number of jobs split between Manufacturing (including Construction) [Orange line] and Services [Blue line] between 1978 and 2019 taking each quarterly return. Service sector jobs increased by 11 million and manufacturing reduced by 4.5 million. Looking at services […]

Philip Hamlyn Williams

Biographer

Dunkirk to D Day – my forthcoming book

War on Wheels

Ordnance

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