The World at War is the definitive television work on the Second World War. It set out to tell the story of the war through the testimony of key participants – from civilians to ordinary soldiers, from statesmen to generals. First broadcast in 1973, the result was a unique and irreplaceable record since many of the eyewitnesses captured on film did not have long to live.

The programme’s producers committed hundreds of interview-hours to tape in its creation, but only a fraction of that recorded material made it to the final cut. For more than 30 years the interviews have never been allowed to be published – until now.

The well-known names interviewed for the series include Albert Speer, Karl Wolff (Himmler’s adjutant), Traudl Junge (Hitler’s secretary), James Stewart (USAAF bomber pilot and Hollywood star), Anthony Eden, John Colville (Parliamentary Private Secretary to Winston Churchill), Averell Harriman (US Ambassador to Russia) and Arthur ‘Bomber’ Harris (Head of RAF Bomber Command).

Highly respected historian and bestselling author Richard Holmes has skilfully woven this valuable original material into a compelling narrative, creating a truly phenomenal oral history of the Second World War.