Recommended Reading

The History of the 487th Bomb Group (H) — Ivo de Jong
The definitive history of the Group, published by Turner Publishing and available through the 487th Bomb Group Association. A large-format hardback of 328 pages, lavishly illustrated with over 500 photographs of the men, aircraft, and operations of the 487th. Covers the full story from activation in Nebraska through to inactivation in Florida in November 1945. Essential reading for anyone with a personal connection to the Group. Available through the 487th BG Association website.

Photo History of the 487th Bomb Group (H)
A photographic record of the Group, personally signed by Lee Hauenstein. Based at Lavenham, Suffolk, covering both the B-24 and B-17 periods. Available through East Anglia Books — a specialist dealer in USAAF unit histories based in Suffolk. A rare and sought-after volume.

The War Years — Irving Schreiber
A personal account by Lt Irving Schreiber, navigator in the Zisk crew of the 839th Squadron, describing his time at Lavenham and his combat missions with the 487th. One of the few firsthand personal accounts from a member of the Group. Available through the 487th BG Association.

The Deadly Skies / Isaiah’s Eagles Rising — Bernard “Barney” Nolan
A personal and historical account of the 487th’s operations from a member who served with the Group at Lavenham. Available through the 487th BG Association website alongside other Group-specific titles.

Action Stations 1: Wartime Military Airfields of East Anglia 1939–1945 — Michael Bowyer
The standard reference work on every wartime airfield in East Anglia, covering their construction, use, and current state. Lavenham — Station 137 — is covered alongside the dozens of surrounding stations that made this region the most densely packed air base concentration in history. Invaluable for anyone wanting to understand the landscape the 487th inhabited. First published 1979; later editions available secondhand.

One Last Look: A Sentimental Journey to the Eighth Air Force Heavy Bomber Bases of World War II in England — Philip Kaplan & Rex Alan Smith
A beautifully produced photographic journey to the surviving sites of 8th Air Force airfields across England, combining wartime photographs with images of the same locations as they appeared decades later. Captures the melancholy and the lingering presence of the American bases better than any other book of its kind. Highly recommended for visitors to Lavenham who want to understand what they are looking at.

Army Air Forces Stations — Barry Anderson (1985)
The reference work on every USAAF station in England, covering construction, designation, units assigned, and post-war history. A dry but invaluable reference used by researchers and cited by the American Air Museum. Best used alongside Bowyer’s Action Stations for a complete picture of the East Anglian base network.

Masters of the Air: America’s Bomber Boys Who Fought the Air War Against Nazi Germany — Donald L. Miller
The book that inspired the Apple TV+ series of the same name. Focuses primarily on the 100th Bomb Group — the 487th’s sister group in the 3rd Air Division — but covers the broader story of the 8th Air Force’s daylight bombing campaign with exceptional narrative drive and human depth. Essential background reading for anyone visiting any East Anglian airfield. Widely available in paperback.

A Wing and a Prayer: The ‘Bloody 100th’ Bomb Group — Harry H. Crosby
The memoir of the 100th Bomb Group’s Group Navigator, covering the devastating losses suffered by the Bloody Hundredth in 1943 and 1944. One of the finest personal accounts of heavy bomber operations from East Anglia — written from the inside, with the clarity of a man who understood exactly what was happening around him. The 100th flew from Thorpe Abbotts, Norfolk, approximately 30 miles from Lavenham.

The Schweinfurt-Regensburg Mission — Martin Middlebrook
A meticulous reconstruction of the catastrophic double mission of 17 August 1943 — before the 487th arrived at Lavenham, but the mission that demonstrated both the power and the terrible vulnerability of the unescorted daylight bombing campaign. Middlebrook’s method of following individual crews through the mission makes for compulsive reading. A model of military history writing.

Twelve O’Clock High — Beirne Lay Jr. & Sy Bartlett
The novel — and later film — written partly by Beirne Lay Jr., the 487th’s first combat commanding officer, drawing on his own experiences flying heavy bombers from English bases. Lay was shot down on one of the 487th’s earliest missions in May 1944, evaded capture, and returned to duty. The fictional 918th Bomb Group in the story draws heavily on real events from East Anglian airfields including Lavenham. Available secondhand.

The Mighty Eighth: A History of the Units, Men and Machines of the US 8th Air Force — Roger A. Freeman
The book that gave the Eighth Air Force its enduring nickname. Written by Roger Freeman, who as a boy watched 8th Air Force formations assemble over his father’s Suffolk farm and spent the rest of his life chronicling what he saw. The definitive single-volume reference work covering every group, wing, and command of the Eighth — unit histories, aircraft, markings, commanders, statistics. The 487th appears throughout. Revised edition widely available. No serious reader of this subject should be without it.

The Mighty Eighth War Diary — Roger A. Freeman
The companion volume to Freeman’s main history, presenting a day-by-day chronological record of every 8th Air Force mission from 1942 to 1945. Allows the reader to look up any individual date — including every date in the 487th’s mission log — and see the broader context of what was happening across the entire Eighth that day. An invaluable reference for researchers and an extraordinary document in its own right.

The Mighty Eighth War Manual — Roger A. Freeman
The third volume of Freeman’s trilogy, covering the operational methods, equipment, armament, and installations of the Eighth Air Force. Explains in detail how the missions were planned, how the formations were built, what the aircraft carried, and how the bases were organised. Essential for understanding what the men of the 487th were actually doing and how.

Airfields of the Eighth: Then and Now — Roger A. Freeman & After the Battle
A photographic comparison of Eighth Air Force airfields as they were in wartime and as they appeared when the book was published. Lavenham is included. Allows readers visiting the site today to compare what they see with the original wartime layout. Available secondhand.

Bomber Offensive — Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris
The memoir of the man who commanded RAF Bomber Command from 1942 until the end of the war — written soon after the armistice with characteristic bluntness and no apology. Harris describes how he built Bomber Command from a demoralised and ineffective force into the weapon that devastated Germany’s cities. Essential primary source reading, not least because it reveals the fundamental differences in doctrine and approach between the RAF’s night area bombing campaign and the USAAF’s daylight precision campaign that were being conducted simultaneously from East Anglian airfields.

Bomber Harris: His Life and Times — Air Commodore Henry Probert
The comprehensive biography of Sir Arthur Harris, drawing on his personal papers. Covers his full life from youth in Rhodesia through WWI and the interwar years to the command of Bomber Command. Probert’s account is detailed, critical but fair, and essential for understanding the strategic debates that shaped how the bombing campaign was fought from East Anglia. Well regarded as the most thorough treatment of Harris in print.

The Bomber War: Arthur Harris and the Allied Bomber Offensive 1939–1945 — Robin Neillands
A balanced examination of the entire Allied bombing campaign — both RAF and USAAF — covering doctrine, technology, command decisions, and the enduring moral debate about area bombing. Particularly good on the relationship and friction between Harris and the American commanders, whose approach at times differed sharply. Neillands does not shy from the controversy but gives both sides a fair hearing.

Bomber — Len Deighton
A novel, but one that demands inclusion here. Deighton reconstructs a single RAF bombing raid — from the East Anglian airfields where the Lancasters are prepared, to the target in Germany, to the families of the men involved — following every perspective simultaneously. The result is arguably the finest piece of fiction about the air war ever written. Anthony Burgess rated it one of the 99 best novels in English since 1939. Set in 1943, it illuminates exactly the kind of night operations that were taking place from East Anglian airfields while the 487th’s predecessors were still training in Nebraska.

With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa — Eugene B. Sledge
Not an air war book — but widely regarded as the finest American WWII memoir in print. Recommended here as an example of the quality of personal writing that emerges from primary sources, and as a reminder that the airmen of the 487th were part of a generation whose experience of war deserves the same careful attention that Sledge brought to his own service. Reading the best of the genre raises the standard for how we approach all personal testimonies.

Flying Fortress: The Illustrated Biography of the B-17s and the Men Who Flew Them — Edward Jablonski
A comprehensive illustrated account of the Boeing B-17, the aircraft with which the 487th flew its most significant missions from Lavenham. Covers the aircraft’s development, combat record, and the experiences of the crews who flew it — including many veterans of East Anglian operations. A useful companion to the Group histories.