Chapter 1 Summary

This chapter reads like "a day in the life of President Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt," except this particular day was a very important one.

On May 9, 1940, Hitler's armies attacked Britain, Holland, Luxembourg, Belgium, and France. Bombs fell on Brussels, Amsterdam, Chilham, and Rotterdam, then on the French cities of Dunkirk, Calais, and Metz.

Roosevelt was fifty-eight years old and had been President for seven years. He got the news from Europe at 11 p.m. and stayed up until 2 a.m. consulting with advisors and foreign leaders. The next morning, he met with General George Marshall, Navy Chief Admiral Harold Stark, Attorney General Robert Jackson, Secretary of Treasury Henry Morgenthau, Secretary of State Cordell Hull, and Undersecretary Sumner Welles. They discussed how ill-prepared the United States was for a war and that Germany had the most modern weapons in the world.

After the meeting...