Behind Enemy Lines with Damien Lewis

Damien Lewis is at the National Army Museum on Wednesday 21 October, talking about his book Behind Enemy Lines. It's a talk that sits right in the museum's wheelhouse: a first-hand account of the Long Range Desert Group operating deep behind enemy lines in North Africa during the Second World War.

The book centres on Captain Lewis 'Archie' Gibson, and Lewis has built it from a proper archive of the man's life. He's worked through Gibson's unpublished memoir, diaries, sketchbooks, letters and wartime reports, and brought in previously unseen classified material to piece together what Gibson actually went through as a driver with the LRDG. It's the kind of story that works better when you can hear it told than when you're just reading it on a page.

There's a particular moment from Gibson's first taste of desert warfare in 1940 that sums up the kind of thing Lewis covers. Under fire from a German 88mm gun, Gibson leapt from his speeding vehicle moments before it was torn apart. He christened his next one 'Wha Daur', after the Scottish ballad 'Who Dares Meddle with Me?' — a name that fits the LRDG's way of working pretty well.

Lewis is well-placed to tell it. He's a Sunday Times bestselling author and journalist who's spent years writing about the Second World War, selling several million copies of his books in 40 countries. He's also worked as a war and conflict reporter for some of the world's major broadcasters, so he knows his way around a conflict zone. His previous titles include The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, SAS Band of Brothers, SAS Brothers in Arms and SAS Daggers Drawn, and Behind Enemy Lines follows that same thread of special operations and soldiers operating far from the main front.

The talk runs from 6.30pm to 7.30pm on Wednesday 21 October at the National Army Museum in London. Tickets are £20, or £16 for members.