Duel in The Mist

Duel in the Mist is the first volume in a series of books examining the involvement of the 1st. SS Panzer Division 'Leibstandarte' in the Ardennes offensive, and focuses on Kampfgruppe Peiper's drive through American lines and ultimate reversal outside the village of Stoumont on the 19th of December 1944.

The written account is based on after action reports by the units involved and numerous interviews with veterans of both sides to provide a ground level perspective of the events which led up to and resulted from the failure of KG Peiper. The text is supported through the collection and painstaking analysis of thousands of images from diverse sources. Of the 127 photos in this book, over half are published for the first time but all are placed in their correct historical, chronological and geographical context. The photos are reproduced in large format to maximize their usefulness to the reader and multiple views of many of the wrecked Panthers are included.

In addition, over the course of the project the detailed scrutiny of hundreds of images of Panthers has enabled the authors, in consultation with Tom Jentz and Hilary Doyle, to present for the first time a concise and authoritative analysis of the relationship between the assembly plants and the camouflage patterns applied to the tanks they produced. The resulting color profiles are the most accurate presented to date, and provide a most useful tool in determining the origin of almost any individual Panther of the late war period.