Judy’s uncanny ability to sense danger, matched with her quick wit and courage saved countless lives. Cherished and adored by the Allied servicemen, she fought to survive alongside them. Judy scavenged for food and helped to feed the starving inmates of the hellish POW camp and, by her presence, brought inspiration and hope to the prisoners.

As in the immortalized story of a parallel event told in the film The Bridge on the River Kwai, POWs were forced, under subhuman conditions, to build a 1,200-mile single-track railroad through the most horrifying jungles and treacherous mountain passes. After several worn-torn years of being bombed and shipwrecked, she ended up in a Japanese prisoner of war camp in North Sumatra along with American, Australian, and British POWs. Judy served as a mascot of the World War II Royal Navy Yangtze River gunboats the Gnat and the Grasshopper. Thrilling and deeply moving, their story will touch the heart of anyone who understands the bond that exists between one man and his dog.Damien Lewis, an award-winning British journalist who has spent twenty years reporting from war and conflict zones, uses his narrative skills to write the extraordinary and inspiriting tale of an English pointer named Judy. By the end of the war Robert and Ant had become very British war heroes, and Ant was justly awarded the Dickin Medal, the 'Animal VC'. Even then he refused to abandon his duty, waiting patiently beside the runway for his master's return from every sortie. Wounded repeatedly in action, shot, facing crash-landings and parachute bailouts, Ant was eventually grounded due to injury. In the months that followed the pair would save each other's lives countless times as they fled France and flew together with Bomber Command the puppy - which Robert named Ant - becoming the Squadron mascot along the way. Unable to desert his charge, he hid the dog inside his flying jacket as he made his escape. Airman Robert Bozdech stumbled across the tiny German Shepherd after being shot down during a daring mission over enemy lines. The other, a lost soul of a different sort - a Czech airman, flying for the French Air Force but soon to be bound for the RAF and the country that he would call home. One was an orphaned puppy, abandoned by his owners as they fled the approaching Nazi forces. In the winter of 1939 in the cold snow of no-man's-land, two loners met and began an extraordinary journey together, one that would bind them for the rest of their lives.

War dog by damien lewis