Ten Days That Shook My World

A powerful blend of WWII history and personal discovery, this memoir traces a son’s search for his father’s forgotten heroism in Ethiopia and the legacy it leaves today. In the darkest days of World War II, as Hitler’s forces converged on Moscow and the Imperial Japanese navy prepared its surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, a 24-year-old British sergeant took part in a rare and almost forgotten Allied victory. Ten Days That Shook My World: Searching for My Father in War-Torn Ethiopia, author Jonathan Wickham recounts how the discovery of an old photograph propels him on a journey to uncover the mystery of his father’s wartime experience. Years of painstaking research reveals that on November 27, 1941, Sgt. Wickham fought as a gunner with British forces who joined Ethiopian resistance fighters. Together, they drove Mussolini from Gondar, his last stronghold and Ethiopia’s old imperial capital, making it the first country liberated from the Axis Powers. The story culminates in the author’s own 10-day journey to Ethiopia in March 2023. The mountainous heartland that he begins scouring for evidence of World War II is only just emerging from a vicious new struggle. Ethiopia has fought a bloody civil war out of which has come a still fragile peace. For protection, he must hire guards armed with AK-47s as he drives and hikes the battle sites around Gondar—the first to do so in 80 years. But he’s rewarded with sharp glimpses of his father’s artillery unit fighting to free Gondar. On a bitterly contested ridge, Alemu, one of his guards and a soldier himself, movingly tells him, “Your father fought alongside our fathers that day.” The story also moves far beyond World War II. It explores Ethiopia today as well as the country’s earlier, equally riveting history—from monasteries on Lake Tana to imperial castles. Ultimately, this also becomes a story of self-discovery, a 10-day journey that ‘shook’ and profoundly changed the author’s own sense of identity and belonging.