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Among the allied troops that came ashore in Normandy on D-Day, June 6, 1944, were thirteen Comanches in the 4th Infantry Division, 4th Signal Company. Under German fire they laid communications lines and began sending messages in a form never before heard in Europe—coded Comanche. For the rest of World War II, the Comanche Code Talkers played a vital role in transmitting orders and messages in a code that was never broken by the Germans.

This book tells the full story of the Comanche Code Talkers for the first time. Drawing on interviews with all surviving members of the unit, their original training officer, and fellow soldiers, as well as military records and news accounts, William C. Meadows follows the group from their recruitment and training to their active duty in World War II and on through their postwar lives up to the present. He also provides the first comparison of Native American code talking programs, comparing the Comanche Code Talkers with their better-known Navajo counterparts in the Pacific and with other Native Americans who used their languages, coded or not, for secret communication. Meadows sets this history in a larger discussion of the development of Native American code talking in World Wars I and II, identifying two distinct forms of Native American code talking, examining the attitudes of the American military toward Native American code talkers, and assessing the complex cultural factors that led Comanche and other Native Americans to serve their country in this way.

An updated edition of a popular study of the Comanche Code Talkers of WWII.

Among the Allied troops who came ashore in Normandy on D-Day were thirteen Comanches in the 4th Infantry Division’s 4th Signal Company. Under German fire they laid communications lines and sent messages in a form never before heard in Europe: coded Comanche. For the rest of World War II, the Comanche Code Talkers played a vital role transmitting orders in a code the Germans never broke. Drawing on interviews with surviving members of the unit, their training officer, and fellow soldiers, as well as archival records, William C. Meadows traces the Comanche Code Talkers from recruitment and training through wartime service and into their postwar lives. He also places their story within the broader history of Native American code talking in the world wars, comparing the Comanche program with the better-known Navajo Code Talkers and examining the military’s use of Native languages for secure communication.

This twenty-fifth anniversary edition adds a new chapter and photographs documenting long-overdue recognition for the Comanche Code Talkers, in the form of congressional medals, museum exhibits, films, and memorials, along with updates in several areas that clarify the development of code talking, add key details of the unit’s history, and highlight the enduring legacy of these soldiers and their linguistic contribution to Allied victory.