Dispatches and Dictators

Oregon Book Award Winner for General Nonfiction

Dispatches and Dictators uncovers the fascinating story of Oregon native Ralph Barnes, the New York Herald Tribune’s European correspondent, who served in Paris, Rome, Moscow, Berlin, and London in the years between the two world wars. Barnes has been praised by colleagues and competitors alike as one of the best reporters of that pivotal era. But since his death in the 1940 crash of a British bomber in Yugoslavia, he has been largely forgotten.

With persistence and unusually keen insight, Ralph Barnes reported on Fascism, Communism, Nazism, and the events leading to World War II. Stalin confined Barnes to Moscow for disclosing that millions were dying during the Soviet collectivization of agriculture, and Hitler expelled Barnes from Germany for predicting the Nazi attack on the Soviet Union.

In Dispatches and Dictators, historian Barbara Mahoney chronicles the short life and brilliant career of Ralph Barnes. Her biography of this extraordinary reporter provides new insights into the tumultuous decade leading up to World War II.