On May 8 1945, forty-six-year-old Drum Major Jackson staggered towards his American liberators. Emaciated, dressed in rags, his decayed boots held together with string, hed been force-marched for twenty days over the Austrian Alps after five heinous years as a POW in Nazi labour camps.
He collapsed into his liberators arms, clinging to his only meaningful possessionhis war diary. Having already experienced the horrific nature of battle in the First World War, Jackson had now survived another Warunlike hundreds of his mates, whod succumbed to disease, insanity, or had been killed in action. Men far younger than he. But he could never have imagined what awaited him on the home front.A captivating testament to human endurance, Jacksons diary and photos, one of the last such memoirs to be published, is the inspiration for The Music Maker. An unforgettable and gripping true story about the life and times of a humble man who, through his passion for music, overcame extreme adversity.
