The latest two issues of "Malta at War" provide a spectacular record of the arrival of the Luftwaffe in Sicily in January 1941 and of the assault on H.M.S. Illustrious at sea off Malta, while escorting a convoy to Malta, and in Grand Harbour where she sought refuge.

This is perhaps the most extensive account of that dramatic episode in the Second World War so far published, complementing other stories of the blitz such as Charles J. Boffa's book.

This is the first time that such extensive pictorial coverage has been given to what was such a traumatic period in the island's ordeal under fire. It was also a turning point of the war in the Mediterranean as Hitler came south to the rescue of his partner Mussolini.

A sequence of photographs taken from the carrier under attack at sea illustrate the ferocity and daring of the dive-bombing and the dramatic pictures of the carrier under assault in Grand Harbour show the determination of the Luftwaffe to sink her.

But these photographs are also a record of the death and destruction that ravaged the harbour area, in particular Senglea and Vittoriosa. Many people were killed under the rubble of their homes and in shelters and many were entombed for days; a number died before they could be rescued.

The German dive-bombers were met by a box barrage that distracted their aim so that the bombs that fell near the carrier failed to cause her any appreciable damage while they destroyed large sections of residential streets, encompassing the parish churches of Senglea and of Vittoriosa, where 33 persons died in the sacristry. A block of flats was also destroyed in Old Mint Street, Valletta, with fatalties among the residents.

A German bomb crashed through two decks of the freighter Essex in French Creek but failed to set off the 4,000 tons of ammunition in the holds which would have destroyed both the carrier berthed near her, the dockyard and the surrounding cities had the ammunition exploded.

Eye-witness accounts of the attack on the carrier at sea and in harbour recall the tragedy of those who died a violent death. A sequence from Nicholas Monsarrat's "The Kappillan of Malta" vividly describes the scene of death and destruction aboard the carrier.

"Malta at War" also gives comprehensive coverage to the simultaneous operations carried out from Malta against the enemy bases in Sicily and Southern Italy and the tragic death of two French airmen shot down over Catania.

The next issue will record scenes of destruction in the Cottonera and rescue efforts also how the statues of St Lawrence, of Our Lady of Victory and of the Redeemer, and others, were removed to safer zones. The German side of the blitz will be told by those who led the attacks.

"Malta at War" sells at Lm1.75 It gives a comprehensive account of the island in the war and the 36 parts will eventually be bound in three volumes