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The you-are-there story of one of the most ferocious small-unit combats in US history . . . As part of the massive Allied invasion of Normandy, three airborne divisions were dropped behind enemy lines to sew confusion in the German rear and prevent panzer reinforcements from reaching the beaches. In the dark early hours of D-Day, this confusion was achieved well enough, as nearly every airborne unit missed its drop zone, creating a kaleidoscope of small-unit combat. Fortunately for the Allies, the 505th Regimental Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division hit on or near its drop zone. Its task was to seize the vital crossroads of Ste Mère Eglise, and to hold the bridge over the Merderet River at nearby La Fière. Benefiting from dynamic battlefield leadership, the paratroopers reached the bridge, only to be met by wave after wave of German tanks and infantry desperate to force the crossing. Reinforced by glider troops, who suffered terribly in their landings from the now-alert Germans, the 505th not only held the vital bridge for three days but launched a counterattack in the teeth of enemy fire to secure their objective once and for all, albeit at gruesome cost. In No Better Place to Die, Robert M. Murphy provides an objective narrative of countless acts of heroism, almost breathtaking in its “you are there” detail. No World War II veteran is better known in 82nd Airborne circles than Robert M. (“Bob”) Murphy. A Pathfinder and member of A Company, 505th PIR, Bob was wounded three times in action, and made all four combat jumps with his regiment, fighting in Sicily, Italy, Normandy, and Holland. He was decorated for valor for his role at La Fière, and is a Chevalier of the French Legion of Honor. After the war, he was instrumental in establishing the 505th RCT Association. A selection of the Military Book Club
A mere handful of battlefields have come to epitomize the anguish and pain of America's Civil War: Gettysburg, Shiloh, Chancellorsville, Chickamauga. Yet another name belongs on that infamous list: Stones River, the setting for Peter Cozzens's No Better Place to Die. It was here that both the Union and Confederate armies lost over one-quarter of their forces in battle casualties. The Confederacy's defeat at Stones River unleashed a wave of dissension that crippled the army's high command and ultimately closed Tennessee to the South for two years. The loss deterred the British and French from coming to the aid of the South in the Civil War, with tragic effects for the Southern cause. In the 126 years since the guns fell silent at Stones River, few books have examined the bloody clash and its impact on the war's subsequent outcome. No Better Place to Die recounts the events and strategies that brought the two armies to the banks of this central Tennessee river on December 31, 1862. Cozzens re-creates the battle itself, following the movements and performance of individual regiments. A series of maps clarifies the combat activity. Cozzens frequently lets the men who fought the battle speak for themselves, through letters, diaries, memoirs, and battlefield communications. Here we learn about such critical moments as General Philip Sheridan's gallant defense along the Wilkinson Pike, one of the war's most tenacious stands against overwhelming odds, and the bravery in battle exemplified by Brekenridge's attack on the Union left, a doomed assault with the poignancy of Pickett's charge. Over twenty thousand Union and Confederate soldiers were killed, wounded, or captured in the bloody New Year's battle of Stone's River. The impact of their struggle extended far beyond the thousands of shattered human lives, ultimately imperiling the fortunes of the Confederacy. No Better Place to Die pays tribute to the heroes, the scoundrels, the mistakes, the bravery, and the grief at Stone's River.
General Braxton Bragg is often described as a despicable, friendless man, the most hated general of the Confederacy. Historians have denigrated Bragg by accepting without challenge the self-serving accusations of prominent, disgruntled subordinates, each of whom sought to explain their own failures by assigning them to Bragg. This biography, without dodging Bragg's deficiencies, refutes much of this false testimony. The result is a balanced view of this controversial general, from his early rise to power in the Western theater to his subsequent fall from grace in the latter years of the Civil War.
This book is to honor the sacrifices and courage shown by the Forty-Second Indiana Infantry in their military campaigns during the Civil War from their organization in 1861 until final victory in April 1865.
Finalist for the Lincoln Prize! Traditional histories of the Civil War describe the conflict as a war between North and South. Kenneth W. Noe suggests it should instead be understood as a war between the North, the South, and the weather. In The Howling Storm, Noe retells the history of the conflagration with a focus on the ways in which weather and climate shaped the outcomes of battles and campaigns. He further contends that events such as floods and droughts affecting the Confederate home front constricted soldiers’ food supply, lowered morale, and undercut the government’s efforts to boost nationalist sentiment. By contrast, the superior equipment and open supply lines enjoyed by Union soldiers enabled them to cope successfully with the South’s extreme conditions and, ultimately, secure victory in 1865. Climate conditions during the war proved unusual, as irregular phenomena such as El Niño, La Niña, and similar oscillations in the Atlantic Ocean disrupted weather patterns across southern states. Taking into account these meteorological events, Noe rethinks conventional explanations of battlefield victories and losses, compelling historians to reconsider long-held conclusions about the war. Unlike past studies that fault inflation, taxation, and logistical problems for the Confederate defeat, his work considers how soldiers and civilians dealt with floods and droughts that beset areas of the South in 1862, 1863, and 1864. In doing so, he addresses the foundational causes that forced Richmond to make difficult and sometimes disastrous decisions when prioritizing the feeding of the home front or the front lines. The Howling Storm stands as the first comprehensive examination of weather and climate during the Civil War. Its approach, coverage, and conclusions are certain to reshape the field of Civil War studies.
" The Battle Rages Higher tells, for the first time, the story of the Fifteenth Kentucky Infantry, a hard-fighting Union regiment raised largely from Louisville and the Knob Creek valley where Abraham Lincoln lived as a child. Although recruited in a slave state where Lincoln received only 0.9 percent of the 1860 presidential vote, the men of the Fifteenth Kentucky fought and died for the Union for over three years, participating in all the battles of the Atlanta campaign, as well as the battles of Perryville, Stones River and Chickamauga. Using primary research, including soldiers’ letters and diaries, hundreds of contemporary newspaper reports, official army records, and postwar memoirs, Kirk C. Jenkins vividly brings the Fifteenth Kentucky Infantry to life. The book also includes an extensive biographical roster summarizing the service record of each soldier in the thousand-member unit. Kirk C. Jenkins, a descendant of the Fifteenth Kentucky's Captain Smith Bayne, is a partner in a Chicago law firm. Click here for Kirk Jenkins' website and more information about the 15th Kentucky Infantry.
Lieutenant General Leonidas Polk was a distinguished West Point graduate, the first Episcopal Bishop of Louisiana, a university founder, and a Confederate commander beloved by his troops, esteemed by the public, and killed on the field of battle. In spite of his many accomplishments, historians invariably disparage Polk's generalship and even his personal character--but is their treatment fair or accurate? This work employs a balanced perspective to shed new light on Polk's military leadership and reveal unexpected truths that explain his conflict with General Braxton Bragg. A seemingly insignificant piece of correspondence, along with an exploration of both men's writings, coalesce into an understanding of the root cause of the command dysfunction and chronic failures of the Army of Tennessee.
A tale of ordinary Florida citizens who, during extraordinary times, were called to battle against their fellow countrymen Over the past twenty years, historians have worked diligently to explore Florida’s role in the Civil War. Works describing the state’s women and its wartime economy have contributed to this effort, yet until recently the story of Florida’s soldiers in the Confederate armies has been little studied. This volume explores the story of schoolmates going to war and of families left behind, of a people fighting to maintain a society built on slavery and of a state torn by political and regional strife. Florida in 1860 was very much divided between radical democrats and conservatives. Before the war the state’s inhabitants engaged in bitter political rivalries, and Sheppard argues that prior to secession Florida citizens maintained regional loyalties rather than considering themselves “Floridians.” He shows that service in Confederate armies helped to ease tensions between various political factions and worked to reduce the state’s regional divisions. Sheppard also addresses the practices of prisoner parole and exchange, unit consolidation and its effects on morale and unit identity, politics within the Army of Tennessee, and conscription and desertion in the Southern armies. These issues come together to demonstrate the connection between the front lines and the home front.
Screenwriter Nunn draws on her true-life experience growing up in Africa to create this darkly romantic crime novel set in 1950s apartheid South Africa. Detective Emmanuel Cooper is caught up in a time and place where racial tensions and the raw hunger for power make for dangerous times.