Diary of an Enlisted Man

Diary of an Enlisted Man PDF Author: Lawrence Van Alstyne
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : New York (State)
Languages : en
Pages : 374

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Book Description

Diary of an Enlisted Man

Diary of an Enlisted Man PDF Author: Lawrence Van Alstyne
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : New York (State)
Languages : en
Pages : 374

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Book Description


A Soldier in World War I

A Soldier in World War I PDF Author: Elmer W. Sherwood
Publisher: Indiana Historical Society
ISBN: 0871951738
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
As a soldier with the 42nd (Rainbow) Division in France in World War I, Elmer Sherwood was an observer with uncommonly good judgment. If his descriptions lacked perfection they partook of an attractive innocence that brought out the truth of such battles as the horrendous Meuse-Argonne offensive that took 26,000 lives.

Diary of a Confederate Soldier

Diary of a Confederate Soldier PDF Author: John S. Jackman
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
The Civil War journal of John Jackman is one of the richest and most literate of all Confederate soldier narratives to survive the war. It is also the only surviving war period diary of a soldier in the famed First Kentucky or orphan Brigade. Jackman follows his brigade across the war-torn South, from Shiloh to Vicksburg, to Baton Rouge, through all the battles for Tennessee, and on through the Atlanta Campaign and the resistance to Sherman's march to the sea. Jackman is an observer right up to the end, when Jefferson Davis and his fleeing cabinet meet for the last time at Washington, Georgia. Written with wit and insight, and unfailingly entertaining. Jackman's journal catches the spirit of the common soldier of the Confederacy in camp and field, as well as some of the excitement and confusion of battle. His opinions are frank, his prejudices few, and his warm and generous nature show through in his remarks on his fellow orphans. Especially significant for its behind-the-lines vignettes of the Army of Tennessee, this journal is one of the most important soldier journals to come from that troubled yet fascinating army.

Pacific War Diary, 1942-1945

Pacific War Diary, 1942-1945 PDF Author: James J. Fahey
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780618400805
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 436

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Book Description
Fahey was a 24-year-old garbage-truck driver when he enlisted in the Navy on Oct. 3, 1942, and became a seaman first class on the USS Montpelier. During almost three years of battle in the Pacific Ocean, he defied Navy rules against keeping a diary by writing copious notes on loose sheets of paper that appeared to anyone watching to be ordinary let

Between Tedium and Terror

Between Tedium and Terror PDF Author: Sy M. Kahn
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 9780252069086
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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Book Description
When Sy Kahn set off to serve in the Pacific during World War II, he was a bookish, naive nineteen-year-old, the youngest in his company. Convinced he would not survive the war, Kahn kept a meticulous record of his experiences as his "foxhole of the mind," even though keeping such a journal was forbidden by military regulations. His secret diary--one soldier's "mark against oblivion"--is a rare ground-level account of the war. Often writing in tents by candlelight, in foxholes, or on board ships, Kahn documents life during four campaigns and over three hundred air attacks. He describes the 244th Port Company's backbreaking work of loading and unloading ships, the suffocating heat, the debilitating tropical diseases, and the relentless, sometimes terrifying bombings, accidents, casualties, and deaths. His wartime odyssey also includes encounters with civilians in Australia, in the Philippines, and, as among the earliest occupation troops, in Japan. A detailed record of the daily cost of war, Kahn's journal reflects his increasing maturity and his personal coming of age, representative of thousands of young Americans who served in World War II.

WWII Diary of a German Soldier

WWII Diary of a German Soldier PDF Author: Helga Herzog Godfrey
Publisher: Author House
ISBN: 1452040168
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 558

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Book Description
I was born and raised in Germany. After my father’s death, my mother spent many winters with my husband and I here in Florida. During these visits, she and I transcribed my father’s World War II diaries into German from the old “Gabelsberger” shorthand, which only Mama was able to read. Subsequently, I translated them into English. These diaries fortunately were discovered by my sister Sigrid in the attic upon the sale of the old family home after my father’s passing in 1989. She felt Mama and I should translate these books for the family. At a later point many friends and acquaintances encouraged me, to publish this diary, to document his thoughts, experiences, and innermost feelings from the beginning of his conscripted military service in 1939 through 1946, when he returned home after being released from a French POW labor camp. During the latter part of 1946 and into 1947, an epilog describes his daily struggles to return to normalcy, the resumption of his teaching career, and the search for food to feed his family. He describes his touching love for his family, as well as his anger and hatred for the insane war and its inept leaders. A war, he was forced to participate in as an ordinary German soldier. Many times he naively commented very unfavorably, sometimes using “choice words” about Hitler, the Nazi Party, and his superiors, a risk, if found out, could have cost him his life. I myself have many memories of the war and its horrors as a little girl without a father, spending night after night in a bunker, the “liberation” of our small town by the Americans. This has left deep and lasting impressions on me. Later on, I met a wonderful American with whom I fell in love and married, with my father proudly walking me down the aisle. This, in spite of the resentment he held against Americans, for shamefully turning him over to the French as a forced labor POW. I remember his sadness, when his little “Murschel”, as he used to call me, left for America with his conviction that if he was lucky, he may be able to see me only once more during his lifetime. However, he was able to enjoy many trips to the United States and I with my family visited my parents often in Germany. After reading his legacy, I knew, I have my beloved father’s permission to share his writings with others, and by doing so, honor his memory.

Soldiering

Soldiering PDF Author: Rice C. Bull
Publisher: Berkley
ISBN: 9780425110379
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292

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Book Description
Among the rank and file of largely uneducated Union Soldiers in the Civil War, Sergeant Rice C. Bull was an exception--a sensitive and perceptive man whose diary vividly describes the training, daily routine and combat that was the life of an infantryman. Among the memorable passages are those of the Battle of Chancellorsville and of marching with Sherman through a devastated Georgia to the sea.

Diary of a Yankee Engineer

Diary of a Yankee Engineer PDF Author: John Henry Westervelt
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
ISBN: 9780823217243
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 316

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Book Description
Diary of a Yankee Engineer is a poignant firsthand account of a soldier's experiences during the Civil War. Westervelt's words, intended not for the history books but for the education of his young son, present an authentic and humble vision of military life and of the North's struggle in the Civil War.

For Cause and Comrades

For Cause and Comrades PDF Author: James M. McPherson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199741050
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
General John A. Wickham, commander of the famous 101st Airborne Division in the 1970s and subsequently Army Chief of Staff, once visited Antietam battlefield. Gazing at Bloody Lane where, in 1862, several Union assaults were brutally repulsed before they finally broke through, he marveled, "You couldn't get American soldiers today to make an attack like that." Why did those men risk certain death, over and over again, through countless bloody battles and four long, awful years ? Why did the conventional wisdom -- that soldiers become increasingly cynical and disillusioned as war progresses -- not hold true in the Civil War? It is to this question--why did they fight--that James McPherson, America's preeminent Civil War historian, now turns his attention. He shows that, contrary to what many scholars believe, the soldiers of the Civil War remained powerfully convinced of the ideals for which they fought throughout the conflict. Motivated by duty and honor, and often by religious faith, these men wrote frequently of their firm belief in the cause for which they fought: the principles of liberty, freedom, justice, and patriotism. Soldiers on both sides harkened back to the Founding Fathers, and the ideals of the American Revolution. They fought to defend their country, either the Union--"the best Government ever made"--or the Confederate states, where their very homes and families were under siege. And they fought to defend their honor and manhood. "I should not lik to go home with the name of a couhard," one Massachusetts private wrote, and another private from Ohio said, "My wife would sooner hear of my death than my disgrace." Even after three years of bloody battles, more than half of the Union soldiers reenlisted voluntarily. "While duty calls me here and my country demands my services I should be willing to make the sacrifice," one man wrote to his protesting parents. And another soldier said simply, "I still love my country." McPherson draws on more than 25,000 letters and nearly 250 private diaries from men on both sides. Civil War soldiers were among the most literate soldiers in history, and most of them wrote home frequently, as it was the only way for them to keep in touch with homes that many of them had left for the first time in their lives. Significantly, their letters were also uncensored by military authorities, and are uniquely frank in their criticism and detailed in their reports of marches and battles, relations between officers and men, political debates, and morale. For Cause and Comrades lets these soldiers tell their own stories in their own words to create an account that is both deeply moving and far truer than most books on war. Battle Cry of Freedom, McPherson's Pulitzer Prize-winning account of the Civil War, was a national bestseller that Hugh Brogan, in The New York Times, called "history writing of the highest order." For Cause and Comrades deserves similar accolades, as McPherson's masterful prose and the soldiers' own words combine to create both an important book on an often-overlooked aspect of our bloody Civil War, and a powerfully moving account of the men who fought it.

The Civil War Diary of a Common Soldier

The Civil War Diary of a Common Soldier PDF Author: Terrence J. Winschel
Publisher: LSU Press
ISBN: 9780807125939
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
William Wiley was typical of most soldiers who served in the armies of the North and South during the Civil War. A poorly educated farmer from Peoria, he enlisted in the summer of 1862 in the 77th Illinois Infantry, a unit that participated in most of the major campaigns waged in Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, and Alabama. Recognizing that the great conflict would be a defining experience in his life, Wiley attempted to maintain a diary during his years of service. Frequent illnesses kept him from the ranks for extended periods of time, and he filled the many gaps in his diary after the war. When viewed as a postwar memoir rather than a period diary, Wiley's narrative assumes great importance as it weaves a fascinating account of the army life of Billy Yank. Rather than focus on the noble and heroic aspects of war, Wiley reveals how basic the lives of most soldiers actually were. He describes at length his experiences with sickness, both on land and at sea, and the monotony of daily military life. He seldom mentions army leaders, evidence of how little private soldiers knew of them or the larger drama in which they played a part. Instead, he writes fondly of his small circle of regimental friends, fills his pages with refreshing anecdotes, records troop movements, details contact with civilians, and describes the appearance of the countryside through which he passed. In the epilogue, Terrence J. Winschel recounts Wiley's complex and often frustrating struggle to obtain his military pension after the war. Wiley was an ingenious misspeller, and his words are transcribed just as he wrote them more than 130 years ago. Through his simple language, we come to know and care for this common man who made a common soldier. His story transcends the barriers of time and distance, and places the reader in the midst of men who experienced both the horror and the tedium of war. Winschel's rich annotation fleshes out Wiley's narrative and provides an enlightening historical perspective. Scholars and buffs alike, especially those fascinated by operations in the lower Mississippi Valley and along the Gulf Coast, will relish Wiley's honest portrait of the ordinary serviceman's Civil War.