This incredible book documents the personal saga of a Confederate soldier from Texas who fought with General Forrest and other southern heroes. It's a true account of Obed Christian's encounters against the Union Army in the south; containing original letters and documented eye witness accounts. Through handwritten letters, my Great Grandfather depicts the massive destruction of cities and hardships encountered by military existence. The stunning eyewitness account of his brother's death, horrifying massacre at Ft. Pillows and bloody combat at Harrisburg, recaptures the devastation of the Civil War. Unique and rare, this book is a MUST READ for all Civil War enthusiast. Students of history will marvel at the captivating personal memoirs and heart warming letters. Military scholars will be enlightened, informed and illuminated by brilliant wartime maneuvers and eye witness accounts. Finally, it belongs on the library shelf of every researcher and historical society.

In 1950, when he commissioned the first edition of The Armed Forces Officer, Secretary of Defense George C. Marshall told its author, S.L.A. Marshall, that "American military officers, of whatever service, should share common ground ethically and morally." In this new edition, the authors methodically explore that common ground, reflecting on the basics of the Profession of Arms, and the officer's special place and distinctive obligations within that profession and especially to the Constitution.

How did Civil War soldiers endure the brutal and unpredictable existence of army life during the conflict? This question is at the heart of Peter S. Carmichael's sweeping new study of men at war. Based on close examination of the letters and records left behind by individual soldiers from both the North and the South, Carmichael explores the totality of the Civil War experience--the marching, the fighting, the boredom, the idealism, the exhaustion, the punishments, and the frustrations of being away from families who often faced their own dire circumstances. Carmichael focuses not on what soldiers thought but rather how they thought. In doing so, he reveals how, to the shock of most men, well-established notions of duty or disobedience, morality or immorality, loyalty or disloyalty, and bravery or cowardice were blurred by war. Digging deeply into his soldiers' writing, Carmichael resists the idea that there was "a common soldier" but looks into their own words to find common threads in soldiers' experiences and ways of understanding what was happening around them. In the end, he argues that a pragmatic philosophy of soldiering emerged, guiding members of the rank and file as they struggled to live with the contradictory elements of their violent and volatile world. Soldiering in the Civil War, as Carmichael argues, was never a state of being but a process of becoming.

C. P. Ellis grew up in the poor white section of Durham, North Carolina, and as a young man joined the Ku Klux Klan. Ann Atwater, a single mother from the poor black part of town, quit her job as a household domestic to join the civil rights fight. During the 1960s, as the country struggled with the explosive issue of race, Atwater and Ellis met on opposite sides of the public school integration issue. Their encounters were charged with hatred and suspicion. In an amazing set of transformations, however, each of them came to see how the other had been exploited by the South's rigid power structure, and they forged a friendship that flourished against a backdrop of unrelenting bigotry. Rich with details about the rhythms of daily life in the mid-twentieth-century South, The Best of Enemies offers a vivid portrait of a relationship that defied all odds. By placing this very personal story into broader context, Osha Gray Davidson demonstrates that race is intimately tied to issues of class, and that cooperation is possible--even in the most divisive situations--when people begin to listen to one another.

This provocative story illuminates the lives of 2 wayward adventure seekers. It's the unfortunate true account of myself and equally neurotic traveling companion. As young, naive gringos, we sought a mood altering pilgrimage to South America. We followed our siren's call towards drama, chaos and confusion in the jungles and mountains of the Inca Empire. For nearly a year, we played hide and seek from military police, danced the jig of civility while dodging the bullet of sanity. Exploits contained in this work are not intended for the squeamish, timid, faint of heart or too delicate. Graphic episodes may offend fragile, tightly wrapped and emotionally stable individuals. That being said, this narrative is equally seductive to extreme travel junkies and adventure seekers. A burgeoning population of recovery oriented Baby Boomers, will discover a niche of paradoxical insight. Arm chair travelers will be shocked, amused, entertained and educated. Hipsters will marvel at the high drama and drop dead humor.