Rhode Island’s “Black Regiment” of the American Revolutionary War is fairly well-known to students of American History. Most published histories of the small colored battalion from Rhode Island are clearly biased in favor of the “regiment” and tend to interpret it as an elite military unit. However, a detailed study and analysis of Rhode Island’s segregated Continental Line by the author reveals a “military experiment” that was beset with difficulties from its start and ultimately failed as a segregated unit in 1780. In this work, many of the popular stories of Rhode Island’s “Black Regiment” are proven to be myths. Follow the accurate historical stories of the colored and white soldiers of Rhode Island’s Continental Line whose courage and sacrifices helped create an independent nation.

Two Centuries Ago, Americans paid for-and relied on-an astonishing government system that provided food, housing, and medical care to those in need. How Welfare Worked in the Early United States: Five Microhistories tells stories of "poor relief" through the lives of five people: a long-serving overseer of the poor, a Continental Army veteran who was banished from town, a nurse who was paid by the government to care for the poor an unwed mother who cared for the elderly and struggled to remain with her daughter, and a young paralyzed man who worked as a Christian missionary inside a poorhouse. Of Native, African, and English descent, these five Rhode Islanders' life stories show how poor relief actually worked. Students of history and of today's social provision have much to learn about how welfare worked in the early United States. Book jacket.

Using a masterful combination of artistry and accuracy, Don Troiani has dedicated his career to transforming our understanding of the military soldier. Don now turns his talents to capturing the under-recognized African-American soldiers as they fought in the French and Indian War, the War of Independence, the War of 1812, and the American Civil War. Don’s battle paintings, figure studies, and artifact collection are teamed with historian John Rees’s insightful text. This long-needed work combines Troiani’s magnificent art—the dramatic battle paintings and authentically illustrated uniformed soldier studies—with Rees’s introductory chapters on the four wars. Using primary sources, Rees gives a true picture of the contributions of the many Black soldiers over the 100-year history. Together Troiani and Rees provide the most comprehensive, authoritative, and well-researched study of the Black soldier in early America.

On 25 April 1915, with the landing of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) below the slopes of Sari Bair on the Gallipoli peninsula, the ANZAC legend was born. Nine months later, having suffered thousands of casualties from disease, hand-to-hand fighting, bombing, sniping and forlorn charges across no man’s land, the politicians and senior military commanders in London called it quits. While the Turks also suffered terribly, they at least emerged victorious. The fighting at Anzac was not restricted to the ANZACs and Turks alone. British troops also fought at Anzac from the earliest days of the invasion and large numbers of British and Indian troops were committed to the Anzac sector during the failed August offensive designed to break the stalemate. The invasion was also supported by large numbers of men — often non-combatants — who performed vital roles. Naval beach officers kept logistics operating in some form of ‘orderly’ fashion; Indian mule handlers moved supplies of food, water and ammunition to the front lines; and medical staff and army chaplains worked on the beach, caring for the wounded and the dead. All these men were frequently under fire from the Turkish battery known as ‘Beachy Bill’. Others surveyed the narrow beachhead and bored deep holes for drinking water; signallers tried desperately to establish and maintain communications; and the gunners hunted the battlefield for suitable places to site their guns. Off the peninsula, but just as vital, were the nursing and medical staff on the hospital ships, at Lemnos, Alexandria, Cairo and Malta, and the airmen who flew above the battlefield spotting for the navy and artillery. Shadows of Anzac: An intimate history of Gallipoli tells the story of the ‘ordinary’ men and women who participated in the Gallipoli campaign from April to December 1915 and gave the Anzac legend meaning. Drawing on letters, diaries and other primary and secondary sources, David Cameron provides an intimate and personal perspective of Anzac, a richly varied portrayal that describes the absurdity, monotony and often humour that sat alongside the horrors of the bitter fight to claim the peninsula.

From the bestselling author of Goodbye Cobber, God Bless You and Gallipoli Sniper.When Hugo Throssell joined the 10th Light Horse Regiment in 1914, soon after the outbreak of the First World War, he was emblematic of the young Australian nation at that time: full of youth, vigour, courage and idealism. These traits were to see him awarded a Victoria Cross after the savage fighting for Hill 60 during the Gallipoli campaign. Badly wounded, Throssell was sent to England to recover. There he met his future wife, Katharine Susannah Prichard, journalist, novelist and committed socialist. It was the beginning of a relationship that changed the course of his life, for although he was to return to war and fight in Palestine, his view of the conflict and its terrible sacrifices began to turn. By 1919, Throssell – once hailed as an Australian hero – was ready to publicly denounce the war. His stance was to forever alienate him from former comrades and the political establishment. The war affected him in other ways too, as he found himself unable to hold down a job and increasingly prone to episodes of depression. In 1933, Throssell killed himself, leaving behind his beloved wife and only child. In his triumph and tragedy he remained as emblematic to his country as he’d been in those heady days of 1914, an example of courage and sacrifice whose youth and future had been forever darkened by the experience of war. Award-winning journalist and bestselling author John Hamilton has written a compelling narrative, giving us an extraordinary perspective of the Gallipoli battles for The Nek and Hill 60, combined with a compassionate and intimate account of the rise and fall of a real Australian hero.