United States Military History

In March 1865, a 30-man team of mostly Black Union soldiers traveled from Jacksonville, Florida 100 miles behind enemy lines to conduct a ridiculously daring raid in remote Marion County. Then they had to return on foot to St. Augustine 80 miles from the raid site, knowing an accomplished Confederate cavalry unit would be hot on their trail. The Black raiders planned the operation, employed their own strategy, led by a Black Sergeant-Major—no White officer—and carried out the mission.

Henry Lee learnt to ride before he was five, joined Washington's Army at nineteen, and was appointed Captain of the Fifth Troop of Virginia Dragoons at twenty. At twenty-two, Colonel Lee took command of a mixed cavalry and infantry unit known as "Lee's Legion"—the finest offensive team in the Continental Army. Nicknamed "Light-Horse Harry" for his raids on British supply wagons, the young Virginian quickly earned a reputation for horsemanship and distinguished himself as one of the most skilled and courageous cavalry officers of the American Revolution.

Americans are more familiar with his signature than with the man himself. In this spirited account of John Hancock's life, Brooke Barbier depicts a patriot of fascinating contradictions—a child of enormous privilege who would nevertheless become a voice of the common folk; a pillar of society uncomfortable with radicalism who yet was crucial to independence. Orphaned young, Hancock was raised by his merchant uncle, whose business and vast wealth he inherited—including household slaves, whom Hancock later freed. By his early thirties, he was one of New England's most prominent politicians.

The Spurgin family of North Carolina experienced the cataclysm of the American Revolution in the most dramatic ways—and from different sides. This engrossing book tells the story of Jane Welborn Spurgin, a patriot who welcomed General Nathanael Greene to her home and aided Continental forces while her loyalist husband was fighting for the king as an officer in the Tory militia.

Though it’s widely overlooked today, the U.S. has had a military presence in Asia for more than 200 years. The East Indies Squadron was formally established by President Andrew Jackson in 1835 to protect American property and trade in Asia, but U.S. warships were protecting American interests in Asia before then. In fact, American merchant vessels reached China as early as the 1780s.

The Vietnam War could have been called a comedy of errors if the consequences weren’t so deadly and tragic. In 1951, while war was raging in Korea, the United States began signing defense pacts with nations in the Pacific, intending to create alliances that would contain the spread of Communism. As the Korean War was winding down, America joined the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, pledging to defend several nations in the region from Communist aggression. One of those nations was South Vietnam.

Samoa is a group of about 20 islands in the South Pacific Ocean, totaling slightly over 1,100 square miles, about a fifth the size of Hawai’i. The ancestors of the Samoans arrived there many centuries ago. Archaeological artifacts suggest Polynesians arrived perhaps three thousand years before the present, or perhaps even earlier.

Most Americans have heard of the Little Bighorn, the 1876 battle in which a band of Lakota Sioux and their allies wiped out most of the 7th US Cavalry under the command of George Armstrong Custer. The movie images are of fierce warriors in long eagle feather headdresses flowing behind them as they gallop across the plains on nimble Indian ponies.

Are you curious to learn what happened after the US Civil War? Then dive into the captivating history of the Reconstruction Era! The US Civil War brought about a lot of change. The nation not only had to figure out how to become united once again, but it also had to figure out how to integrate the newly freed slaves into society. In addition, the country had to figure out how to recover from the war, which devastated the South and took many lives on both sides.

The State of Jones is a true story about the South during the Civil War, the real South. Not the South that has been mythologized in novels and movies, but an authentic, hardscrabble place where poor men were forced to fight a rich man's war for slavery and cotton. In Jones County, Mississippi, a farmer named Newton Knight led his neighbors, white and black alike, in an insurrection against the Confederacy at the height of the Civil War.

The State of Jones is a true story about the South during the Civil War: the real South. Not the South that has been mythologized in novels and movies, but an authentic, hardscrabble place where poor men were forced to fight a rich man's war for slavery and cotton. In Jones County, Mississippi, a farmer named Newton Knight led his neighbors, white and black alike, in an insurrection against the Confederacy at the height of the Civil War.

Riveting, moving, and impossible to put down, War, Terrible War takes us into the heart of the Civil War, from the battle of Manassas to the battle of Gettysburg and on to the South's surrender at Appomattox Court House. Follow the common soldiers in blue and gray as they endure long marches, freezing winter camps, and the bloodiest battles ever fought on American soil.

The attack of the US Pearl Harbor Naval Base changed the entire progress of World War II, and as a result, it was a very formative event both for the United States and Japan. Though the two nations seemed unlikely enemies at the onset of the Second Great War, bloodshed between them would be greater than anyone could have imagined. The future of the world at large was changed on December 7, 1941, when the Empire of Japan chose to make a preemptive strike on its most feared Pacific neighbor, the United States of America.

Personalities. Characters. History. John C. Waugh, the author of the popular and award-winning The Class of 1846, presents forty of the most memorable and impactful individuals he has come across during his three decades of researching and writing about the American Civil War—or as he calls them, his “Unforgettables” in the aptly titled, Unforgettables: Winners, Losers, Strong Women, and Eccentric Men of the Civil War Era.

In Victory City, John Strausbaugh returns to tell the story of New York City's war years with the same richness, depth, and nuance he brought to his previous books, City of Sedition and The Village, providing listeners with a groundbreaking new look into the greatest city on earth during the most transformative - and costliest - war in human history.

Tucked safely away in storage is an unnamed sculpture commissioned by George Pullman and sculpted by Carl Rohl-Smith depicting the "Fort Dearborn Massacre". It was originally installed near the mansion of the creator of the Pullman Palace Car Company, which manufactured railroad sleeping cars in the mid-19th century. Although

What was the bloodiest war in American history? Most people with at least a little knowledge of history would quickly say that it was the Civil War (1861-65), and they would certainly be correct overall. However, when historians go farther back in time and include colonial wars and look at casualties per capita, the correct answer would be the much-lesser known conflict known as "King Philip's War" (1675-76).

The Apaches of the American Southwest have achieved almost legendary status for their fierceness and their tenacity in fighting the US Army. Names like Nana, Cochise, and Geronimo are synonymous with bravery and daring, and the tribe had that reputation long before the Americans arrived. Indeed, among all the Native American tribes, the Spanish, Mexicans, and Americans learned the hard way that the warriors of the Apache were perhaps the fiercest in North America.

The American Revolution is replete with seminal moments that every American learns in school, from the "shot heard 'round the world" to the Declaration of Independence, but the events that led up to the fighting at Lexington and Concord were borne out of 10 years of division between the British and their American colonies over everything from colonial representation in governments to taxation, the nature of searches, and the quartering of British regulars in private houses.

In the summer of 1775, a Virginia gentleman-planter was given command of a New England army laying siege to British-occupied Boston. With his appointment, the Continental Army was born. Yet the cultural differences between those serving in the army and their new commander-in-chief led to conflicts from the very beginning that threatened to end the Revolution before it could start. The key challenge for General George Washington was establishing the standards by which the soldiers would be led by their officers.