History of the Military Canteen (Classic Reprint)
History of the Military Canteen (Classic Reprint)

Author: Philip Hildreth Reade

Publisher:

Published: 2015-07-05

Total Pages: 174

ISBN-13: 9781330755372

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Excerpt from History of the Military Canteen At the beginning of the last century, and for some years after, the soldiers canteen was a wooden, drum-shaped affair, provided with a nozzle. (See cut p. 120.) To now return to that shape and adopt a hollow cylinder, modeled after a drum for packing figs in, would be an advance backwards. The history of mankind is the history of the development of weapons and equipment for war by improvements, in which one nation has overcome another and survived. Within a few months from now our military organization will have been readjusted. The arms and equipments to be necessitated by the increase in numbers of our permanent military establishment should be new and not of the nineteenth century pattern. By July, 1901, perhaps 60,000 canteens now carried by, or in the possession of, United States Volunteers and Regulars will have been turned in. Some of these canteens will be suspended by the returned volunteers beside the obsolete muzzle-loading firearms of the civil war period, and some may find their way into the museums for the collection and display of archaic military weapons and equipments. From being an inconsequential article of a soldier's personal equipment the canteen has become, in fact, one of the most important articles, because connected with hygienic considerations; in other words, because it carries water and because the majority of our troops are in localities where good water is of prime consideration to health. Those who live a comparatively fixed life can hardly weigh aright the importance of a good canteen. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Canteen Army
Canteen Army

Author: Nathan Morley

Publisher:

Published: 2018-09-06

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 9781719947367

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This is the extraordinary story of Naafi - The Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes - a quietly fantastic retail operation that has seen action in almost every theatre of war over the last century.Beginning with the origins of regimental canteens, through the First World War, World War Two, Suez, Korea, Cyprus, the Falklands, Iraq and Afghanistan, Canteen Army charts the impact that Naafi has had on every aspect of military lives and British culture. It describes how Naafi was never willing to be just a spectator, and maintained the highest standards under shellfire, rocket attacks, air-raids and in the galleys of Navy ships on the high seas. Using diaries, exclusive interviews, news archives, letters, and company records, Canteen Army takes a lively journey to tell the story of how Naafi has worked alongside the remarkable men and women ensuring Britain's survival in the Second World War, and its continued security since then. There are vivid descriptions of what life was like working this vast retail operation, which operated thousands of canteens, pubs, cafes, shops and hotels from the deserts of North Africa to the freezing wastelands of Iceland. Naafi was also responsible for ENSA, the much-ribbed entertainment branch, which chalked up countless wartime shows around the world, featuring stars like Gracie Fields, Arthur Askey and George Formby. Those who have served with the British forces know what a remarkable job Naafi do in both war and peacetime. The men and women of the institute, while sharing the dangers of their comrades in uniform, provide the small luxuries that make life in a war zone more bearable. From the Dunkirk to the battle of the Falklands, Nathan Morley's Canteen Army brings to life the far-reaching history of this much-loved institution."Where our armed forces go Naafi is never far behind. They provide a wonderful service. They build morale. They are there when it matters." - Michael Heseltine

Once Upon a Town
Once Upon a Town

Author: Bob Greene

Publisher: Harper Collins

Published: 2009-03-17

Total Pages: 280

ISBN-13: 0061751278

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In search of "the best America there ever was," bestselling author and award-winning journalist Bob Greene finds it in a small Nebraska town few people pass through today—a town where Greene discovers the echoes of the most touching love story imaginable: a love story between a country and its sons. During World War II, American soldiers from every city and walk of life rolled through North Platte, Nebraska, on troop trains en route to their ultimate destinations in Europe and the Pacific. The tiny town, wanting to offer the servicemen warmth and support, transformed its modest railroad depot into the North Platte Canteen. Every day of the year, every day of the war, the Canteen—staffed and funded entirely by local volunteers—was open from five a.m. until the last troop train of the day pulled away after midnight. Astonishingly, this remote plains community of only 12,000 people provided welcoming words, friendship, and baskets of food and treats to more than six million GIs by the time the war ended. In this poignant and heartwarming eyewitness history, based on interviews with North Platte residents and the soldiers who once passed through, Bob Greene tells a classic, lost-in-the-mists-of-time American story of a grateful country honoring its brave and dedicated sons.

American Military History Volume 1
American Military History Volume 1

Author: Army Center of Military History

Publisher:

Published: 2016-06-05

Total Pages: 436

ISBN-13: 9781944961404

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American Military History provides the United States Army-in particular, its young officers, NCOs, and cadets-with a comprehensive but brief account of its past. The Center of Military History first published this work in 1956 as a textbook for senior ROTC courses. Since then it has gone through a number of updates and revisions, but the primary intent has remained the same. Support for military history education has always been a principal mission of the Center, and this new edition of an invaluable history furthers that purpose. The history of an active organization tends to expand rapidly as the organization grows larger and more complex. The period since the Vietnam War, at which point the most recent edition ended, has been a significant one for the Army, a busy period of expanding roles and missions and of fundamental organizational changes. In particular, the explosion of missions and deployments since 11 September 2001 has necessitated the creation of additional, open-ended chapters in the story of the U.S. Army in action. This first volume covers the Army's history from its birth in 1775 to the eve of World War I. By 1917, the United States was already a world power. The Army had sent large expeditionary forces beyond the American hemisphere, and at the beginning of the new century Secretary of War Elihu Root had proposed changes and reforms that within a generation would shape the Army of the future. But world war-global war-was still to come. The second volume of this new edition will take up that story and extend it into the twenty-first century and the early years of the war on terrorism and includes an analysis of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq up to January 2009.

In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg
In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg

Author: Lance J. Herdegen

Publisher: Savas Publishing

Published: 2015-07-19

Total Pages: 359

ISBN-13: 1940669413

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The storied Iron Brigade carved out a unique reputation during the Civil War. Its men fought on many hard fields, but they performed their most legendary exploits just outside a small Pennsylvania town called Gettysburg on the first day of July in 1863. There were many heroic actions that morning and afternoon, but the fight along an unfinished deep scar in the ground north of the Chambersburg Pike was one never forgotten, and is the subject of Lance J. HerdegenÕs and William J. K. BeaudotÕs award-winning (and long out of print) In the Bloody Railroad Cut at Gettysburg: The 6th Wisconsin of the Iron Brigade and its Famous Charge. The railroad cut fighting was led mainly by the ÒCalico BoysÓ of the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers. Detached from the balance of the Iron Brigade, the Badgers of the 6th charged nearly 200 yards to meet a Confederate brigade that had swung into what looked like an ideal defensive position along an unfinished railroad cut northwest of town. The fighting was close, brutal, personal, and bloodyÑand it played a key role in the final Union victory. The Wisconsin men always remembered that moment when they stood under Òa galling fireÓ in an open field just north of the pike. Using hundreds of firsthand accounts, many previously unpublished, Herdegen and Beaudot carry their readers into the very thick of the fighting. The air seemed Òfull of bullets,Ó one private recalled, the men around him dropping Òat a fearful rate.Ó Pvt. Amos Lefler was on his hands and knees spitting blood and teeth with Capt. Johnny Ticknor of Company K down and dying just a handful of yards away. Pvt. James P. Sullivan felt defenseless, unable as he was to get his rifle-musket to fire because of bad percussion caps. Rebel buckshot, meanwhile, smashed the canteen and slashed the hip of Sgt. George Fairfield. Behind the Wisconsin men, Lt. Col. Rufus Dawes watched a ÒfearfulÓ and ÒdestructiveÓ Confederate fire crashing with Òan unbroken roar before us. Men were being shot by twenties and thirties.Ó While frantically loading and shooting, the Badgers leaned into the storm of bullets coming from the cut 175 yards away. The Westerners pushed slowly into the field andÑat that very instant when victory or defeat teetered undecidedÑthe ÒJayhawkersÓ in the Prairie du Chien Company began shouting ÒCharge! Charge! Charge!Ó And so they did. Young Dawes lifted his sword and shouted ÒForward! Forward Charge! Align on the Colors!Ó It was at that moment, remembered Cpl. Frank Wallar, a farmer-turned-soldier who would soon make his name known to history by capturing the flag of the 2nd Mississippi, Òthere was a general rush and yells enough to almost awaken the dead.Ó Out of print for nearly two decades, this facsimile reprint and its new Introduction share with yet another generation of readers the story of the 6th WisconsinÕs magnificent charge. Indeed it is their story, and how they remembered it. And it is one you will never forget.

The Adventures of a Revolutionary Soldier
The Adventures of a Revolutionary Soldier

Author: Joseph Plumb Martin

Publisher: DigiCat

Published: 2022-11-13

Total Pages: 198

ISBN-13:

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Joseph Plumb Martin (1760 – 1850) was a soldier in the Continental Army and Connecticut Militia during the American Revolutionary War, holding the rank of private for most of the war. His published narrative of his experiences has become a valuable resource for historians in understanding the conditions of a common soldier of that era, as well as the battles in which Martin participated. "My intention is to give a succinct account of some of my adventures, dangers and sufferings during my several campaigns in the revolutionary army." Contents: Campaign of 1776. Campaign of 1777. Campaign of 1778. Campaign of 1779. Campaign of 1780. Campaign of 1781. Campaign of 1782. Campaign of 1783.

War of the Rats
War of the Rats

Author: David L. Robbins

Publisher: Bantam

Published: 2009-12-16

Total Pages: 514

ISBN-13: 0307575373

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For six months in 1942, Stalingrad is the center of a titanic struggle between the Russian and German armies—the bloodiest campaign in mankind's long history of warfare. The outcome is pivotal. If Hitler's forces are not stopped, Russia will fall. And with it, the world.... German soldiers call the battle Rattenkrieg, War of the Rats. The combat is horrific, as soldiers die in the smoking cellars and trenches of a ruined city. Through this twisted carnage stalk two men—one Russian, one German—each the top sniper in his respective army. These two marksmen are equally matched in both skill and tenacity. Each man has his own mission: to find his counterpart—and kill him. But an American woman trapped in Russia complicates this extraordinary duel. Joining the Russian sniper's cadre, she soon becomes one of his most talented assassins—and perhaps his greatest weakness. Based on a true story, this is the harrowing tale of two adversaries enmeshed in their own private war—and whose fortunes will help decide the fate of the world.