To commemorate the 150th Anniversary of the end of the Civil War, Diversion Books is publishing seminal works of the era: stories told by the men and women who led, who fought, and who lived in an America that had come apart at the seams. Two of America’s finest statesman, a man who would become the first Senate Majority Leader and a man who would become President, present tales that illustrate the bravery, the perseverance, and the dangers that went into building a great nation. This entertaining volume captures America at its most rough-and-tumble, with stories to enthrall both young and old.
Historians' attempts to understand legendary Confederate General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson have proved uneven at best and often contentious. An occasionally enigmatic and eccentric college professor before the Civil War, Jackson died midway through the conflict, leaving behind no memoirs and relatively few surviving letters or documents. In Inventing Stonewall Jackson, Wallace Hettle offers an innovative and distinctive approach to interpreting Stonewall by examining the lives and agendas of those authors who shape our current understanding of General Jackson. Newspaper reporters, friends, relatives, and fellow soldiers first wrote about Jackson immediately following the Civil War. Most of them, according to Hettle, used portions of their own life stories to frame that of the mythic general. Hettle argues that the legend of Jackson's rise from poverty to power was likely inspired by the rags-to-riches history of his first biographer, Robert Lewis Dabney. Dabney's own successes and Presbyterian beliefs probably shaped his account of Jackson's life as much as any factual research. Many other authors inserted personal values into their stories of Stonewall, perplexing generations of historians and writers. Subsequent biographers contributed their own layers to Jackson's myth and eventually a composite history of the general came to exist in the popular imagination. Later writers, such as the liberal suffragist Mary Johnston, who wrote a novel about Jackson, and the literary critic Allen Tate, who penned a laudatory biography, further shaped Stonewall's myth. As recently as 2003, the film Gods and Generals, which featured Jackson as the key protagonist, affirmed the longevity and power of his image. Impeccable research and nuanced analysis enable Hettle to use American culture and memory to reframe the Stonewall Jackson narrative and provide new ways to understand the long and contended legacy of one of the Civil War's most popular Confederate heroes.
THE EARLY HISTORY of America was a time of heroes. Just to embark on the earliest ocean voyages for settlement took special courage, as did the ever-expanding ventures into the wilderness. Henry Cabot Lodge and Theodore Roosevelt, descendants of two of the country's earliest settlers, have selected from among the many whose heroism stood out, from the Colonial Era through the Civil War. Some names we still know well-Washington, Boone, Custer, Lincoln-while others we know vaguely or not at all. The authors, eminent historians as well as political figures of their time, had come of age reading their stories. George Washington did not merely cross the Delaware and become our first president; he faced the enemy time after time in battle, showing know fear. And the authors were aware of the details of every battle-of every courageous political stand. They were aware of General Stark's leading his militiamen in the victorious uphill assault against a vastly superior, well-trained and well-armed force in the battle of Saratoga. And of George Cotchet and Shubrick Hayne, who successively retrieved a fallen banner to carry it forward, only to fall themselves at the hands of the enemy. These are tales of unspeakable valor, of those who heed the call of duty no matter the danger.
From a former US Assistant Surgeon General comes the epic tale of a young man’s struggle to survive a journey across America during the Civil War. Told by his stepmother that he alone had been responsible for the death of his mother, abandoned by the earlier departure of his father for the California 1849 goldfields, and threatened with being locked in a cage with his stepmother’s psychotic brother, eight-year-old Benjamin Franklin “B .F.” Windes decides to abandon home and trail his father’s path. Thus begins a trip of constant struggle with disease, severe weather, hardship, Indian attack, and death on his lone journey across much of what is now the United States. B.F. spends the next eleven years in gold rush towns in California—first as a barber, then as a physician’s assistant—before departing for the Caribbean at age nineteen, where he becomes a blockade-runner during the American Civil War. At war’s end, he discovers that the men he had been dealing with were nothing more than common murderers and thieves—Bushwhackers. He travels to the Missouri Ozarks where he meets the girl of his dreams. But their romance is threatened when he finds himself battling a man from his past in order to safeguard his family and his future. Orphan Hero, based on the life of the author’s great-grandfather in the mid-nineteenth century, is a tale of courage and perseverance in the face of incredible hardship. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade, Yucca, and Good Books imprints, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in fiction—novels, novellas, political and medical thrillers, comedy, satire, historical fiction, romance, erotic and love stories, mystery, classic literature, folklore and mythology, literary classics including Shakespeare, Dumas, Wilde, Cather, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.
A collection of great war stories! Here is a jumbo book of tales of courage and valor: 37 stories in all. * Our Classics and Greatest Stories series have a proven track record * Readers love tales of honor, courage, and valor * We have successfully re-launched the Greatest Stories series with Special Ops and Snipers * Unlike other books that focus on one war or conflict, this includes tales from more than 250 years of warfare in North America In War Stories, editor Lamar Underwood has pulled together some of the finest writings about war-fighting that capture readers imaginations. It includes legendary tales from the French and Indian Wars, the Civil War, the Great War, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq – more than 250 years of warfare from colonial times up through the present day. This unforgettable collection includes stories by: *Baron Manfred Von Richthofen *Christina Olds *Randy Zahn *Eddie Rickenbacker *William “Buffalo Bill” Cody *Stephen Crane *Michael Lee Lanning *Blake Stillwell *General Custer, and many others.
Albert F. Blaisdell and Francis K. Ball are the American co-authors of several historical short story collections for children, including Short Stories from American History (1905) and Stories of the Civil War (1890)
To commemorate the 150th Anniversary of the end of the Civil War, Diversion Books is publishing seminal works of the era: stories told by the men and women who led, who fought, and who lived in an America that had come apart at the seams. The events leading up to the Civil War reveal a country divided by more than just a belief in, or revulsion of, slavery. It reveals a country still forming, even as it fissures and breaks apart. It reveals an industrial north and an agricultural south evolving into enemies even as they mutually benefit one another. It reveals politicians playing to their bases, riling up young men especially to take up arms against their fellow countrymen. This astonishing historical work chronicles all this and more, exploring the fractious ideologies and the most important figures who led the country into its bloodiest conflict.
