The last U.S. Army mules were formally mustered out of the service in December 1956, ending 125 years of military reliance on the virtues of this singular animal. Much less glamorous than the cavalryman?s horse, the Army pack mule was a good deal more important: from the Mexican War through World War II, mules were an indispensable adjunct to army movement. ø The author has exhaustively researched the ubiquitous yet nearly invisible army mule. Through his work we learn a great deal about military procurement, transport, and supply, the bedrock on which military mobility rests.

Though the efficient movement of men, supplies, and equipment was a fundamental component of the civil war, Earl J. Hess’s Civil War Logistics is the first comprehensive study of the logistical systems that allowed the Union and Confederate armies to wage war. According to Hess, the Federal logistical effort was far more successful than the Confederate attempt to move and supply southern armies. This was due mainly to limited resources in the South but also to the North’s administrative management and a willingness to seize transportation resources when it needed them. Hess concludes that the logistical superiority of the northern forces laid a vital foundation for Union victory in the Civil War.

“A fascinating narrative with all the grace and power embodied in the wild horses that once populated the Western range . . . [A] magnificently told saga.” —Albuquerque Journal A Los Angeles Times Best Nonfiction Book of the Year Mustang is the sweeping story of the wild horse in the culture, history, and popular imagination of the American West. It follows the wild horse across time, from its evolutionary origins on this continent to its return with the conquistadors, its bloody battles on the old frontier, its iconic status in Buffalo Bill shows and early westerns, and its plight today as it makes its last stand on the vanishing range. With the Bureau of Land Management proposing to euthanize thousands of horses and ever-encroaching development threatening the land, the mustang’s position has never been more perilous. But as Stillman reveals, the horses are still running wild despite all the obstacles, with spirit unbroken. Hailed by critics nationwide, Mustang is “brisk, smart, thorough, and surprising” (Atlantic Monthly). “Like the best nonfiction writers of our time (Jon Krakauer and Bruce Chatwin come to mind), Stillman’s prose is inviting, her voice authoritative and her vision imaginative and impressively broad.” —Los Angeles Times “Powerful . . . Stillman’s talent as a writer makes this impossible [to stop reading], to the mustang’s benefit.” —Orion “A circumspect writer passionate about her purpose can produce a significant gift for readers. Stillman’s wonderful chronicle of America’s mustangs is an excellent example.” —The Seattle Times

This wide-ranging, original account of the politics and economics of the giant military supply project in the North reconstructs an important but little-known part of Civil War history. Drawing on new and extensive research in army and business archives, Mark R. Wilson offers a fresh view of the wartime North and the ways in which its economy worked when the Lincoln administration, with unprecedented military effort, moved to suppress the rebellion. This task of equipping and sustaining Union forces fell to career army procurement officers. Largely free from political partisanship or any formal free-market ideology, they created a mixed military economy with a complex contracting system that they pieced together to meet the experience of civil war. Wilson argues that the North owed its victory to these professional military men and their finely tuned relationships with contractors, public officials, and war workers. Wilson also examines the obstacles military bureaucrats faced, many of which illuminated basic problems of modern political economy: the balance between efficiency and equity, the promotion of competition, and the protection of workers' welfare. The struggle over these problems determined the flow of hundreds of millions of dollars; it also redirected American political and economic development by forcing citizens to grapple with difficult questions about the proper relationships among government, business, and labor. Students of the American Civil War will welcome this fresh study of military-industrial production and procurement on the home front—long an obscure topic.

Some of the legendary gunmen of the Old West were lawmen, but more, like Billy the Kid and Jesse James, were outlaws. Tom Horn (1860–1903) was both. Lawman, soldier, hired gunman, detective, outlaw, and assassin, this darkly enigmatic figure has fascinated Americans ever since his death by hanging the day before his forty-third birthday. In this masterful historical biography, Larry Ball, a distinguished historian of western lawmen and outlaws, presents the definitive account of Horn’s career. Horn became a civilian in the Apache wars when he was still in his early twenties. He fought in the last major battle with the Apaches on U.S. soil and chased the Indians into Mexico with General George Crook. He bragged about murdering renegades, and the brutality of his approach to law and order foreshadows his controversial career as a Pinkerton detective and his trial for murder in Wyoming. Having worked as a hired gun and a range detective in the years after the Johnson County War, he was eventually tried and hanged for killing a fourteen-year-old boy. Horn’s guilt is still debated. To an extent no previous scholar has managed to achieve, Ball distinguishes the truth about Horn from the numerous legends. Both the facts and their distortions are revealing, especially since so many of the untruths come from Horn’s own autobiography. As a teller of tall tales, Horn burnished his own reputation throughout his life. In spite of his services as a civilian scout and packer, his behavior frightened even his lawless companions. Although some writers have tried to elevate him to the top rung of frontier gun wielders, questions still shadow Horn’s reputation. Ball’s study concludes with a survey of Horn as described by historians, novelists, and screenwriters since his own time. These portrayals, as mixed as the facts on which they are based, show a continuing fascination with the life and legend of Tom Horn.

An unheralded military hero, Charles Young (18641922) was the third black graduate of West Point, the first African American national park superintendent, the first black U.S. military attachÉ, the first African American officer to command a Regular Army regiment, and the highest-ranking black officer in the Regular Army until his death. Black Officer in a Buffalo Soldier Regiment tells the story of the man who-willingly or not-served as a standard-bearer for his race in the officer corps for nearly thirty years, and who, if not for racial prejudice, would have become the first African American general.

In this biography of Lucian K. Truscott, Jr., author Harvey Ferguson tells the story of how Truscott—despite his hardscrabble beginnings, patchy education, and questionable luck— not only made the rank of army lieutenant general, earning a reputation as one of World War II’s most effective officers along the way, but was also given an honorary promotion to four-star general seven years after his retirement.

The Battle of the Rosebud may well be the largest Indian battle ever fought in the American West. The monumental clash on June 17, 1876, along Rosebud Creek in southeastern Montana pitted George Crook and his Shoshone and Crow allies against Sioux and Northern Cheyennes under Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. It set the stage for the battle that occurred eight days later when, just twenty-five miles away, George Armstrong Custer blundered into the very same village that had outmatched Crook. Historian Paul L. Hedren presents the definitive account of this critical battle, from its antecedents in the Sioux campaign to its historic consequences. Rosebud, June 17, 1876 explores in unprecedented detail the events of the spring and early summer of 1876. Drawing on an extensive array of sources, including government reports, diaries, reminiscences, and a previously untapped trove of newspaper stories, the book traces the movements of both Indian forces and U.S. troops and their Indian allies as Brigadier General Crook commenced his second great campaign against the northern Indians for the year. Both Indian and army paths led to Rosebud Creek, where warriors surprised Crook and then parried with his soldiers for the better part of a day on an enormous field. Describing the battle from multiple viewpoints, Hedren narrates the action moment by moment, capturing the ebb and flow of the fighting. Throughout he weighs the decisions and events that contributed to Crook’s tactical victory, and to his fateful decision thereafter not to pursue his adversary. The result is a uniquely comprehensive view of an engagement that made history and then changed its course. Rosebud was at once a battle won and a battle lost. With informed attention to the subtleties and significance of both outcomes, as well as to the fears and motivations on all sides, Hedren has given new meaning to this consequential fight, and new insight into its place in the larger story of the Great Sioux War.

Dogs: If therapists didn't charge you and were willing to chase sticks, they would be dogs. The kindly and receptive silence, the respect for secrets, the inexhaustible supply of attention-these are a dog's, and a therapist's, finest qualities. Dogs, though, are more fun than therapists, more tender, more dear, and certainly more admiring. Turkeys: I never expected to have any feelings about turkeys, but I love them. They follow me around like puppies. If I say "gobble" to them, they all start gobbling, in unison. Sometimes they show up outside my office and tap on the windows until I look up at them, and then they wait there, with endless patience, until I come outside and greet them. Chickens: Tweed and Mabel Black Label, my Araucana hens, are somewhat antisocial. When I pick up either of them, they eye me with such deep suspicion that I feel like they can smell omelets on my breath. Pet tigers: You know how it is-you start with one tiger, then you get another and another, then a few are born and a few die, and you start to lose track of details like exactly how many tigers you have. Cats: The cats were acquired to deal with the mice in the basement, but they don't like being in the basement because, well, I don't know why. Maybe because there are mice down there. Coyotes: Like everyone in Los Angeles, the coyotes I've seen there look like they work out a lot with personal trainers. Book jacket.

With more than 1,700 cross-referenced entries covering every aspect of World War II, the events and developments of the era, and myriad related subjects as well as a documents volume, this is the most comprehensive reference work available on the war. This encyclopedia represents a single source of authoritative information on World War II that provides accessible coverage of the causes, course, and consequences of the war. Its introductory overview essays and cross-referenced A–Z entries explain how various sources of friction culminated in a second worldwide conflict, document the events of the war and why individual battles were won and lost, and identify numerous ways the war has permanently changed the world. The coverage addresses the individuals, campaigns, battles, key weapons systems, strategic decisions, and technological developments of the conflict, as well as the diplomatic, economic, and cultural aspects of World War II. The five-volume set provides comprehensive information that gives readers insight into the reasons for the war's direction and outcome. Readers will understand the motivations behind Japan's decision to attack the United States, appreciate how the concentration of German military resources on the Eastern Front affected the war's outcome, understand the major strategic decisions of the war and the factors behind them, grasp how the Second Sino-Japanese War contributed to the start of World War II, and see the direct impact of new military technology on the outcomes of the battles during the conflict. The lengthy documents volume represents a valuable repository of additional information for student research.