Tom Clavin

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A dramatic new look at Custer's last stand in time for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of the Little Big Horn, by the #1 New York Times bestselling coauthor of The Heart of Everything That Is.

On June 25–26, 1876, the Battle of the Little Bighorn, commonly referred to as Custer's Last Stand, was fought between combined forces of the Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes and the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the United States Army. Along the show more Little Bighorn River in Montana Territory, the battle resulted in the devastating defeat of U.S. forces and was the most significant action of the Great Sioux War of 1876.

Now, for the 150th anniversary of this famous engagement, #1 New York Times bestseller and coauthor of the biography of Sioux warrior Red Cloud, The Heart of Everything That Is, Tom Clavin takes a fresh look at Custer's Last Stand.

This dramatic look at the Little Bighorn battle has to not only include the Native American point of view―with two dynamic Native figures, Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, on prominent display―but also the impact it had on the Plains Indians. It turned out to be their last stand too because a vengeful nation quashed any remaining resistance, with a conclusive massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890, almost simultaneous with the murder of Sitting Bull.

In addition, Custer’s character by June 1876 is at the heart of this world-famous disaster. For all his celebrated bravery, especially at Gettysburg 13 years earlier, Custer became a devout media hound, desperate to gain fame. Even, some say, his own demise was a misguided attempt at grabbing national headlines: He envisioned a massacre – just not his own. As both the camera and the tabloid came of age, George Armstrong Custer became America’s first bona fide celebrity.

Vengeance is a thrilling read, filled with action, legendary characters, and poignance for the impact this had on Native Americans and the shape of the American West.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: I wondered what the hell there could be left to say about this military engagement that could illuminate the events in a light, through a lens and filter, that could deepen the focus and increase the contrast. "Hold my beer" said Author Clavin.

I know there are full biographies of all the men at the center of the story being told, excellent ones that delve into psychology, racism, nationalistic myth-making and resistance to it. The short chapters and broad focus of this historical analysis of causes and effects can't offer that depth or completeness. It can, and does, offer more accessible takes on the dramatis personae and thus that much more context for the pyrrhic victory won at the Little Bighorn River.

It's not a story where breaking news is likely to occur...the souces cited in the notes tell you we're not hot on the trail of some newly discovered textual evidence breaking open some of the enduring mysteries of Custer's uncharacteristically stupid actions. It's not that book; it's very much a useful primer, broadening its intended white, history-buff audience's awareness of how the battle looked from its different combatants' eyes. I enjoyed the quick-hit chapters because I'm only very slightly interested in the battle bits, more in the people bits. The carnage is not stinted herein. But we're not *immersed* in it because no piece of the story as retold here lasts long enough to make the reader feel he's going to need to scrub blood off his footgear after the read.

It's a popularization of more scholarly, and a contextualization of more white-triumphalist, works that have come before it. As I do not care to subject myself to the dizzying heights/depths of historiographic work done on Manifest Destiny and its concomitant Native American genocide, it's a work that suited my reading needs. show less

I DNF’d this (mostly the audiobook version though I also checked out the ebook from our excellent library - I like to go between reading and listening) early on, for its breezy, conversational tone while discussing such things as genocide. For example, the introduction says something like, imagine as you read, you’re gathered around a campfire, listening to legendary tales about mighty people. Yet early on we hear, in the most blasé fashion, that one of the principals of the foundation show more of Texas felt that the only way to handle the natives of the land to make way for white settlement was literal genocide. This was narrated in a tone fitting for a grocery list or a sports score.

I found this so jarring and upsetting I simply didn’t want to stick around to hear more. I made it a small way past this but could tell this was going to be the tone of the work and that made it a no go. History is important and I’m under no illusions about the indefensible nature of what was done to the indigenous peoples of North America, but to simply imagine that this is a legendary tale told around a campfire gives a surreal Pecos Bill cast to murder. show less

Dramatic true story of a maritime military operation interrupted by an enormous typhoon. Admiral Halsey’s fleet was preparing to support MacArthur’s invasion of Luzon in the Philippines in 1944, when they steered directly into the course of Typhoon Cobra with its 90-foot waves and over 100 knot gusting winds. This book tells an inspiring story of sailors confronting life-or-death situations. Though much of the story is tragic, the highlight is a valiant rescue effort by a relatively show more inexperienced captain and crew of a small Destroyer Escort.

The first part of the book sets up the military objectives and participants. The second part tells of the gathering storm, leadership decisions, and the ships’ maneuvers. The rescue effort is riveting, and it is worth reading the book just for this portion. The travails of the sailors contending with the elements, wounds, sharks, madness induced from drinking saltwater, and numerous miseries are heart-wrenching. Though the authors do not dwell on the carnage, the graphic descriptions are not for the faint-hearted.

The authors are journalists, trying to determine if the sinking of ships and loss of life was preventable. The transcripts of the U.S. Naval Court of Inquiry had been recently declassified and formed much of the basis of their analysis, along with survivors’ stories and in-depth research. These stories jump around a bit, and it is sometimes difficult to keep track of which ship is being referenced. The personal anecdotes are particularly effective in showing what the sailors encountered as their ships were battered by the storm.

Two examples of these personal accounts include:
“Clinging to the top of the Cape Esperance’s center mast with every muscle in his body, Paul Schlener was not sure what to do as the storm increased in intensity. His watch was technically over, but whether through oversight or intention, no crewmate had relieved him and no officer had signaled for him to climb down. In fact, the scud was so thick that he could barely make out the deck sixty feet below. He was petrified.”
and
“Kosco sat upright in his bunk. He was overwhelmed “with a feeling of great, leaden weights pressing on [my] shoulders.” He threw on his heavy weather gear and scrambled up the iron skipper’s ladder to the navigation deck. Leaning into the wind and listening to the pounding surf, he surveyed the otherworldly tableau; giant, mottled whitecaps stretched endless in every direction under a black, starless dome. If the dark side of the moon were covered by sea, he thought, this is what it would look like.”

I am very glad that meteorology has progressed since WWII, and it is unlikely that a fleet would be unaware of the location of such a large storm today. There are definitely lessons in leadership to be gleaned from this book, primarily related crisis management. It definitely creates food for thought on how the reader would react in a similar situation. Part military analysis, part man vs. nature, part survival story, this book is filled with peril, catastrophe, and heroism. I read it in observance of Veterans’ Day and found it a powerful tribute to the Brotherhood of the Sea. show less

In my youth Daniel Boone was a hot commodity, as were Lewis and Clark, Crockett, Custer, Carson, and a long list of other figures whose lives made America’s dream of manifest destiny a reality. At my young age, Boone’s adventures in opening the wilderness were a thrill, but that is all they were, adventures. The authors of the books I read back then did little to provide context to his deeds.

Over the years, America’s attitudes towards its interactions with native Americans underwent a show more quantum shift. The publication of books such as Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee changed our view from that of Indian wars to genocidal extermination. In the final decades of the twentieth century the heroic luster of early American explorers and pioneers tarnished in the face of unrelenting condemnation to the point where my daughters, both in their twenties, had never heard of Daniel Boone before today.

Fortunately, the new millennium has brought us a new generation of historians whose interests lie more in telling an accurate, unbiased story than in glorifying one side or the other. Authors such as Nathaniel Philbrick and Erik Larson have made careers out of taking all we think we know about famous people and events and turning it on its head by the simple expedient of telling the unvarnished truth. High on this list of authors are Bob Drury and Tom Clavin who have cowritten books spanning U.S. history from Valley Forge to Vietnam, including a biography of Oglala Sioux Chief Red Cloud. Their newest book, Blood and Treasure, relates the events surrounding Daniel Boone’s settlement of Kentucky and his role in the American Revolutionary War.

It has been fifty years since I last read a book about him. Back then, books told the story of Daniel Boone, the legend. Now, I finally get a chance to learn about Daniel Boone, the man. It is not a ‘warts and all’ exposé aimed at trashing his reputation, but a skillfully researched account of his life provided in the context of the times in which he lived.

Many of the more memorable stories of him are about Boone the Indian fighter, his close calls and escapes, but they leave out the fact that these events were part of a larger war. During the Revolution, the British actively recruited warriors from numerous tribes to make war on the American settlers. By opening up a western front, they hoped to pull men and resources away from George Washington’s army and thereby end the war. To this end, the British Army offered bounties for American scalps. When the Shawnee and several other tribes besieged Boonesborough in 1778 they were accompanied by forty to fifty British and and Canadians and fought under the Union Jack. Had the siege succeeded, they could have easily taken several smaller settlements and “flank the coastal revolutionaries from the rear, forcing Washington’s Continental Army to defend two fronts. Gen. Cornwallis was already planning to open a southern theater, and it is easy to imagine he and Hamilton crushing the southern rebels between them”. In the Shawnees’ defense, The British were offering them the one thing that their survival depended on, all the land west of the Alleghenies and laws prohibiting white settlements in Indian lands. Stamp Acts and ‘taxation without representation’ be damned. This vast expanse of unsettled land is what the war was all about.

Bottom line: Drury and Clavin penned an amazing book that revisits a history that has been all but forgotten. As a genealogist, I appreciate the tremendous amount of research that went into it. I highly recommend this book.

*Quotations are cited from an advanced reading copy and may not be the same as appears in the final published edition. The review was based on an advanced reading copy obtained at no cost from the publisher in exchange for an unbiased review. While this does take any ‘not worth what I paid for it’ statements out of my review, it otherwise has no impact on the content of my review.

FYI: On a 5-point scale I assign stars based on my assessment of what the book needs in the way of improvements:
*5 Stars – Nothing at all. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
*4 Stars – It could stand for a few tweaks here and there but it’s pretty good as it is.
*3 Stars – A solid C grade. Some serious rewriting would be needed in order for this book to be considered great or memorable.
*2 Stars – This book needs a lot of work. A good start would be to change the plot, the character development, the writing style and the ending.
*1 Star – The only thing that would improve this book is a good bonfire. show less