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(More customer reviews)There is only one problem with Terrell Garren's writing. You can't stop reading them once you start! This book as with all Mr. Garren's work appeals to me as I live in the same area as my forebearers who served in the War Between the States and their unit is refered to in this work. I also had a WBTS ancestor who died in a Union prison at Rock Island Illinois. The boys in this story are based on actual 17 year olds from Western North Carolina who end up in Camp Douglas, outside Chicago.They became "Galvanized Yankees" to escape torture, starvation, and freezing to death. Once out west they became entangled in the Modoc Indian war with tragic results. There have been a number of books published recently discussing the conditions in Union prisons. Most people think Andersonville when the topic is brought up. But as The Fifth Skull points out the Union prisoners received the same rations as the typical Confederate soldier. Remember the Confederacy was under a Union blockade and could hardly feed themselves. The Union was under no such pressure however the prisoners in Union custody died of malnutrition,exposure,and lack of medical treatment for what reason? I highly recommend this book for WTBS history buffs and folks interested in the old west in the period right after the war.
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A new book by Civil War author and historian Terrell T. Garren is a compelling story of the Civil War, life as a prisoner of war, and one of the most bizarre of America's Indian wars. Garren, author of the regional best-seller, The Secret of War: A Dramatic History of Civil War Crime in Western North Carolina, and Moutain Myth: Unionism in Western North Carolina, "holds no punches" as he exposes abusive and barbaric acts committed by U.S. Army officers. He says, "This is a story that has long needed to be told." The story follows the lives of two seventeen-year-olds conscripted by Confederate authorities in the last year of the Civil War. The two are sent to Camp Vance in Morganton, North Carolina, as members of the Ninth Battalion, Confederate Junior Reserves. They and the other boys are without weapons or training when the camp is raided by Union soldiers. The two boys are captured and taken to the horrific Union prison at Camp Douglas in Chicago, Illinois. They endure the hardships of prison life until they are at the breaking point. Eventually they join the Union army's Galvanized Regiments to save themselves, and they end up on the western frontier where fate takes them to California. After serving on the plains and joining the regular army the two are assigned to duty as scouts during the Modoc War in northern California and southern Oregon. Always, they find themselves fighting for their very survival.
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