Enjoying a good book on history

Posted

I love a good book on history. One of my favorite historical authors is Hampton Sides. I have read all four of his books.

My first book by Sides was “Hellhound on his Trail.” This exciting story covers the largest manhunt in American history, the hunt for Martin Luther King Jr’s killer James Earl Ray. 

An interesting fact about Ray. He escaped from a maximum security prison in 1967 by hiding in a bread truck the year before he assassinated King. That prison was the Missouri State Penitentiary in Jefferson City.

From there, I went on to read Sides’ best-selling book “Ghost Soldiers” a heroic story of the rescue of American soldiers held captive in the Philippines at the end of World War II. Among those rescued were the last surviving members of the infamous Bataan Death March. 

I enjoyed the next book by Sides: “In the Kingdom of Ice.” In this book Sides chronicles the thrilling adventure of the USS Jeannette and the heroic efforts of her captain George W. DeLong and his crew of 32 to survive in one of the most brutal places on earth in their attempt to reach the North Pole.

Spoiler alert: They never made it. Their ship was trapped in ice northwest of Alaska for almost two years before the ice melted enough to allow the vessel to float again. 

Its freedom was short lived. Within 48 hours, the ship was crushed by moving ice and sank, leaving her crew some 300 nautical miles north of the Siberian coast.

Here is when the fight for survival begins for the lost sailors. 

If you want to know more, I recommend you purchase or check out this book from the library. You won’t be sorry.

One attribute I enjoy about Sides’ books — short chapters. Sometimes when I sit down to read I only have 10 to 15 minutes. Short, concise chapters make it easy to find a stopping place. In the occasion when the chapter is longer, he has dividing points.

I love to read books on history for the sheer joy of learning. To me, history is often more exciting than fiction. And let’s face it, reading is a great way to escape the pressures of everyday life.

I am always intrigued when I discover a connection to Missouri, such as Ray escaping from the prison in Jefferson City.

There is more than one connection to Missouri in Side’s fourth book, Blood and Thunder: An Epic of the American West. One of the main figures in this book is Kit Carson. Raised in Boone’s Lick, Mo. he ran away from an apprenticeship at 17 and headed west on the Santa Fe Trail. When he was 19 he became a mountain man. From this experience, he learned to speak Spanish, French and most of the Indian dialects of the west. 

But he never learned to read or write.

The next link to Missouri from this book was Thomas Hart Benton, not the painter, but his great-uncle. Benton, the politician, was a Missouri senator. He was perhaps the greatest proponent of westward expansion called manifest destiny.

Benton lobbied for three expeditions to explore the west. He saw to it that his son-in-law John C. Fremont would lead them. It was Carson who Fremont chose as his guide.

In a sidebar, our seventh president Andrew Jackson died in 1845 with a musket ball in his lung. He had received the ball from dual with Benton in 1813. It’s incredible how many of the great leaders of our country are connected. That dual did not stop the two from becoming friends and supporting each other when Jackson was president.

If only our current politicians could get along so well after a disagreement. Maybe they need to get in a boxing ring and duke it out.

When you read tales of triumph and tragedy, it puts everything into perspective. It makes the reader realize that many hardships we encounter cannot compare to what others have endured.

Two books I recently finished were “The Naked Communist” by Cleon Skousen and “Terror in the City of Champions” by Tom Stanton. I hope to share what I learned in these books in the coming weeks.

Two books on my night stand that I am looking forward to are “Killing the Killers,” Bill O’Reilly’s latest book in his Killing Series and “Robert E. Lee, A Life” by Allen C. Guelzo. I have read books on Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant. I can’t wait to learn more about this remarkable figure from our history.