In The Wall Street Journal, Victor Davis Hanson named With the Old Breed
one of the top five books on epic twentieth-century battles. Studs Terkel
interviewed the author for his definitive oral history, The Good War. Now E.
B. Sledge´s acclaimed first-person account of fighting at Peleliu and Okinawa
returns to thrill, edify, and inspire a new generation. An Alabama boy steeped
in American history and enamored of such heroes as George Washington and Daniel
Boone, Eugene B. Sledge became part of the war´s famous 1st Marine Division-3d
Battalion, 5th Marines. Even after intense training, he was shocked to be
thrown into the battle of Peleliu, where the world was a nightmare of flashes,
explosions, and snapping bullets. By the time Sledge hit the hell of Okinawa,
he was a combat vet, still filled with fear but no longer with panic. Based on
notes Sledge secretly kept in a copy of the New Testament, With the Old Breed
captures with utter simplicity and searing honesty the experience of a soldier
in the fierce Pacific Theater. Here is what saved, threatened, and changed his
life. Here, too, is the story of how he learned to hate and kill-and came to
love-his fellow man. From the Trade Paperback edition.
