Degree Department

Ordered West: The Civil War Exploits of Charles A. Curtis

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Accounts of Charles Curtis, who served in the 5th United States Infantry on the New Mexico and Arizona frontier. This is edited version version of serial installments (originally published in newspapers from 1877-1880) with the addition of biographical information and some historical context, as well as some reorganization to read chronologically and some normalization of language and spelling. Index starts on page 561.
Date: June 2017
Creator: Gaff, Alan D. & Gaff, Donald H.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Law of War Manual (open access)

Law of War Manual

From section 1.1.2 Scope: "This manual is not a definitive explanation of all law of war issues. This manual focuses on jus in bello -- law relating to the conduct of hostilities and the protection of war victims. This manual seeks to address the law of war that is applicable to the United States, including treaties to which the United States is a Party, and applicable customary international law. It provides legal rules, principles, and discussion, particularly with respect to DoD practice. Although the views of other States may be referenced in this manual, it is not a purpose of this manual to describe the views of other States, which may differ from views expressed in this manual" (p. 1).
Date: June 2015
Creator: United States. Department of Defense. Office of General Counsel.
System: The UNT Digital Library

From the Halls of the Montezumas: Mexican War Dispatches from James L. Freaner, Writing under the Pen Name “Mustang”

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James L. Freaner was one of America’s first war correspondents covering General Winfield Scott’s campaign during the Mexican War. His letters appeared in newspapers under the byline “Mustang,” and his reports from the front included publication of complete casualty lists (long before official reports became public), detailed battle descriptions, and observations on postwar Mexico. Freaner’s greatest contribution was persuading Nicholas P. Trist, negotiator with Mexico, to ignore his recall and conclude a peace treaty that added California, Nevada, Utah, and other territory to a growing country. From the Halls of the Montezumas is a complete compilation of Freaner’s Mexican War reporting. Editors Alan D. Gaff and Donald H. Gaff annotated the text with footnotes identifying people, places, and events, also adding pictures of key figures and maps.
Date: October 2019
Creator: Gaff, Alan D.; Gaff, Donald H. & Mustang (War correspondent), 1817-1852
System: The UNT Digital Library

Civil War General and Indian Fighter James M. Williams: Leader of the 1st Kansas Colored Volunteer Infantry and the 8th U.S. Cavalry

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The military career of General James Monroe Williams spanned both the Civil War and the Indian Wars in the West, yet no biography has been published to date on his important accomplishments, until now. From his birth on the northern frontier, westward movement in the Great Migration, rush into the violence of antebellum Kansas Territory, Civil War commands in the Trans-Mississippi, and as a cavalry officer in the Indian Wars, Williams was involved in key moments of American history. Like many who make a difference, Williams was a leader of strong convictions, sometimes impatient with heavy-handed and sluggish authority. Building upon his political opinions and experience as a Jayhawker, Williams raised and commanded the ground-breaking 1st Kansas Colored Volunteer Infantry Regiment in 1862. His new regiment of black soldiers was the first such organization to engage Confederate troops, and the first to win. He enjoyed victories in Missouri, Indian Territory (Oklahoma), and Arkansas, but also fought in the abortive Red River Campaign and endured defeat and the massacre of his captured black troops at Poison Spring. In 1865, as a brigadier general, Williams led his troops in consolidating control of northern Arkansas. Williams played a key role in taking Indian …
Date: May 15, 2013
Creator: Lull, Robert W.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Civil War Soldiers of Kendall County, Texas: A Biographical Dictionary (open access)

Civil War Soldiers of Kendall County, Texas: A Biographical Dictionary

Book containing an alphabetical list of persons from Kendall County, Texas who served in the military during the Civil War, with any known biographical information about each person. There is also relevant background information about the area in the preface, and a series of tables at the end of the book, containing additional reference material. A table of contents is on page v.
Date: 2013
Creator: Kiel, Frank Wilson 1930-
System: The Portal to Texas History

Beyond the Quagmire: New Interpretations of the Vietnam War

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In Beyond the Quagmire, thirteen scholars from across disciplines provide a series of provocative, important, and timely essays on the politics, combatants, and memory of the Vietnam War. The essays pose new questions, offer new answers, and establish important lines of debate regarding social, political, military, and memory studies. Part 1 contains four chapters by scholars who explore the politics of war in the Vietnam era. In Part 2, five contributors offer chapters on Vietnam combatants with analyses of race, gender, environment, and Chinese intervention. Part 3 provides four innovative and timely essays on Vietnam in history and memory.
Date: March 2019
Creator: Jensen, Geoffrey W. & Stith, Matthew M.
System: The UNT Digital Library

War in East Texas: Regulators vs. Moderators

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From 1840 through 1844 East Texas was wracked by murderous violence between Regulator and Moderator factions. More than thirty men were killed in assassinations, lynchings, ambushes, street fights, and pitched battles. The sheriff of Harrison County was murdered, and so was the founder of Marshall, as well as a former district judge. Senator Robert Potter, a signer of the Texas Declaration of Independence, was slain by Regulators near his Caddo Lake home. Courts ceased to operate and anarchy reigned in Shelby County, Panola District, and Harrison County. Only the personal intervention of President Sam Houston and an invasion of the militia of the Republic of Texas halted the bloodletting. The Regulator-Moderator War was the first and largest of the many blood feuds of Texas. Bill O'Neal includes rosters of names of the Regulator and Moderator factions arranged by the counties in which the individuals were associated, along with a roster of the victims of the war.
Date: July 2018
Creator: O'Neal, Bill
System: The UNT Digital Library

Always for the Underdog: Leather Britches Smith and the Grabow War

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Louisiana’s Neutral Strip, an area of pine forests, squats between the Calcasieu and Sabine Rivers on the border of East Texas. Originally a lawless buffer zone between Spain and the United States, its hardy residents formed tight-knit communities for protection and developed a reliance on self, kin, and neighbor. In the early 1900s, the timber boom sliced through the forests and disrupted these dense communities. Mill towns sprang up, and the promise of money lured land speculators, timber workers, unionists, and a host of other characters, such as the outlaw Leather Britches Smith. That moment continues to shape the place’s cultural consciousness, and people today fashion a lore connected to this time. In a fascinating exploration of the region, Keagan LeJeune unveils the legend of Leather Britches, paralleling the stages of the outlaw’s life to the Neutral Strip’s formation. LeJeune retells each stage of Smith’s life: his notorious past, his audacious deeds of robbery and even generosity, his rumored connection to a local union strike—the Grabow War—significant in the annals of labor history, and his eventual death. As the outlaw’s life vividly unfolds, Always for the Underdog also reveals the area’s history and cultural landscape. Often using the particulars of …
Date: December 15, 2010
Creator: LeJeune, Keagan
System: The UNT Digital Library

Women in Civil War Texas: Diversity and Dissidence in the Trans-Mississippi

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Women in Civil War Texas is the first book dedicated to the unique experiences of Texas women during this time. It connects Texas women’s lives to southern women’s history and shares the diversity of experiences of women in Texas during the Civil War. Contributors explore Texas women and their vocal support for secession, coping with their husbands’ wartime absences, the importance of letter-writing, and how pro-Union sentiment caused serious difficulties for women. They also analyze the effects of ethnicity, focusing on African American, German, and Tejana women’s experiences. Finally, two essays examine the problem of refugee women in east Texas and the dangers facing western frontier women. The contents include: "Everyone has the war fever" / Vicki Betts -- Caroline Sedberry, politician's wife / Dorothy Ewing -- He said, she said / Beverly Rowe -- Finding joy through hard times / Brittany Bounds -- Black Texas women and the freedom war / Bruce A. Glasrud -- Black women and Supreme Court decisions during the Civil War era / Linda S. Hudson -- Mexican-Texan women in the Civil War / Jerry Thompson and Elizabeth Mata -- Courage on a Texas frontier / Judith Dykes-Hoffman -- "In favor of our fathers' country …
Date: October 2016
Creator: Liles, Deborah M. & Boswell, Angela
System: The UNT Digital Library

The AEF in Print: An Anthology of American Journalism in World War I

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The AEF in Print is an anthology that tells the story of U.S. involvement in World War I through newspaper and magazine articles—precisely how the American public experienced the Great War. From April 1917 to November 1918, Americans followed the war in their local newspapers and popular magazines. The book’s chapters are organized chronologically: Mobilization, Arrival in Europe, Learning to Fight, American Firsts, Battles, and the Armistice. Also included are topical chapters, such as At Sea, In the Air, In the Trenches, Wounded Warriors, and Heroes. “Some of these stories are real gems. Irving Cobb’s account of the sinking of the SS Tuscania, for example, is absolutely riveting, and the same can be said of William Shepherd’s description of life aboard US Navy destroyers in the Atlantic, Floyd Gibbons’s narration of his wounding at Belleau Wood, and George Pattullo’s roll-out of the Sergeant York legend.” —Steven Trout, author of On the Battlefield of Memory: The First World War and American Remembrance. “The well-written and evocative articles bring the war to life.” —Jennifer Keene, author of Doughboys, the Great War, and the Remaking of America.
Date: May 2018
Creator: Dubbs, Chris & Kelley, John-Daniel
System: The UNT Digital Library

Still the Arena of Civil War: Violence and Turmoil in Reconstruction Texas, 1865/1874

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Following the Civil War, the United States was fully engaged in a bloody conflict with ex-Confederates, conservative Democrats, and members of organized terrorist groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan, for control of the southern states. Texas became one of the earliest battleground states in the War of Reconstruction. Throughout this era, white Texans claimed that Radical Republicans in Congress were attempting to dominate their state through “Negro-Carpetbag-Scalawag rule.” In response to these perceived threats, whites initiated a violent guerilla war that was designed to limit support for the Republican Party. They targeted loyal Unionists throughout the South, especially African Americans who represented the largest block of Republican voters in the region. Was the Reconstruction era in the Lone Star State simply a continuation of the Civil War? Evidence presented by sixteen contributors in this new anthology, edited by Kenneth W. Howell, argues that this indeed was the case. Topics include the role of the Freedmen’s Bureau and the occupying army, focusing on both sides of the violence. Several contributors analyze the origins of the Ku Klux Klan and its operations in Texas, how the Texas State Police attempted to quell the violence, and Tejano adjustment to Reconstruction. Other chapters …
Date: March 15, 2012
Creator: Howell, Kenneth W.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Enemies Within: The Cold War and the AIDS Crisis in Literature, Film, and Culture (open access)

Enemies Within: The Cold War and the AIDS Crisis in Literature, Film, and Culture

Book discussing the literature and film of the Cold War and AIDS eras in an effort to link the two with the fear they created; "not only the political and biological illnesses...but also the fear and panic they engender." Index starts on page 235.
Date: 2017
Creator: Foertsch, Jacqueline, 1964-
System: The UNT Digital Library
War in the Pacific: A Chronology January 1, 1941 through September 30, 1945 (open access)

War in the Pacific: A Chronology January 1, 1941 through September 30, 1945

Text outlining major events in the Pacific Theater throughout World War II, organized by date. It also includes text for the Instrument of Surrender, appendices containing military and war data, a bibliography, and list of related Web sites.
Date: March 2014
Creator: Hyland, George O., III
System: The UNT Digital Library

Power, Institutions, and Leadership in War and Peace: Lessons from Peru and Ecuador 1995-1998

This book discusses the boundary dispute war between Ecuador and Peru in 1995 and the role of institutions, leadership, and power played in leading to the war and making peace.
Date: 2013
Creator: Mares, David R. & Palmer, David Scott
System: The Portal to Texas History
Memories of Wartime Wanderings: What I Did in World War II (open access)

Memories of Wartime Wanderings: What I Did in World War II

Personal memoirs of Ann van Wynen Tomas about her time in the U.S. Foreign Service during World War II, serving in South Africa and later at the Dutch Government in Exile, in London.
Date: 2013
Creator: Thomas, Ann van Wynen & Lincecum, Jerry Bryan, 1942-
System: The Portal to Texas History

Riding for the Lone Star: Frontier Cavalry and the Texas Way of War, 1822-1865

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Historical description of military operations organized into eight chapters covering frontier Texas: [1] Tribal Warfare of Colonial Tejas, 1822-1835, [2] The War for Texian Independence, 1835-1836, [3] Conflicts of the Early Texas Republic, 1836-1838, [4] Conflicts of the Middle Texas Republic, 1838-1840, [5] Conflicts of the Late Texas Republic, 1841-1845, [6] The Mexican-American War, 1846-1848, [7] Conflicts of Antebellum Texas, 1846-1861, and [8] The War for Confederate Independence, 1861-1865. Index starts on page 393.
Date: February 2016
Creator: Jennings, Nathan A.
System: The UNT Digital Library

Stilwell and Mountbatten in Burma: Allies at War, 1943-1944

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Stilwell and Mountbatten in Burma explores the relationship between American General Joseph “Vinegar Joe” Stilwell and British Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten in the China-Burma-India Theater (CBI) and the South East Asia Command (SEAC) between October 1943 and October 1944, within the wider context of Anglo-American relations during World War II. Using original material from both British and American archives, Jonathan Templin Ritter discusses the military, political, and diplomatic aspects of Anglo-American cooperation, the personalities involved, and where British and American policies both converged and diverged over Southeast Asia. Although much has been written about CBI, Stilwell and China, and Mountbatten, no published comparison study has focused on the relationship between the two men during the twelve-month period in which their careers overlapped. This book bridges the gap in the literature between Mountbatten’s earlier naval career and his later role as the last Viceroy of British India. It also presents original archival material that explains why Stilwell was so anti-British, including his 1935 memorandum titled “The British,” and his original margin notes to Mountbatten’s farewell letter to him in 1944. Finally, it presents other original archival material that refutes previous books that have accused Stilwell of needlessly sacrificing the lives of …
Date: April 2017
Creator: Ritter, Jonathan Templin
System: The UNT Digital Library

Yesterday There Was Glory: With the 4th Division, A.E.F., in World War I

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Memoir describing historical events and personal accounts of Gerald Andrew Howell based on his experiences during World War I, originally completed in 1946 : "His narrative was a study of a small group of American soldiers attempting to survive some of the most ferocious combat of the 'Great War.' He included information on the movements and activities of his 39th Infatry Regiment and the 4th Division, but Howell kept the focus of the story on his squad, a typical cross section of the A.E.F. {American Expeditionary Forces]" (p. 2) This edited version has some introductory and supplementary information and has made minor corrections to the original text. Index starts on page 338.
Date: September 2017
Creator: Howell, Gerald Andrew & Patrick, Jeffrey L.
System: The UNT Digital Library

Command Culture: Officer Education in the U.S. Army and the German Armed Forces, 1901-1940, and the Consequences for World War II

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In Command Culture, Jörg Muth examines the different paths the United States Army and the German Armed Forces traveled to select, educate, and promote their officers in the crucial time before World War II. Muth demonstrates that the military education system in Germany represented an organized effort where each school and examination provided the stepping stone for the next. But in the United States, there existed no communication about teaching contents or didactical matters among the various schools and academies, and they existed in a self chosen insular environment. American officers who finally made their way through an erratic selection process and past West Point to the important Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, found themselves usually deeply disappointed, because they were faced again with a rather below average faculty who forced them after every exercise to accept the approved “school solution.” Command Culture explores the paradox that in Germany officers came from a closed authoritarian society but received an extremely open minded military education, whereas their counterparts in the United States came from one of the most democratic societies but received an outdated military education that harnessed their minds and limited their initiative. On the other …
Date: June 15, 2011
Creator: Muth, Jörg
System: The UNT Digital Library

Oral History Interview with Thomas Jenny, April 3, 2013

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Interview with Thomas Jenny, a Marine Corps and Air America pilot from Miami, Florida, who served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. Jenny discusses his interest in aviation, entering the Naval Flight Training Program, flight training, joining the Marine Corps, assignment to Korea, working for Pan-Am, joining Air America, and flying a variety of aircraft and missions from Thailand and Laos.
Date: April 3, 2013
Creator: Ferguson, J. Michael & Jenny, Thomas
System: The UNT Digital Library

Oral History Interview with Max Schlotter, July 21, 2014

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Transcript of an interview with Max Schlotter, WWII and Korean War Navy veteran. Schlotter shares concerning his childhood in the Congo and Texas; family history; living on the Alabama-Coushatta reservation near Livingston, Texas; enlistment in the Navy; assignment on USS Thurston; attending the V-12 program; assignment on the USS Long Island in the Pacific Theater; post-war college and teaching; recall by Navy during the Korean War; assignment to USS Adirondack and Naples, Italy; and post-war life. Appendix includes photos, a map of the Okinawa Invasion, and biographical notes.
Date: July 21, 2014
Creator: Millier, Callie & Schlotter, Max, 1924-
System: The UNT Digital Library
Military History of the West: Volume 41 (open access)

Military History of the West: Volume 41

Annual publication of the University of North Texas detailing military history in the western United States.
Date: 2011
Creator: University of North Texas
System: The Portal to Texas History

A Machine-Gunner in France: The Memoirs of Ward Schrantz, 35th Division, 1917-1919

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This is the WWI memoir of Ward Schrantz, a National Guard officer and machine gun company commander in the Kansas-Missouri 35th Division. He extensively documents his experiences and those of his men, from training at Camp Doniphan to their voyage across the Atlantic, and to their time in the trenches in France’s Vosges Mountains and ultimately to their return home. He devotes much of his memoir to the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, in which the 35th Division suffered heavy casualties and made only moderate gains before being replaced by fresh troops. Schrantz also describes the daily life of a soldier, including living conditions, relations between officers and enlisted men, and the horrific experience of combat. Editor Jeffrey Patrick combines his narrative with excerpts from a detailed history of the unit that Schrantz wrote for his local newspaper, and also provides an editor’s introduction and annotations.
Date: April 2019
Creator: Schrantz, Ward L. & Patrick, Jeffrey L.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Growing up in Texas (open access)

Growing up in Texas

Memoir written by Annie Margaret Rankin Warner and Virginia "Jenny" Louise Rankin Marshall of stories on growing up in West Texas from 1866-1995.
Date: 2016
Creator: Rankin Warner, Annie Margaret & Marshall, Virginia R.
System: The Portal to Texas History