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In its essence, Texas history is military history. Comprehensive in scope, A Military History of Texas provides the first single-volume military history of Texas from pre-Columbian clashes between Native American tribes to the establishment of the United States Space Force as the newest branch of the nation’s military in the twenty-first century. Rather than creating new theories of what happened, author Loyd Uglow synthesizes competing views of Texas’s military past into a narrative that deals evenhandedly with different interpretations, and recognizes that there is a measure of truth in each one, even while emphasizing those that seem most plausible. Uglow ties the various engrossing a...
Winner, T. R. Fehrenbach Book Award, Texas Historical Commission Summerfield G. Roberts Award, Sons of the Republic of Texas Honorable Mention, Certificate of Commendation, American Association for State and Local History Hardly were the last shots fired at the Alamo before the Texas Revolution entered the realm of myth and controversy. French visitor Frederic Gaillardet called it a "Texian Iliad" in 1839, while American Theodore Sedgwick pronounced the war and its resulting legends "almost burlesque." In this highly readable history, Stephen L. Hardin discovers more than a little truth in both of those views. Drawing on many original Texan and Mexican sources and on-site inspections of almo...
The notion has persisted far too long that the army of patriots that won Texas independence from Mexico in 1835-1836 was totally without uniforms, clad indifferently for the most part in rustic frontier garb. This was true for many, but by no means all. Surprisingly, there were uniformed Texas units in all of the major battles of the Texas Revolution from the first to the last: the siege of Bexar, the Alamo, Goliad (Coleto), and the final victory at San Jacinto. This new book by Bruce Marshall is a long overdue history of the uniforms of the Texas Revolution and the men who wore them. It will also reveal certain hitherto suppressed material from some who served, including the vast majority of the Texas officers, challenging the generally accepted historical version portraying the Texas commander, General Sam Houston, as a master strategist who, alone, deserved full credit for saving Texas.
Traces the history of Texas during the Civil War from the passage of the secession ordinance in Austin through the battle of Palmito Ranch, and includes information about Texas sites associated with the war.
On November 11, 1918, what was then called “the Great War” ended. The consequences of four years of warfare in Europe reverberated throughout the world, leaving few places untouched. Even though it was far from the scenes of conflict, Texas was forever changed, as historian Gregory W. Ball details in Texas and World War I. This accessible history recounts the ways in which the war affected Texas and Texans politically, socially, and economically. Texas’s position on the United States border with Mexico and on the western edge of the American South profoundly influenced the ways in which the war affected the state, from fears of invasion from the across the Rio Grande—fears that put t...
The idea of Texas was forged in the crucible of frontier warfare between 1822 and 1865, when Anglo-Americans adapted to mounted combat north of the Rio Grande. This cavalry-centric arena, which had long been the domain of Plains Indians and the Spanish Empire, compelled an adaptive martial tradition that shaped early Lone Star society. Beginning with initial tactical innovation in Spanish Tejas and culminating with massive mobilization for the Civil War, Texas society developed a distinctive way of war defined by armed horsemanship, volunteer militancy, and short-term mobilization as it grappled with both tribal and international opponents. Drawing upon military reports, participants' memoir...
In Why Texans Fought in the Civil War, Charles David Grear provides insights into what motivated Texans to fight for the Confederacy. Mining important primary sources—including thousands of letters and unpublished journals—he affords readers the opportunity to hear, often in the combatants’ own words, why it was so important to them to engage in tumultuous struggles occurring so far from home. As Grear notes, in the decade prior to the Civil War the population of Texas had tripled. The state was increasingly populated by immigrants from all parts of the South and foreign countries. When the war began, it was not just Texas that many of these soldiers enlisted to protect, but also their native states, where they had family ties.
When their country calls, Texas Aggies go to war. From the Spanish-American War and World War I to Operation Iraqi Freedom, Aggies have been in the forefront of America’s armed forces, producing more officers than any other school outside the service academies. More than 20,000 Texas Aggies served in World War II, for instance, including more than 14,000 as commissioned officers. Trained in leadership and the knowledge required for warfare, Aggies have served with distinction in all branches of the military service. In this first-ever compilation of the impressive war record of Texas Aggies, stories of individual soldiers, airmen, sailors, and marines are displayed with an abundance of sta...
Written for both the specialist and the casual reader, Texas and the Mexican War discusses the pivotal role Texas played in the Mexican War, battles fought on Texas soil, and the contributions—for better or sometimes worse—of Texas troops throughout the war. Since the opening of hostilities in 1846, the Mexican War has remained controversial. Author Charles M. Robinson III describes how attitudes of the era were influenced by sectional, political, and social differences, and, in recent times, by comparison to conflicts such as Vietnam. Robinson draws on U.S. and Mexican sources to discuss conditions in both countries that he believes made the war inevitable. Besides examining the politic...
A portrait of Houston's diverse careers that sheds light upon his heroism, romanticism, and contributions to the Republic of Texas