Heroic Sacrifice Over Sicily

A thousand questions flashed through Lieutenant Cy Lewis’s mind as he spotted the pair of German Messerschmitt Me-109 fighters banking in to attack him. Read more

Harry S. Truman’s Battery D, 129th Field Artillery, 35th Division

In the darkness and driving rain on August 29, 1918, German artillery shells smashed down on American artillerymen fighting on a fir-clad slope in the Vosges Mountains in Alsace. Read more

The Big Red One in World War II

The outbreak of World War II on September 1, 1939, found the United States in an isolationist mood that precluded, for the time being, any direct involvement in the conflict. Read more

The Knoxville Campaign: Battle of Fort Sanders

After the crushing Union defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln relieved Maj. Read more

The Return of Hadley’s Harem

First Lieutenant Gilbert B. Hadley—he liked to be called “Gib”—was buried back home in Kansas in 1997, some 54 years after he was killed in action on August 1, 1943. Read more

Triumph At Plassey

For nearly 200 years, India was the jewel in the crown of the British Empire. Untold wealth flowed from such cities as Bombay, Madras, and Calcutta, supplying Great Britain with much of what made it possible to construct its world empire. Read more

Carnage at Bussaco

Tired, battered, and bruised, the Spaniards had put up a brave fight, but the enemy had proven too powerful. Read more

King Turned Pawn

It was around noon, June 19, 1940, when a small caravan of cars set out from Antibes in southern France en route to the Spanish border. Read more

The Death of General Robert McCook

When the Civil War erupted, so many of Lisbon, Ohio-born Robert McCook’s large extended family joined the Union Army that the clan became known as the “Fighting McCooks.” Read more

Off to War in a Plywood Box

They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old;

Age shall not weary them nor the years condemn. Read more

Wilson’s Creek: Bull Run of the West

At the beginning of 1861, Missouri was in turmoil. A slave state since its inception in 1820, Missouri had grown increasingly tied to urban industry. Read more

Suppressing the E-boats

A wily British scientist, a secret weapon, and a daring daytime Bombing raid helped break the back of the deadly German E-boat attacks on the Allied ships that supported the early D-Day landings at Normandy. Read more

‘Tis To Glory We Steer

Brimming with gale force winds, uncharted reefs, and a force of 21 enemy ships of the line, the bay seemed to be a deathtrap for the flagship Royal George. Read more

Yamashita’s Bluff Takes Singapore

Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto was not the only gambler in Imperial Japan’s military hierarchy. Lt. Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita, appointed commander of the Imperial Japanese Army’s (IJA) 25th Army on November 2, 1941, to lead the invasion of Malaya and Singapore, also took risks to capture the prized British territory in less than 100 days after his invasion commenced on December 8. Read more

Skanderberg: Christian Hero of Albania

On December 12, 1466, a small group of horsemen led by an old man with a long white beard rode up to the gates of Rome. Read more

A Survivor’s Tale

By Flint Whitlock

The mission was top secret. The heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis (CA-35) had just delivered the last parts of the atomic bomb from California to the island of Tinian and was heading, unescorted, to Guam when it was intercepted by a Japanese submarine, the I-58, and torpedoed on July 30, 1945. Read more

Maryland’s Maj. Gen. Nathaniel Towson

Few in the unincorporated community in Baltimore County that bears his name know of the deeds of the eminent American brevet Maj. Read more

Decades of Diplomacy

I am riding a borrowed bike along the Rhine, passing the Schaum-Hof, where last night I dined on a deck overlooking the river with a stately Dutch lady friend of a friend. Read more

Duke Philip III of Burgundy’s Near East Espionage

Duke Philip III “The Good” of Burgundy took responsibility in the early 15th century for overseeing intelligence missions to the Near East to assess the strength of the Ottoman Empire relative to the relief of the beleaguered Byzantines, as well as the possible recovery of Jerusalem. Read more

Prince Philip’s War

The son of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and Princess Alice of Battenberg, Prince Philip was the last of five children and a great-great grandchild of Queen Victoria. Read more