History

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE
The harrowing, true account from the brave men on the ground who fought back during the Battle of Benghazi.
13 HOURS presents, for the first time ever, the true account of the events of September 11, 2012, when terrorists attacked the US State Department Special Mission Compound and a nearby CIA station called the Annex in Benghazi, Libya. A team of six American security operators fought to repel the attackers and protect the Americans stationed there. Those men went beyond the call of duty, performing extraordinary acts of courage and heroism, to avert tragedy on a much larger scale. This is their personal account, never before told, of what happened during the thirteen hours of that now-infamous attack.

13 HOURS sets the record straight on what happened during a night that has been shrouded in mystery and controversy. Written by New York Times bestselling author Mitchell Zuckoff, this riveting book takes readers into the action-packed story of heroes who laid their lives on the line for one another, for their countrymen, and for their country.

13 HOURS is a stunning, eye-opening, and intense book--but most importantly, it is the truth. The story of what happened to these men--and what they accomplished--is unforgettable.

Kurt Eichenwald--New York Times bestselling author of Conspiracy of Fools and The Informant--recounts the first 500 days after 9/11 in a comprehensive, fly on the wall, compelling page-turner as gripping as any thriller.

Kurt Eichenwald--New York Times bestselling author of Conspiracy of Fools and The Informant-- recounts the first 500 days after 9/11 in a comprehensive, compelling page-turner as gripping as any thriller.

In 500 Days, master chronicler Kurt Eichenwald lays bare the harrowing decisions, deceptions, and delusions of the eighteen months that changed the world forever, as leaders raced to protect their citizens in the wake of 9/11.

Eichenwald's gripping, immediate style and trueto- life dialogue puts readers at the heart of these historic events, from the Oval Office to Number 10 Downing Street, from Guantanamo Bay to the depths of CIA headquarters, from the al-Qaeda training camps to the torture chambers of Egypt and Syria. He reveals previously undisclosed information from the terror wars, including never before reported details about warrantless wiretapping, the anthrax attacks and investigations, and conflicts between Washington and London.

With his signature fast-paced narrative style, Eichenwald-- whose book, The Informant, was called "one of the best nonfiction books of the decade" by The New York Times Book Review--exposes a world of secrets and lies that has remained hidden for far too long.

Reissued for Spring 2012 to coincide with the anniversary of the sinking of the TITANIC in April 1912.

Here is the one book with all of the answers to your questions about the TITANIC! This is the heart-stopping story about the legendary ship--from the building,
maiden voyage, and tragic sinking, to its high-tech discovery on the ocean floor. Special features include the making of the James Cameron movie, true-or-false
quizzes, and real-life stories of the young people who sailed on the fateful journey. Illustrated with dozens of paintings, diagrams, and rare photographs.

A fast-moving story of an American serving with the legendary Asian warriors in WWII.

As heard on the New Yorker Radio Hour: The triumphant and "engaging history" (The New Yorker) of the young women who devised a winning strategy that defeated Nazi U-boats and delivered a decisive victory in the Battle of the Atlantic.

By 1941, Winston Churchill had come to believe that the outcome of World War II rested on the battle for the Atlantic. A grand strategy game was devised by Captain Gilbert Roberts and a group of ten Wrens (members of the Women's Royal Naval Service) assigned to his team in an attempt to reveal the tactics behind the vicious success of the German U-boats. Played on a linoleum floor divided into painted squares, it required model ships to be moved across a make-believe ocean in a manner reminiscent of the childhood game, Battleship. Through play, the designers developed "Operation Raspberry," a counter-maneuver that helped turn the tide of World War II.

Combining vibrant novelistic storytelling with extensive research, interviews, and previously unpublished accounts, Simon Parkin describes for the first time the role that women played in developing the Allied strategy that, in the words of one admiral, "contributed in no small measure to the final defeat of Germany." Rich with unforgettable cinematic detail and larger-than-life characters, A Game of Birds and Wolves is a heart-wrenching tale of ingenuity, dedication, perseverance, and love, bringing to life the imagination and sacrifice required to defeat the Nazis at sea.

New England's culinary history is marked by a varying array of chowders. Early forms were thick and layered, but the adaptability of this beloved recipe has allowed for a multitude of tasty preparations to emerge. Thick or thin, brimming with fish or clams or corn, chowder springs up throughout the region in as many distinctive varieties as there are ports of call yet always remains the quintessential expression of New England cuisine. Food writers and chowder connoisseurs Robert S. Cox and Jacob Walker dish out the history, flavors and significance of every New Englander's favorite comfort food.

When a cowboy takes a look at life, his sense of purpose and meaning is shaped by God's creation and the rugged terrain of the landscape he covers on horseback. Alongside the rugged and breathtaking paintings of award-winning artist Chris Owen, author Armour Patterson, a child of the western landscape, explores the wisdom cowboys offer every man:

A cowboy's honor leads the way

Rough trails are great teachers

Faith is the best companion for the journey

Patience gets the job done

Courage is a cowboy's lifeline

An every-occasion gift for fans of cowboy art and stories and anyone who longs to sit back in the saddle and take in the ideals and inspiration of the West.

In wartime Japan's bid for conquest, humanity suffered through one of its darkest hours, as a hidden genocide took the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Cloaked in secrecy and protected under the banner of scientific study, the best and brightest of Japan's medical establishment volunteered for a major initiative in support of the military that involved the systematic murder of Chinese civilians. With the help of the United States government, they were allowed to get away with it. Based on important original research, this book reveals as never before the full extent of this crime, in a story that is as compelling as it is terrifying.

Beginning in 1931, the military of Imperial Japan came up with a new strategy to further the nation's drive for expansion: germ warfare. But they needed help to figure out how to do it. So they recruited thousands of doctors and research scientists, all of whom accepted willingly, in order to develop a massive program of biological warfare that was referred to as "the secret of secrets." This covert operation consisted of horrifying human experiments and germ weapon attacks against people whose lives were seen as expendable, including Chinese men, women, and children living in Manchuria and other areas of Japanese occupation. Even American POWs were targeted.

At the forefront of this disturbing enterprise wasan elite organization known as Unit 731, led by Japan's answer to Joseph Mengele, Dr. Shiro Ishii. Under Ishii'sorders, captives were subjected to deeds that strain the boundaries of imagination. Men and women were frozen alive to study the effects of frostbite. Others were dissected without anesthesia. Tied to posts, victims were infected with virulent strains of anthrax and other diseases. Entire cities were aerially sprayed with fleas carrying bubonic plague. All told, more than five hundred thousand people died. Yet after the war, U.S. occupation forces under General Douglas MacArthur struck a deal with the doctors of Unit 731 that shielded them from accountability for their atrocities.

In this meticulously documented work, Daniel Barenblatt has drawn upon startling new evidence of Japan's germ warfare program, including firsthand accounts from both perpetrators and survivors. Authoritative, alarming, and gripping from start to finish, A Plague upon Humanity is a powerful investigation that exposes one of the most shameful chapters in human history.

"Fascinating...Gelles has provided a balanced portrait, and her mastery of the period's issues and history is evident on every page. Her treatment of the family... [is] written with understanding and sensitivity... But it is her strength as a feminist historian that makes her treatment of Abigail the most gripping... masterful and captivating."
-- Washington Times

"A landmark... Well-organized and expertly composed, the book is an impressive addition to the nation's written history."
-- Oklahoma City Oklahoman

Readers who enjoyed Doris Kearns Goodwin's No Ordinary Time, Cokie Roberts's Founding Mothers, and David McCullough's John Adams will love "this eminently readable... charming and sensitive, yet candid and unflinching joint biography" (Daniel Walker Howe, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848) of America's original "power couple" Abigail and John Adams.

The sixteenth president of the United States is regarded by many as the most courageous and diplomatic president during one of the most difficult times in American history. He was forced to deal with the secession of the southern states, the operations of the American Civil War and the antagonisms of political enemies in the North. Such a traumatic and momentous time called for a great leader, and Abraham Lincoln was the man to answer the challenge of a nation.

With less than a year of formal schooling, he rose above the hardscrabble childhood on the frontier through a debt-ridden early career as a circuit-riding country lawyer and minor politician, to national eminence and achievement. A sensitive man, prone to bouts of depression, Abraham Lincoln would provide crucial leadership to a country torn by Civil War. Although the price would be high, Lincoln saw that the United States must again become 'one nation indivisible.'

Over 125 rare photographs and prints supplement this riveting biography, revealing the life of this enigmatic fi gure. The Illustrated Biography of Abraham Lincoln is also a history of the United States during its most critical period, and a pictorial testament to the nation and the one man who held the nation together, a man described by Walt Whitman as 'the grandest fi gure on the crowded canvas of the drama of the nineteenth century.'

The story of the landmark case that put the "Supreme" in Supreme Court.

Among the many momentous decisions rendered by the Supreme Court, none has had a greater impact than that passed down in 1803 by Chief Justice John Marshall in the case of Marbury v. Madison. While the ruling itself was innocuous--denying the plea of a minor functionary named William Marbury on constitutionally technical grounds--its implications were enormous. For Marshall had, in essence, claimed for the Supreme Court the right to determine what the Constitution and our laws under it really mean, known formally as the principle of "judicial review." Yet, as Lawrence Goldstone shows in his compelling narrative, that right is nowhere expressed in the Constitution and was not even considered by the Framers or the Founding Fathers, who would never have granted such power in a checks-and-balances system to unelected officials serving for life.

The Activist underscores the drama that occurred in 1803 by examining the debates that took place during the Constitutional Convention of 1787--among the most dramatic moments in American history--over the formation and structure of our judicial system. In parallel, Goldstone introduces in brief the life and ambition of John Marshall, and the early, fragile years of the Supreme Court, which--until Marshall's ascension to Chief Justice--sat atop the weakest of the three branches of government. Marshall made the Court supreme, and while judicial review has been used sparingly, without it the Court would likely never have intervened in the 2000 presidential election. Indeed, the great irony Goldstone reveals is that judicial review is now so enfranchised that Justice Antonin Scalia could admit, as he has, that the Supreme Court "made it up" in the same breath as he insists that justices must adhere steadfastly to the exact words of the Constitution.

Nobody brings the debates of the Constitutional Convention to life as does Lawrence Goldstone, and in this election year, no more interesting book on the Supreme Court will appear than The Activist, which makes the past come alive in the present.

Dear Friends, Here I am on the sacred soil of the FFV within 8 miles of the rebel pickets, and expecting to move 6 miles further on every hour...

Sandra A. Turgeon and the East Providence Historical Society are proud to present this compilation of wartime correspondence from Lt. Peter Hunt. These intimate letters provide insight to the human cost of one of America's bloodiest conflicts. Peter is not merely another faceless Union soldier but an eager eighteen-year-old recruit-his story exemplifies the courage of the many men who went to war.

Not until after the catastrophic First Battle of Bull Run did Peter receive his mother's blessing to join the Union army. Peter's regular letters back to his mother, sister, and three brothers evidence the alternating boredom and brutality of the war, chronicling a frustrating winter spent waiting at Miner's Hill and the shock of seeing the carnage wreaked at the Battle of Hanover Court House. Peter's own horse was once shot out from under him as his comrades beside him fell.

Peter experienced the violence of the war firsthand, but through it all, he kept his faith in the cause. Turgeon's collection celebrates his bravery, honor, and humanity.

This is a comprehensive look at how France influenced the American Revolutionary War in a variety of ways: intellectually, financially, and militarily. It raises the crucial question of whether America could have won its independence without the aid of France.

The book begins with an overview of the intellectual and ideological contributions of the French Enlightenment thinkers, called the philosophes, to the American and French revolutions. It then moves to cover the many forms of aid provided by France to support America during the Revolutionary War. This ranged from the covert aid France supplied America before her official entry into the war, to the French outfitters and merchants who provided much-needed military supplies to the Americans. When the war began, the colonists thought the French would welcome an opportunity to retaliate and regain their country. France also provided naval assistance, particularly to the American privateers who harassed British shipping and contributed to the increased shipping rates which added to Great Britain's economic hardships. France's military involvement in the war was equally as important.

America's First Ally looks at the contributions of individual French officers and troops, arguing that America could not have won without them. Desmarais explores the international nature of a war which some people have called the first world war. When France and Spain entered the conflict, they fought the Crown forces in their respective areas of economic interest. In addition to the engagements in the Atlantic Ocean, along the American and European coasts and in the West Indies, there are accounts of action in India and the East Indies, South America and Africa.

Also included are accounts drawn from ships' logs, court and auction records, newspapers, letters, diaries, journals, and pension applications.

Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh have long been exalted as two of the greatest American icons of the twentieth century. From award-winning journalist Max Wallace comes groundbreaking and astonishing revelations about the poisonous effect these two so-called American heroes had on Western democracy. In his wide ranging investigation, Wallace goes further than any other historian to expose how Ford and Lindbergh-acting in league with the Nazis-almost brought democratic Europe to the verge of extinction.
With unprecedented access to declassified FBI and military intelligence files, Wallace reveals how the close friendship and ideological bond between automotive pioneer Ford and aviator Lindbergh culminated in an abuse of power that helped strengthen Hitler's regime and undermined the Allied war effort. Wallace traces Henry Ford's ties to Nazi Germany back as far as the 1920s, presenting compelling evidence of a financial paper trail proving that Ford subsidized the rise to power of Adolph Hitler, who described Ford as "my inspiration." For the first time, the genesis of Ford's notorious Anti-Semitism is uncovered: "The American Axis" proves that Ford's private secretary and life-long confidante was a German spy, who channeled his employer's Jew-baiting crusades to further the cause of the Third Reich.
Lindbergh's own anti-Semitism and white-Supremacist views captured the attention of the Nazis, who soon manipulated him in their clandestine Fifth Column efforts. As the first unauthorized biographer to gain access to the Lindbergh archives, Wallace paints a substantially more chilling portrait of Lindbergh's pre-war activities than any previous historian and produces new evidence that the Nazis secretly plotted to install Lindbergh as the leader of the movement to keep America out of World War Two.
The most controversial corporate investigation since IBM and the Holocaust, the book reveals that the Ford Motor Company's military and political complicity in the Third Reich war effort was considerably stronger than the company has acknowledged and that a US Army post-war investigation concluded that the company had become "an arsenal of Nazism." Wallace disputes a recent internal investigation into the use of slave labor at Ford's German plant during World War II - which company officials claimed as a vindication of its wartime activities - and reveals that corporate President Edsel Ford was about to be indicted by the US government for "Trading With the Enemy" at the time of his 1943 death.
"The American Axis" is not only a mesmerizing, cautionary tale, but a compelling historical expose.

In this vivid and brilliant biography, David Stewart describes Aaron Burr, the third vice president, as a daring and perhaps deluded figure who shook the nation's foundations in its earliest, most vulnerable decades.

In 1805, the United States was not twenty years old, an unformed infant. The government consisted of a few hundred people. The immense frontier swallowed up a tiny army of 3,300 soldiers. Following the Louisiana Purchase, no one even knew where the nation's western border lay. Secessionist sentiment flared in New England and beyond the Appalachians.

Burr had challenged Jefferson, his own running mate, in the presidential election of 1800. Indicted for murder in the dueling death of Alexander Hamilton in 1804, he dreamt huge dreams. He imagined an insurrection in New Orleans, a private invasion of Spanish Mexico and Florida, and a great empire rising on the Gulf of Mexico, which would swell when America's western lands seceded from the Union. For two years, Burr pursued this audacious dream, enlisting support from the General-in-Chief of the Army, a paid agent of the Spanish king, and from other western leaders, including Andrew Jackson. When the army chief double-crossed Burr, Jefferson finally roused himself and ordered Burr prosecuted for treason.

The trial featured the nation's finest lawyers before the greatest judge in our history, Chief Justice John Marshall, Jefferson's distant cousin and determined adversary. It became a contest over the nation's identity: Should individual rights be sacrificed to punish a political apostate who challenged the nation's very existence? In a revealing reversal of political philosophies, Jefferson championed government power over individual rights, while Marshall shielded the nation's most notorious defendant. By concealing evidence, appealing to the rule of law, and exploiting the weaknesses of the government's case, Burr won his freedom.

Afterwards Burr left for Europe to pursue an equally outrageous scheme to liberate Spain's American colonies, but finding no European sponsor, he returned to America and lived to an unrepentant old age.

Stewart's vivid account of Burr's tumultuous life offers a rare and eye-opening description of the brand-new nation struggling to define itself.

From the New York Times bestselling author of Heroes Proved, a moving and inspirational chronicle of our national heroes' sacrifices and triumphs in Iraq and Afghanistan, after their return to the homefront.

Combat-decorated Marine Oliver North delivers a riveting firsthand account of the extraordinary young American volunteers--the best and bravest of their generation--who stepped forward to defend us from radical Islamic terror. For more than a dozen years North and his award-winning documentary team from FOX News Channel's War Stories have traveled to the frontlines of the War on Terror to profile the dedicated men and women who serve our nation in harm's way and chronicle what it truly means to be a hero. This time, he follows them from the battlefield to the homefront and finds extraordinary inspiration in their triumph over life-altering adversity.

In this new volume of his New York Times bestselling American Heroes series, North describes in vivid detail the breathtaking courage, steadfast commitment, and resilient strength of those who serve--and those who love them. The term "selfless devotion" may be a cliché to many in our modern culture--but not to the men and women on the pages of this book. Their stories resound with bravery, a warrior ethos, and spiritual strength that ought to encourage us all.

Heroes are people who knowingly place themselves at risk for the benefit of others. They give of themselves, literally and physically. Since the terror attack of 9-11- 01, more than 2 million young Americans have volunteered to serve in difficult and dangerous places. No military force in history has been asked to do more than those who have served and sacrificed in this long fight. They are American heroes. So too are their loved ones here at home. These are their stories.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - From the author of A. Lincoln, a major new biography of one of America's greatest generals--and most misunderstood presidents

Winner of the William Henry Seward Award for Excellence in Civil War Biography - Finalist for the Gilder-Lehrman Military History Book Prize

In his time, Ulysses S. Grant was routinely grouped with George Washington and Abraham Lincoln in the "Trinity of Great American Leaders." But the battlefield commander-turned-commander-in-chief fell out of favor in the twentieth century. In American Ulysses, Ronald C. White argues that we need to once more revise our estimates of him in the twenty-first.

Based on seven years of research with primary documents--some of them never examined by previous Grant scholars--this is destined to become the Grant biography of our time. White, a biographer exceptionally skilled at writing momentous history from the inside out, shows Grant to be a generous, curious, introspective man and leader--a willing delegator with a natural gift for managing the rampaging egos of his fellow officers. His wife, Julia Dent Grant, long marginalized in the historic record, emerges in her own right as a spirited and influential partner.

Grant was not only a brilliant general but also a passionate defender of equal rights in post-Civil War America. After winning election to the White House in 1868, he used the power of the federal government to battle the Ku Klux Klan. He was the first president to state that the government's policy toward American Indians was immoral, and the first ex-president to embark on a world tour, and he cemented his reputation for courage by racing against death to complete his Personal Memoirs. Published by Mark Twain, it is widely considered to be the greatest autobiography by an American leader, but its place in Grant's life story has never been fully explored--until now.

One of those rare books that successfully recast our impression of an iconic historical figure, American Ulysses gives us a finely honed, three-dimensional portrait of Grant the man--husband, father, leader, writer--that should set the standard by which all future biographies of him will be measured.

Praise for American Ulysses

"[Ronald C. White] portrays a deeply introspective man of ideals, a man of measured thought and careful action who found himself in the crosshairs of American history at its most crucial moment."--USA Today

"White delineates Grant's virtues better than any author before. . . . By the end, readers will see how fortunate the nation was that Grant went into the world--to save the Union, to lead it and, on his deathbed, to write one of the finest memoirs in all of American letters."--The New York Times Book Review

"Ronald White has restored Ulysses S. Grant to his proper place in history with a biography whose breadth and tone suit the man perfectly. Like Grant himself, this book will have staying power."--The Wall Street Journal

"Magisterial . . . Grant's esteem in the eyes of historians has increased significantly in the last generation. . . . [American Ulysses] is the newest heavyweight champion in this movement."--The Boston Globe

"Superb . . . illuminating, inspiring and deeply moving."--Chicago Tribune

"In this sympathetic, rigorously sourced biography, White . . . conveys the essence of Grant the man and Grant the warrior."--Newsday

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE AND "NEW YORK TIMES" BESTSELLER The liberation of Europe and the destruction of the Third Reich is a story of miscalculation and incomparable courage, of calamity and enduring triumph. In this first volume of the Liberation Trilogy, Rick Atkinson focuses on 1942 and 1943, showing how central the great drama that unfolded in North Africa was to the ultimate victory of the Allied powers and to America's understanding of itself.
Opening with the daring amphibious invasion in November 1942, "An Army at Dawn "follows the American and British armies as they fight the French in Morocco and Algiers, and then take on the Germans and Italians in Tunisia. Battle by battle, an inexperienced and often poorly led army gradually becomes a superb fighting force. Central to the tale are the extraordinary but flawed commanders who come to dominate the battlefield: Eisenhower, Patton, Bradley, Montgomery, and Rommel.
Brilliantly researched, rich with new material and fresh insights, Atkinson's vivid narrative provides the definitive history of the war in North Africa.