"Blood and Thunder," October, 2006

[Tricia]

This looks like it could be interesting:

Blood and Thunder, Hampton Sides, Doubleday. To be released this October.

From today's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: Blood And Thunder interweaves the lives of Kit Carson, the frontiersman-turned-Army-general, and the Navajo chief Narbona in order to trace the American conquest of the Southwest.

For more information, check out www.amazon.com

Regards,
Leyton McLean

[historynut1876]

I checked out the book on Amazon and there isn't too much information to really get a full handle of the book. However, based on the brief synopsis and reviews I was left with the impression that the book was anti Kit Carson and pro-Native American. I felt it was agenda driven. (For the record, I am not for conquest, but the "taking of the West" was really a necessity considering the speed of modern advances ending the food supply of the Plains Indians, for whom I have much respect) .

I have to disagree with review quotes like these:
a vivid account of how ‘The New Men’ swept away the thriving civilizations of the Native Americans in their conquest of the West

Sides [the author] is alive to the exuberance and alert to the tragedy of the taking of the West

Anyone who has read about the West, not just Custer (or any other interesting personality or event) knows that the "thriving civlizations" were killing and displacing each other. Everyone seems to damn James Welch, but he included the following quote in Killing Custer (p. 99, softcover version): "These lands once belonged to the Kiowas and Crows, but we whipped those nations out of them, and in this we do what the white men do when they want the lands of the Indians."
- Black Hawk

This book also appears to present a larger perspective than that of just Kit Carson and the Navaho Indians. One of the problems with writing about history is the need to be politically correct. Even on this board to a degree. However, there is no way to talk about the past, or even the present, without bringing religion into the mix. Has anyone ever noticed that every people thinks God is on their side? The Jews think God is on their side, the Arabs and the Christians likewise. Manifest Destiny was the Christian belief that God gave this country to them, being that the Indians weren't doing anything that they deemed worthy with it. So first comes the declaration that God is on our side, then follows the conquest without too much remorse, because we've got God on OUR side. Everyone speaking for God all the time. It just makes me want to scream.

Some might read this and have some nasty words for me. Okay. Some might read this and say, what does any of this have to do with this book? This book, based on what I read at Amazon, brings these thoughts to mind. Instead of damning Custer, it damns Carson. And like most books, it is probably intellectually dishonest.

[elisabeth]

You're right, and it's not just between religions, of course; as the history of Europe shows, each Christian nation blithely thinks God is on its side when fighting another Christian nation. Ludicrous.

Political correctness in history is the death of truth. However worthy the motives, it's no different in the end from Hitler's or Stalin's or Mao's rewriting of their nations' history books; it's the wiping of the collective memory. Dangerous.

Comically, it's political correctness -- in a way -- that's got us all here! The Custer battle is the mystery it is largely because the political correctness of the 19th century said Thou Shalt Not Upset Mrs. Custer. So all those good, well-meaning officers swore themselves to silence, and the whole truth never got told. Perhaps that's a demonstration in miniature of the perils, as it's left the whole affair as a tabula rasa on which each generation can paint the picture that its own psychic needs demand. First, an Arthurian myth for the New World to mark America's coming of age; then, post WW1, the anti-militarist "Glory Hunter" story; now, the Indians-Good-White-Man-Bad scenario ... and on it goes. (Mrs. Custer has a lot to answer for!) Trying to dig for the truth behind the various myths is, I hope, what unites us on this board, and I hope we're brave enough to put political correctness firmly in its place ...

[crzhrs]

Maybe the problem is religion . . .