A small independent press out of West Virginia, in time for the centennial of America's entry into the Great War, has just released four titles relating to the Battle of Belleau Wood.
The first is a republication of a very scarce Marine Corps company history from the First World War: A HISTORY OF 20th COMPANY, 5th REGIMENT, UNITED STATES MARINES, originally published in Germany in 1919. In addition to original material, this reissue has new section introductions placing the company history in a context of the larger war, footnotes, and a number of previously unpublished field messages and operation reports.
The next title is a facsimile edition of another scarce Marine Corps company history from the First World War: 78th COMPANY, 6th MARINES, SECOND DIVISION, ARMY OF OCCUPATION, also originally published in Germany in 1919.
The third title is self-explanatory: THREE EARLY BOOKLETS ABOUT THE BATTLE OF BELLEAU WOOD. These are reprints of three scarce booklets, originally published between 1918 and 1923, and now long out-of-print, which concerned the Battle of Belleau Wood, and the creation of the American Aisne-Marne Cemetery. The book includes thirty-one period photographs, plus a detailed field map (displayed on 8 consecutive pages) of Belleau Wood, Belleau, Bouresches, Vaux and other nearby woods and villages.
~~~~~ When the Tide Turned: The American Attack at Chateau Thierry and Belleau Wood in the first week of June, 1918 by Otto H. Kahn,
~~~~~ Bois-Belleau, Chateau Thierry: Remembrance from France. 24 photographs by Marcel Delboy.
~~~~~ and Belleau Wood and the American Army: The 2nd & 26th Divisions (June & July 1918) by Captain R. Andriot of the French Army.
~~~~~ Also included are seven photographs of the Aisne-Marne Cemetery at Belleau Wood from the early 1920s.
Finally, there is STARK COUNTY POEMS: WAR AND THE DEPRESSION COME TO SPOON RIVER by BJ Omanson, a collection thirty-five years in the making of lyric and narrative poems in the regionalist/naturalistic tradition of American poetry.
Among these poems are several longer narrative poems pertaining directly to the experiences of a local farmer, Alpheus Appenheimer, who served as a muleskinner with the 6th Machine Gun Battalion of the 4th Brigade of Marines, 2nd Division, AEF at Belleau Wood. In addition to the poems, there is an essay, "Effects of War: how one Illinois farm couple's experience of the First World War inspired a cycle of regionalist poems" (first published in the Illinois State Genealogical Society Quarterly), which deals expressly with Appenheimer's experiences at Belleau Wood, and the effects of those experiences on his family in later years.
All four books are paperbacks, published in 2017 by Monongahela Press. The History of 20th Company is 8.5 x 11 inches, while the other three are 6 x 9.
on May 1, 2017 at 2:56 pm Leave a Comment
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