Showing results by publisher "Blackstone Audio, Inc." in Historical

Having once said “a military life had no charms to me,” U.S. Grant entered West Point to get through the course, secure a detail for a few years as assistant professor of mathematics at the Academy, and afterwards obtain a permanent position as professor at some respectable college. But the course his life took was quite different. Little did he ever dream that he would serve with distinction in the Mexican War, lead the Union to victory in the Civil War, and struggle through eight years as President of the United States.

Among other things, Franklin was a printer, philosopher, inventor, statesman, and not least, a writer. Franklin's autobiography captures the essence of his spirit. In it, we can see him as a product of the 18th century enlightenment, a type of Yankee statesman who could use the language of Addison, Steele, Swift, and Defoe. In his autobiography, Franklin asks himself, "Who am I, how did I come to be, and why am I a human being as I am?" And he answers with the honesty, wit, and charm.

The expanded version of this authoritative biography of Wallenberg discusses previously sealed prison records and archives; reports of recent sightings of Wallenberg; the Wallenberg family's historic multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the former Soviet Union; and the worldwide activities in honor of this great man who could not be a bystander.

In early November 1834, an aristocratic young couple from Savannah and South Carolina sailed from New York and began a seventeen-year odyssey in West Africa. Leighton and Jane Wilson sailed along what was for them an exotic coastline, visited cities and villages, and sometimes ventured up great rivers and followed ancient paths.

Winifred and Bernard inherited the high European cultural ideals and attitudes that came of being born into prosperous German-Jewish émigré families. To young Ian, who would visit from Holland every Christmas, they seemed the very essence of England, their spacious Berkshire estate the model of genteel English country life at its most pleasant and refined. It wasn't until years later that he discovered how much more there was to the story.

For 15 years, Eleanor Roosevelt and her handsome doctor, David Gurewitsch, were friends, traveling, entertaining, and eventually buying a townhouse together in Manhattan. Their friendship has always intrigued historians, but not much is known about it. David kept detailed journals and took thousands of photos, but he never publicly discussed their time together.

In June 1947, fresh out of college and long before he would win the Pulitzer Prize and become known as one of America’s finest historians, Stanley Karnow boarded a freighter bound for France, planning to stay for the summer. He stayed for ten years, first as a student and later as a correspondent for Time magazine. By the time he left, Karnow knew Paris so intimately that his French colleagues dubbed him “le plus parisien des Américains”—the most Parisian American.

As fresh and poignant today as when they were written, these touching letters capture the heart of everyday life during the Civil War. Set both at home in Florida and on the front, the letters were written by two generations of families whose members included radical secessionists, moderates, and even a few Unionists.

When the 1944 presidential election campaign geared up late that spring, Franklin D. Roosevelt had already been in office longer than any other president. Sensing likely weakness, the Republicans mounted an energetic and expensive campaign, hitting hard at FDR’s liberal domestic policies and the ongoing cost of World War II. Despite gravely deteriorating health, FDR and his feisty running mate, the unexpected Harry Truman, campaigned vigorously against young governor Thomas E. Dewey of New York.

In 1856 Abraham Lincoln was a former congressman who had grown bored with his work as a lawyer, until he was drawn into the murder case that would define his career. This book reveals not only the mystery of the murder case as investigated by Lincoln but also the mystery of Abraham Lincoln as investigated by the author.

This is a survey across history, and includes a diverse cast of legendary humorists who got a grand kick out of life, including Benjamin Franklin and the Marx Brothers, Charles Dickens and Damon Runyon, W. C. Fields and Samuel Johnson, William Hogarth and James Thurber. Including dark humor, satire, bawdy wit, biting sarcasm, and more, this entertaining and erudite collection brings to life great minds who reflected on life’s follies, pretensions, and foibles with that greatest of gifts: humor.

Deemed "irreplaceable" by Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson assumed his nickname during the Battle of Bull Run in the Civil War. It is said that the Army of Northern Virginia never fully recovered from the loss of Jackson's leadership when he was accidentally shot by one of his own men and died in 1863.

Here is Humphrey Bogart: the pro's pro on the set and the Hollywood renegade off it; the man's man, the ladies' man, the hard worker, and the man who liked to drink too much; the husband in three roller-coaster marriages and finally one perfect match; the proud father and absentee parent; the good friend and even better enemy.

In Young Mr. Roosevelt Stanley Weintraub evokes Franklin Delano Roosevelt's political and wartime beginnings. An unpromising patrician playboy appointed assistant secretary of the Navy in 1913, Roosevelt learned quickly and rose to national visibility during World War I. Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 1920, he lost the election but not his ambitions. While his stature was rising, his testy marriage to his cousin Eleanor was fraying amid scandal quietly covered up. Even polio a year later would not suppress the ever indomitable Roosevelt and his inevitable ascent.

Douglas MacArthur is best remembered for his adaptability, a quality which hoisted him to his greatest accomplishments. Adaptability now reigns as the most indispensable trait for high military leadership in this era of technological leaps, which guarantee radical changes in the nature of war during the span of an ordinary career.

From his rare vantage point as Lewis's student, friend, and professional colleague, Professor John Lawlor recalls Lewis "in his habit as he lived." He offers an unforgettable account of studying under Lewis and an enchanting depiction of undergraduate life at Oxford between the wars. To round out his picture, Professor Lawlor draws on the recollections of other associates of Lewis, including a close comparison with J.R.R. Tolkien.

On a cold, moonlit night in January 1944, Anne-Marie Walters, just 20 years old, parachuted into southwest France to work with the Resistance in preparation for the long-awaited Allied invasion. The daughter of a British father and a French mother, she was to act as a courier for George Starr, head of the "Wheelwright" circuit of the Special Operations Executive. Over the next seven months, Walters crisscrossed the region, carrying messages, delivering explosives, arranging the escape of downed airmen, and more.

The newest addition to Palgrave's Great Generals series focuses on Andrew Jackson's career including his time as a general in Tennessee and his rise up the Army ranks. Jackson's effective use of spies in wartime and of martial law in peacetime sparked a debate about the curtailing of civil liberties in the name of national security that continues to this day.

Nelson Mandela is well known throughout the world as a heroic leader who symbolizes freedom and moral authority. He is fixed in the public mind as the world’s elder statesman - the gray-haired man with a kindly smile who spent 27 years in prison before becoming the first Black president of South Africa. But Nelson Mandela was not always elderly or benign....

The descendants of Richard and Anne Lee have occupied a preeminent place in American history. They were among the first families of Virginia. Two were signers of the Declaration of Independence; several others distinguished themselves during the Revolutionary War; and one, Robert E. Lee, remains widely known.