''Thirteen Soldiers: A Personal History of Americans at War'' (styled ''13 Soldiers'' on the front cover) is a 2014 book by

United States Senator The United States Senate is the Upper house, upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives being the Lower house, lower chamber. Together they compose the national Bica ...

John McCain John Sidney McCain III (August 29, 1936 – August 25, 2018) was an American politician and United States Navy officer who served as a United States senator from Arizona from 1987 until his death in 2018. He previously served two terms ...

and his frequent collaborator and former staff member

Mark Salter Mark Salter (born 1955) is an American speechwriter from Davenport, Iowa, known for his collaborations with United States Senator John McCain on several nonfiction books as well as on political speeches. Salter also served as McCain's chief of s ...

. (Unlike their previous books, with this one Salter has a co-equal writing credit rather than a 'with' credit.) Published by

Simon & Schuster Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publ ...

, it contains a chapter representing one person's story from each of America's thirteen major wars.

Summary

The soldiers described, and the wars they fought in, are: #

Joseph Plumb Martin Joseph Plumb Martin (also spelled as Joseph Plum Martin; November 21, 1760 – May 2, 1850) was a soldier in the Connecticut Militia and Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, and was mustered out as a 23-year-old Sergeant in ...

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

# Charles Black,

War of 1812 The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States of America and its indigenous allies against the United Kingdom and its allies in British North America, with limited participation by Spain in Florida. It bega ...

Samuel Chamberlain Samuel Emery Chamberlain (November 27, 1829 – November 10, 1908) was an American soldier, painter, and author who traveled throughout the American Southwest and Mexico during the mid-19th century. Early life Chamberlain was born in Center H ...

Mexican–American War The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the (''United States intervention in Mexico''), was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. It followed the 1 ...

Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (March 8, 1841 – March 6, 1935) was an American jurist and legal scholar who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.Holmes was Acting Chief Justice of the Un ...

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

Edward L. Baker Jr. Edward Lee Baker Jr. (December 28, 1865 in Laramie County, Wyoming – August 26, 1913 in Los Angeles) was an African-American United States Army Captain#United States, Captain who received the Medal of Honor for actions during the Spanish–Americ ...

Spanish–American War , partof = the Philippine Revolution, the decolonization of the Americas, and the Cuban War of Independence , image = Collage infobox for Spanish-American War.jpg , image_size = 300px , caption = (clock ...

Littleton Waller Littleton Tazewell "Tony" Waller (September 26, 1856 – July 13, 1926) was a career officer in the United States Marine Corps, who served in the Spanish–American War, the Caribbean and Asia. He was court martialled and acquitted for acti ...

Philippine–American War The Philippine–American War or Filipino–American War ( es, Guerra filipina-estadounidense, tl, Digmaang Pilipino–Amerikano), previously referred to as the Philippine Insurrection or the Tagalog Insurgency by the United States, was an arm ...

# Elton Mackin,

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Guy Gabaldon Guy Louis Gabaldon (March 22, 1926 – August 31, 2006) was a United States Marine who, at age 18, captured or persuaded to surrender over 1,300 Japanese soldiers and civilians during the battles for Saipan and Tinian islands in 1944 during World ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

# Chester "Pete" Salter,

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

Leo K. Thorsness Leo Keith Thorsness (February 14, 1932 – May 2, 2017) was a colonel in the United States Air Force who received the Medal of Honor for his actions in the Vietnam War. He was awarded the medal for an air engagement on April 19, 1967. He was shot ...

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

# Mary Rhoads,

Gulf War The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Iraq were carried out in two key phases: ...

# Monica Lin Brown,

War in Afghanistan (2001–present) War in Afghanistan, Afghan war, or Afghan civil war may refer to: *Conquest of Afghanistan by Alexander the Great (330 BC – 327 BC) *Muslim conquests of Afghanistan (637–709) *Conquest of Afghanistan by the Mongol Empire (13th century), see als ...

Michael A. Monsoor Michael Anthony Monsoor (April 5, 1981September 29, 2006) was a United States Navy SEAL who was killed during Invasion of Iraq and posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor. He enlisted in the United States Navy in 2001 and graduated from Basic Un ...

Iraq War {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Iraq War {{Nobold, {{lang, ar, حرب العراق (Arabic) {{Nobold, {{lang, ku, شەڕی عێراق (Kurdish languages, Kurdish) , partof = the Iraq conflict (2003–present), I ...

Only three of the thirteen are officers and there is diversity among the thirteen, with two African Americans and two women represented as well as people from different social classes. Their activities notable range from traditional battlefield heroics to medics saving lives to refusals to follow illegal orders. McCain said: "We try to, kind of, give a cross-section of people who - the only thing that really bound them together was the fact that they served their country with heroism and sacrifice."https://www.npr.org/2014/11/08/362482291/mccains-soldiers-13-ordinary-people-transformed-by-battle McCain's 'Soldiers:' 13 Ordinary People Transformed By Battle NPR November 8, 2014 While McCain and Salter described the military lives of McCain and his two famous admiral forebears in their 1999 ''

Faith of My Fathers ''Faith of My Fathers'' is a 1999 bestselling non-fiction book by United States Senator John McCain with Mark Salter. Published by Random House, it is part autobiography, part family memoir. It traces the story of McCain's life growing up, during ...

'', in this book it is the chapter on the Korean War that describes the actions of Salter's father, Chester "Pete" Salter. The elder Salter (1927-1999) was in the U.S. Navy during World War II but in the U.S. Army as infantry in the Korean War. He was awarded the

Silver Star The Silver Star Medal (SSM) is the United States Armed Forces' third-highest military decoration for valor in combat. The Silver Star Medal is awarded primarily to members of the United States Armed Forces for gallantry in action against an e ...

for courageous actions taken near

Anju, South Pyongan Anju-si () is a city in the South P'yŏngan province of North Korea. Its population was 240,117 in 2008. The Ch'ongch'on River passes through Anju. 200px, Sinanju Chongnyon station in the western part of Anju Climate Administrative divisions ...

in North Korea on November 5, 1950, as UN forces advanced towards the

Yalu River The Yalu River, known by Koreans as the Amrok River or Amnok River, is a river on the border between North Korea and China. Together with the Tumen River to its east, and a small portion of Paektu Mountain, the Yalu forms the border between ...

. In this action, which is described in this book, Salter was one of the soldiers who interacted with

Mitchell Red Cloud, Jr. Mitchell Red Cloud Jr. (2 July 1925 – 5 November 1950) was a United States Army corporal who was killed in action while serving in the Korean War. Corporal Red Cloud posthumously received the Medal of Honor for heroic actions "above and be ...

, who posthumously received the

Medal of Honor The Medal of Honor (MOH) is the United States Armed Forces' highest military decoration and is awarded to recognize American soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, guardians and coast guardsmen who have distinguished themselves by acts of valor. ...

for the November 5 action. (The actions of Red Cloud are more fully described in McCain and Salter's 2004 volume '' Why Courage Matters''.)

Reception

In a review for the ''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', Alexander Rose wrote that "McCain and Salter have chosen a thoughtful array of subjects" and that the book was in the tradition of

Plutarch Plutarch (; grc-gre, Πλούταρχος, ''Ploútarchos''; ; – after AD 119) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''P ...

's ''

Parallel Lives Plutarch's ''Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans'', commonly called ''Parallel Lives'' or ''Plutarch's Lives'', is a series of 48 biographies of famous men, arranged in pairs to illuminate their common moral virtues or failings, probably writt ...

'' and the romances and chronicles of

Medieval literature Medieval literature is a broad subject, encompassing essentially all written works available in Europe and beyond during the Middle Ages (that is, the one thousand years from the fall of the Western Roman Empire ca. AD 500 to the beginning of t ...

in revealing how character and codes of behavior can lead to greatness. However Rose disagrees with the authors' implicit assumption that soldiers across all these wars faced similar challenges or that their experiences were similarly "transforming". A review in ''

Roll Call ''Roll Call'' is a newspaper and website published in Washington, D.C., United States, when the United States Congress is in session, reporting news of legislative and political maneuverings on Capitol Hill, as well as political coverage of c ...

'' complimented the authors, saying: "John McCain knows from experience that nobody is a better comrade in the trenches of writing than Salter. The two combine the fog of war with the fog of writing. Salter has a vocabulary as rich as McCain’s insights." ''

Military Review The U.S. Army Combined Arms Center (USACAC) is located at Fort Leavenworth and provides leadership and supervision for leader development and professional military and civilian education; institutional and collective training; functional training; ...

'' said that McCain and Salter "do an incredible job of bringing to life not only the experiences and stories of the individuals being examined, but also of those who served around them."Harding, Eugene M. 13 Soldiers: A Personal History of Americans at War, Military Review, May–June 2016 However it chided the authors for including only a general bibliography and not specific citations for possibly novel statements and said that as a consequence the book was well-suited to general audiences but not academic ones. ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of B ...

'' said "McCain and Salter aptly reveal humanizing moments in such theaters of cruelty.”http://www.prescottenews.com/index.php/news/current-news/item/24470-release-of-new-john-mccain-book-thirteen-soldiers Release of New John McCain Book: Thirteen Soldiers ''

Kirkus Reviews ''Kirkus Reviews'' (or ''Kirkus Media'') is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus (1893–1980). The magazine is headquartered in New York City. ''Kirkus Reviews'' confers the annual Kirkus Prize to authors of fic ...

'' summarized the book as containing "A patriotic though unsentimental look at the major wars fought by the United States as told through the difficult experiences of ordinary soldiers."https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/john-mccain/thirteen-soldiers/ Kirkus Reviews McCain appeared in media interviews to promote the book and also did some book signings. ''Thirteen Soldiers'' was published in

trade paperback Trade paperback may refer to: * Trade paperback, a higher-quality softcover version of a book * Trade paperback (comics) In comics in the United States, a trade paperback (shortened: TPB or trade) is a collection of stories originally published ...

in November 2015.

References

External links

*
Interview with McCain on ''Thirteen Soldiers'' at the National Press Club, November 11, 2014

C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American cable and satellite television network that was created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a nonprofit public service. It televises many proceedings of the United States ...

{{John McCain Books by John McCain Books by Mark Salter 2014 non-fiction books Biographies (books) Books about military history Simon & Schuster books Books about military personnel Collaborative non-fiction books