Hand-Book for Active Service. Containing Practical Instructions in Campaign Duties. For the Use of Volunteers.
New York: Van Nostrand, 1861. First edition. Hardcover. 'There are at this moment in the United States 3,000,000 of organized troops… many of them have been drilled in military tactics.. but few have of them have been in actual service and are unacquainted with the duties of camp and garrison life… These pages have been prepared to avoid ...useless labor, unnecessary privation, personal suffering that would come with… life in the field.' "With this knowledge… volunteers have in many respects the advantage over regular troops."
With chapters such as the Recruit, Company, Regiment, March, Camp, Guards and Guard Mounting, Rations and Mode of cooking them, Field Fortifications, Ammunition….
Contemporary pencil ownership signature of 'Edwin D. Brown' written in pen and pencil at the end blank endpaper with what looks like a family crest of a stag's head. There is also a lovely pencil portrait of an older man on the front free endpaper with the top half of the page torn out.
In an article in the Geneva Courier newspaper for 10th September 1862... 'The following are the names, age and residence of each member of Capt. Clapp's Company from the Town of Phelps. ---- NAME Edwin D. Brown AGE 21 ---' Phelps is a small town in upstate New York above Lake Geneva.
Small 8vo, 252pp,10 tipped in plates. Red cloth binding with the cover featuring a gold stamped image of a Zouave soldier standing in front of a tent with drums on his right and rifles standing in a pyramid formation. Spine darkened, rubbed and unreadable. Spine cracked and fragile but holding. Internally slt foxing, otherwise vg. Good -. Item #28557
Price: $200.00