The Eisenhower Chronicles

I am pleased to welcome M.B. Zucker to my blog today. As a fellow biographical fiction writer, Zucker has taken on a fascinating historical figure. In his Eisenhower Chronicles, readers will experience some of the most exciting moments of the 20th century.

Welcome, Mr Zucker!

~ Samantha

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The Eisenhower Chronicles: An Excerpt

Guest Post by Michael Zucker

It is early 1942. America has entered WWII following the attack on Pearl Harbor, and Ike has become a protege to Army Chief of Staff George Marshall. He is in charge of the War Department's War Plans Division. He contemplates the state of the war and discusses an interesting proposal for the first time...

Ike concentrated on a logic tree of wartime priorities he was drawing for the Combined Chiefs while hunched over his office desk. The fall of Britain, or Russia, or India will give the Axis a greater industrial output than the Allies. That can’t be allowed to happen. Our industrial power is the key to victory.

He glanced at a map that hung on the wall. Ike envisioned recent events in his head, picturing the ultimate nightmare if fortune did not reverse and the Axis maintained its momentum.

The Axis currently controls about one-third of the Earth’s surface. Nazi U-boats dominate the Atlantic. We’re losing dozens and dozens of ships per month. Hundreds of thousands of tons of material. Even our sea lanes to South America are at risk of being cut off. But the situation in the Eastern Hemisphere is infinitely worse. The Nazis are poised to overrun the Soviets in the Caucasus Mountains and Rommel’s pushing back the Brits in Egypt. Those two German thrusts can link up in the Middle East and quickly overrun that region. U-boats could then cross the Red Sea and enter the Indian Ocean. The Japanese, meanwhile, are overrunning the Dutch East Indies and could push through Burma and into India. The Nazis and Japanese could then link up near the Himalaya Mountains. And that would be it. The joining of the Axis armies would mark the entire Hemisphere’s fall to totalitarianism. Russia and China will be defeated and forced to surrender. Churchill will probably get thrown out of office with a No Confidence vote and Britain will make a deal with Hitler to avoid total destruction. Before too long the Axis will turn its attention to our Hemisphere. And America, with all its might, won’t be able to resist the combined strength of the entire rest of the world, no matter what Lincoln said. Americans will lose their freedoms. Freedom of speech. Right to a fair trial. Everything. We’ll all be Hitler’s slaves. The whole world.

That’s why I don’t get what’s wrong with this country. Why wasn’t it ready? My countrymen aren’t stupid. They must have seen what was at stake when Hitler took one country after another. And how could the Navy be caught with its pants down at Pearl Harbor? Because of that Japan has conquered half of the Pacific. How are so many people messing up this badly with this much at stake? What is wrong with people? And the Navy is still messing up. And MacArthur. And…

I need to calm down. We have a lot of smart people here. They’re getting a lot of the big decisions right. Like choosing to prioritize Germany over Japan. Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Combined Chiefs were right about that. I was wrong to question them. Yes, military doctrine says to target the weaker enemy first. But in this situation, that’s Germany. The Germans have more of their firepower pinned down fighting the British and the Soviets than the Japanese do in the Pacific. And besides, defeating Japan would do nothing to help Stalin. Our top priority needs to be to keep Russia in the war. Especially when there are rumors that Stalin has been asking Hitler for peace terms. If only there was some way to relieve pressure on the Russians.

Ike looked at the map. The Allies needed to slow the Axis advance. But more importantly, they needed to destroy the German Army. The German Army was Hitler’s center of gravity. Destroying it would force Germany’s surrender. That was the only way to win the war. But how would the Allies do that? Germany ruled the continent. The Allies had no way to even reach the German Army and fight it in a capacity large enough to destroy it.

The British are fighting Rommel in Egypt, but the Afrika Korps is a fraction of the entire German Army. The Soviets are fighting a huge portion of it, but they lack our industrial power and are taking excessive casualties. We need somewhere we can engage the bulk of the German Army and defeat it. I feel like that keeps leading me back to…

Ike turned to General Clark, one of his oldest friends in the Army.

“Can I talk to you?” Ike asked.

“Of course,” Clark replied. “What is it?”

“I think I know how we’re going to win the war in Europe.”

Clark froze. He turned away from his own desk to listen to Ike. A two-star general knew how to beat Hitler?

“Let’s hear it,” Clark said.

Ike hesitated.

“I think we need to cross the English Channel and invade the coast of France.” He had goosebumps saying it out loud for the first time.

Clark’s eyebrows furrowed.

“Are you serious?”

“Yes.”

“Ike, there hasn’t been a successful cross-channel attack since William the Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings in 1066. And there’s never, in the history of warfare, been a successful attack from England and into France. What you’re talking about is without any precedence in military history. And against the toughest enemy imaginable.”

“Hear me out, Mark. When I served in Panama under Conner, he made me study the Civil War in extreme detail. Every general, every strategy. What worked and what didn’t. And you know what I learned? That Ulysses Grant was the best general we ever produced. He defeated Lee and saved the Union.”

“Which he did through brute force. Grant was a butcher.”

“No, he wasn’t. His casualties were lower than Lee’s. Grant did it by systematically destroying Lee’s Army. Not by taking Richmond, the Confederate capital. Not with some special maneuver like outflanking the Confederates. He did it through attrition. He targeted Lee’s Army, like Clausewitz wrote about in On War, and he destroyed it. That forced Lee’s surrender at Appomattox. There’s no special button we can press to defeat the Third Reich. I want us to do to Hitler what Grant did to Lee.”

“And we’d have to invade France to do that?”

“It’s the only land area large enough to engage the German Army on a large scale and defeat it decisively.”

“North Africa’s obviously not large enough. And there’s not enough of the German Army there to fight. What about the Russian front? We could put forces there and help Stalin defeat the German Army there.”

“Our lines of approach would be too long.”

“We could go through Murmansk from the north or from the Persian Gulf via the Cape of Good Hope from the south. We’re already sending the Russians war material that way.”

“I don’t think we could send millions of soldiers as well. Besides, I don’t see Roosevelt and Marshall wanting to rely on Stalin that much. I see them agreeing to a cross-channel attack before they’d ever make that deal with Stalin.”

“What about going through Norway?”

“It’s not large enough for the type of ground campaign we’d need to defeat the German Army.”

“Portugal? Spain? We wouldn’t have to go through the Atlantic Wall.”

“Maybe. But France is closer to Germany, so it would be closer to the heart of Hitler’s empire and engage the German Army faster. Plus, it wouldn’t pull Franco into the war.”

Clark nodded, persuaded.

“What timeline are you thinking?”

“If Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Combined Chiefs get on board with this now, we can invade France by early next year. The Brits would have to take the lead, since we’d still be building up our military.”

“Did you think of this just now?”

“I actually thought of it last September. But the more I think about grand strategy, the more I’m convinced that that’s the only way to beat Hitler.”

It’s strange. I’ve spent every day thinking about Hitler since November 1938. How he’s putting his own selfish interests over his duty to humanity, the threat he poses, how to stop him, how to defeat him. But he’s never heard of me. Doesn’t know I exist. Life is odd.

The Eisenhower Chronicles by M.B. Zucker

In 1938 he was a lieutenant colonel stationed in the Philippines; by 1945 the world proclaimed him its savior. From leading the forces of liberal democracy against history’s most evil tyrant to the presidency, Dwight D. Eisenhower fought for and kept the peace during the most dangerous era in history.

The Eisenhower Chronicles dramatizes Ike’s life, portraying his epic journey from unknown soldier to global hero as only a novel could. He is shown working with icons such as FDR, Winston Churchill, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and confronting challenges like D-Day, the Little Rock Crisis, and Sputnik.

Eisenhower’s legacy is grounded in defending the world from fascism, communism, and nuclear weapons. This novel shows how he accomplished it all and takes readers into his mind and soul, grounding the history in the man who made it.

Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Waterstones, and Kobo.

Connect with M.B. Zucker

M. B. Zucker has been interested in storytelling for as long as he can remember. He discovered his love of history at fifteen and studied Dwight Eisenhower for over ten years. Mr. Zucker earned his B.A. at Occidental College and his J.D. at Case Western Reserve University School of Law. He lives in Virginia with his wife.

Connect with him through his website or on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Amazon Author Page, and Goodreads. 

Mary Katharine Goddard and the Declaration of Independence

Did you know that a woman's name appears on some copies of the Declaration of Independence? Mary Katharine Goddard was a Baltimore printer hired to publish a broadside of the Declaration including for the first time the names of all the signers. Below them, in tiny print, one can also find the text, 'Baltimore, in Maryland: Printed by Mary Katharine Goddard.' Who was this woman whose name appears alongside America's famous Founding Fathers?

Born in 1738, Mary was middle-aged but unmarried at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. She had been well educated, especially for a woman of the 18th century, and her father, Giles Goddard, served as postmaster before his death in 1755. Mary and her mother, Sarah, served as the steady business minds behind the business fronts of Mary's younger brother, William, and he eventually left Mary completely in charge of the Maryland Journal.

Independently operating the newspaper, Mary published updates on the British blockade of Boston, encouraged Marylanders in the boycott of British goods, and printed copies of Thomas Paine's Common Sense. Mary also printed articles regarding concerns of those who remained loyal to Great Britain. Some attacked her for this, but Mary was firm in her stance for freedom of speech and the need for civil discourse. She also served as Baltimore's postmaster, possibly making her the first female US employee. When Congress needed a patriotic printer, they needed to look no further.

The Declaration was printed by Mary in January 1777. Adding her own name boldly to the broadside put Mary in the same danger as the men who had signed. (Her standard imprint was MK Goddard, rather than her full name.) Each was declaring themselves traitors to the British crown - or American patriots - depending upon your point-of-view. There could be no turning back once the list was distributed in bold, black ink.

In 1784, William Goddard returned to take back the Maryland Journal that his sister had run so effectively throughout the Revolutionary War in his absence. Not one to fade away quietly, Mary printed publications to compete with him and continued in business on her own. The siblings became estranged and possibly never spoke again.

Another blow struck when Mary was removed from her position as postmaster, supposedly because the job was too arduous for a fifty-year-old woman. She petitioned the Senate and President Washington for the post to be returned to her in 1790. Many citizens of Baltimore wrote in support of her as well, but she received no response from the Senate while Washington responded that he would not intervene in the decision.

Knocked down but not defeated, Mary continued successfully selling books and dry goods at a Baltimore shop for two more decades, well into what was considered old age for that era. 

Mary Katharine Goddard died at age 78 in 1816, having witnessed the birth of the United States and the War of 1812. In her will, Mary manumitted her enslaved servant, Belinda Starling, and 'also give and bequeath unto said Belinda Starling all the property of which I may did posessed; all which I do to recompense the faithful performance of duties to me.' Despite her accomplishments as printer and one of America's first female employees, Mary Katharine Goddard's name has been largely forgotten.

Learn more about the lives of Women of the American Revolution - available at Pen & Sword, Amazon, Book Depository, Barnes & Noble, or your favorite book retailer. Also available now at Audible and audiobooks.com!

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On Bur Oak Ridge by Jenny Knipfer

 

It is my pleasure to welcome Jenny Knipfer as my guest today with an excerpt from her new book. If you loved Luminous, you might consider On Bur Oak Ridge for your next read.

Welcome, Jenny!

~ Samantha

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Excerpt from On Bur Oak Ridge

Guest Post by Jenny Knipfer

Molly - Late September 1919

I see him, but I can’t move. I stand rooted in place like a tree with my arms outstretched.

“Momma!” he giggles with glee, and he runs toward me, dangerously close to the vat of boiling water.

Water vapor rises from the vat and hangs suspended in the air in a slow, surreal way. Some soap bubbles float large and free, growing until they burst, appearing like a shimmer of glitter around the halo of Lonny’s blond ringlets.

My frozen-in-place arms strain to rescue him, but they are immovable. I’m helpless to prevent what’s coming next—what I’ve seen over and over and over again. The vat supports creak and groan, the mechanism tips, and Lonny is lost in a sea of boiling water and bedsheets. Next, I feel the hiss and pain. My hands fly to my face, where the burning-hot, carbolic water sears my skin. My voice strains to scream, but no sound issues from my wide-open jaws…

“Molly? Molly!”

It takes me some seconds to realize that Mabel’s form hovers over me, grooves edged on her face, set deeper in the faint glow of the candle she holds in one hand.

“You must have been dreaming,” she says, somewhat breathlessly, and she sits on the side of the bed next to me.

I blink my eyes several times and try to make sense of her words.

Her eyes, flecked with questions, reflect the flame. “We heard you moaning.”

She reaches out and smooths some hair away from my face.

I’m grateful she doesn’t inquire about the origin of my dream. I push up on my elbows and raise myself into a sitting position, working to calm my breathing.

“I’m sorry I’ve disturbed you,” I growl out, my throat dry.

She sets the candle on the nightstand. “There’s no need to apologize.” Turning back, she asks, “Do you want to tell me about it?”

How do I explain?

Swallowing, I begin, “I was dreaming about...my son.”

One of her brows hunches lower. “It must not have been a pleasant dream.”

She tilts her head, waiting. Patient as ever.

“No.” I pause and search her eyes in the candlelight. “Did...Robin tell you about the accident?”

She nods. “Some. I know you got burned, but I didn’t know your son was also involved.” She shakes her head. “Well, I know you had a son, but Robin didn’t say how he...” She lets her explanation hang and squints her eyes. “What did happen?”

I don’t want to talk about it now. It’s not that I don’t trust Mabel, but I don’t want to relive it again, not twice in one night.

“I think I need to rest. Do you mind if I tell you the whole story another time?” I plead.

She stands. “Of course. I...shouldn’t have asked.”

I intercept her hand as she reaches for the candle. “I want you to know the truth, Mabel, but I just can’t bear thinking about it anymore tonight.”

She nods and barely smiles.

Linc appears in the open doorway to my bedroom, his hair on end and his eyes droopy. “Is everything all right?”

Guilt pricks at me for interrupting my hosts ’sleep.

Mabel steps close to her husband, a confident tone to her words. “Nothing we can’t handle.”

I value my friend’s loyalty and protection so much.

“Nothing but a dream,” I say and moisten my dry lips with my tongue.

But dreams have more substance than nothing. At times, they seem like my reality and the life I lead upon this Earth a woeful, fictional tale.

“Good, good.” Linc runs a hand through his hair and yawns. “Tomorrow comes early. Let’s get back to our rest.”

Mabel steps through the doorway, offering a consoling lift of her lips to me before disappearing into the hallway. Linc nods once more, steps back, and closes the door behind him.

I lean my head on the metal bedframe, close my eyes, and breathe—in...and...out. Several bouts of this rhythm help quiet my yet pounding heart.

That particular type of dream hasn’t manifested in some time; they sporadically reoccur. I tire of the burden and wish to have them as aptly erased as rubber erases lead off paper. But their stain remains, in my mind, on my body, and forever within my heart.

I lie back on my pillow in the darkness and pray quietly for peace.

“God, You’ve helped me again and again through my struggles. You never relinquished me to the darkness of my own thoughts or dreams but called me into the light. When my heart broke from grief, you comforted me with the thought that I will see my son again and that You are with him. I like to envision him picking daisies in a wide-open field with other small children while You watch. Your word says that Your eyes are ever on Your children."

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“The plot has its twists and turns to keep readers intrigued…to the very end. A great comfort read that will soothe the spirit with renewed hope and faith.” Readers’ Favorite five-star review

A HISTORICAL NOVEL OF FINDING HEALING AND A SECOND CHANCE AT LOVE

In the early 1900s, quiet and reserved Molly Lund finds refuge from her past at the Nelsons ’farm in Minnesota. In an attempt to turn a new page in her life, Molly works at making peace with her losses and coming to terms with the disfiguring burns on her face.

Samuel Woodson, the Nelsons ’hired hand, carries his own cares. Split from his family and bearing a burden of misplaced guilt for an act that haunts him, Samuel–seeing past Molly’s scars–draws her out of her self-protective shell.

Molly and Samuel form a friendship, but just as their hearts lead them deeper, an unexpected guest comes calling, demanding what’s his.

Will Molly and Samuel find a way to be together or will they be separated, due to impediments beyond their control? Can they trust in God’s plan and travel a path that heals the hurts of the past?

Readers of historical fiction, Christian historical fiction, and Christian historical romance will delight in this beautifully wrought story of the healing power of love.

“A heartwarming story of healing from external and internal scars. Through some of life’s harder lessons the characters learn to trust, forgive, and find second chances out of the ashes of pain and loss.” Anne Perreault, author of eighteen inspirational novels, including the Yellowstone series

Trigger Warnings: Grief, trauma from burns, accidental death, time in an insane asylum

Buy now on Amazon - Read FREE with Kindle Unlimited

Connect with Jenny

Jenny lives in Wisconsin with her husband, Ken, and their pet Yorkie, Ruby. She is also a mom and loves being a grandma. She enjoys many creative pursuits but finds writing the most fulfilling.

Spending many years as a librarian in a local public library, Jenny recently switched to using her skills as a floral designer in a retail flower shop. She is now retired from work due to dis-ability. Her education background stems from psychology, music, and cultural missions.

All of Jenny’s books have earned five-star reviews from Readers’ Favorite, a book review and award contest company. She holds membership in the: Midwest Independent Booksellers As-sociation, Wisconsin Writers Association, Christian Indie Publishing Association, and Inde-pendent Book Publishers Association.

Jenny’s favorite place to relax is by the western shore of Lake Superior, where her novel series, By The Light of the Moon, is set.

She deems a cup of tea and a good book an essential part of every day. When not writing, Jenny can be found reading, tending to her many houseplants, or piecing quilt blocks at her sewing machine.

Her new historical fiction, four-part series entitled, Sheltering Trees, is set in the area Jenny grew up in, where she currently lives, and places along Minnesota’s Northern Shore, where she loves to visit. She is currently writing a four-part novella series entitled: Botanical Seasons and a three-part fantasy series entitled: Retold Fairy Tales.

Connect with Jenny on her website, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, BookBub, Amazon Author Page, and Goodreads.

Nathan Hale & the Linonian Society Library

College students today have become accustomed to libraries of almost infinite resources. Items not directly placed into one's hands upon request might be available online or through an interlibrary loan. Such was not the case at Yale College in the 18th century.

Pickings were slim, especially for undergraduate students in their first and second years. In 1755, only twenty-eight books were made available for check-out by freshmen and sophomores. Even upperclassmen found their options often did not include books that they were hoping to read.

Connecticut Hall
Yale dorm where Nathan Hale roomed with his brother, Enoch

In 1770, the young men of the Linonian Society decided to do something about this problem. The Linonian Society was a club formed for the purpose of rhetoric and debate covering a wide variety of topics. It is no wonder that such a group of erudite students would desire greater access to the types of titles they wished to discuss.

The notes of their 16 July 1770 meeting record the founding of the Linonian Society Library. Nathan Hale donated some of the initial supply of books. He would also later become the scribe who wrote the minutes for Linonian Society meetings. The Travels of Cyrus by AM Ramsay was one of his contributions.

Nathan also provided a share of the cost of subscribing to The Spectator. One of the founders of The Spectator was Joseph Addison, who wrote the play Cato, which might have inspired Nathan Hale's final words when he was hanged by the British as a rebel spy on 22 September 1776. 

If Hale did say something like, 'My only regret is that I have but one life to give for my country,' it is likely that he was inspired by Cato when he says of his son's death in battle, 'How beautiful is death when earn'd by virtue! What a pity is it, that we can die but once to serve our country.' Another report quoted Hale as saying, 'If I had ten thousand lives, I would lay them all down.' This line is also a paraphrase from Addison's Cato when he insists that it would be, 'Better to die ten thousand deaths than wound my honour.'

Cato is also often named as one of General George Washington's favorite plays, and it was put on by soldiers during the harsh winter of 1777-8 at Valley Forge. Nathan Hale probably wouldn't have known of the general's preference and died before this production, but it makes his choice of last words more poignant since it was Washington's desire for information on the enemy that led to Nathan's death. 

The Linonian Society continued to build and care for its library for a century. In 1871, the titles were transferred to the Yale library, which had also improved in the intervening decades. These titles, bearing a bookplate designating them as Linonian property remain part of the Yale library today.

Read more about Nathan Hale in But One Life, available worldwide in paperback and for Kindle.

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Tony Riches is a prolific writer of Tudor era fiction who has joined me as a guest before. I am happy to welcome him today with a journey into early American history involving his latest protagonist, Sir Walter Raleigh, and the lost colony of Roanoke.

Welcome, Tony!

~ Samantha

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Raleigh and the Lost Colony of Roanoke

Guest Post by Tony Riches

I’d always been intrigued by what has become known as the ‘lost colony’ and was keen to find primary sources to understand what might have actually happened. Once he gained influence at court, Raleigh promoted the idea of creating English colonies in North America to challenge Spanish colonial policy. The Roanoke adventure began when Raleigh was granted the right to explore the New World and send colonists in the name of Queen Elizabeth I.

In return for a fifth share of all gold and silver discovered, (or looted from Spanish and Portuguese ships) Raleigh could seize any land not already claimed by any ‘Christian prince’. Raleigh was well aware of the opportunities on the coast of the New World, and identified the island of Roanoke as a base for his first colony.

Unluckily for Raleigh, the queen refused permission for him to sail to Roanoke in person, so he sent Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe to find a suitable site for colonisation. They arrived at Roanoke Island in July, 1584, and met the native tribes, the Secotans and the Croatans. Barlowe returned with two Croatoans, named Manteo and Wanchese, who told Raleigh all about the Roanoke area. He presented them to Queen Elizabeth, which cause quite a stir at her Court, and announced he’d claimed the New World in the queen’s name, as the empire of Virginia.

Raleigh sent a second expedition of five ships, led by Richard Grenville, with his appointed governor, Ralph Lane, who had experience of establishing the English settlements in Ireland. The expedition sailed to Roanoke Island in 1585. This first attempt failed due to disagreements between Grenville and Lane, poor provisioning, and trouble with the local people, so in 1587 Raleigh replaced the military men with craftsmen, farmers, and their families, and sent another expedition, led by John White, to set up a new colony.

John White was an artist, a surprising choice for his new role as governor of the colony at Roanoke Island. They built the ‘Cittie of Raleigh’, a substantial base, with houses for each family, but White had to leave his daughter Elinor, her husband, and their infant daughter, Virginia, (the first English child born in America) when he sailed for England to report back to Raleigh in 1587 and bring back fresh supplies.

He was not to know that the Spanish Armada would be sighted soon afterwards, and White was not allowed to return to Roanoke until 1590. To his despair he found the settlement abandoned, and his possessions ransacked. The single word ‘CROATOAN’ was found carved on a tree. John White hoped this was a sign to show where the colonists had gone, but he was unable to search nearby Croatoan Island and returned home to tell Raleigh of the disaster.

The fate of the lost colony has been a mystery for many years, but archaeologists have uncovered new evidence suggesting that the survivors divided into different settlements, and at least some were assimilated into the local population.

I enjoyed researching the life and times of Sir Walter Raleigh, and discovering his strengths and weaknesses, as a courtier, explorer and failed politician, soldier and poet, a man ready to speak up for the poor and to honour his debts. My hope is that my new book, Raleigh – Tudor Adventurer, will help readers see beyond the myths and half-truths, and have a better understanding of the man who has been called the last true Elizabethan.

Tudor adventurer, courtier, explorer and poet, Sir Walter Raleigh has been called the last true Elizabethan.

He didn’t dance or joust, didn’t come from a noble family, or marry into one. So how did an impoverished law student become a favourite of the queen, and Captain of the Guard?

The story which began with the best-selling Tudor trilogy follows Walter Raleigh from his first days at the Elizabethan Court to the end of the Tudor dynasty.

Available worldwide on Amazon.

Read for FREE with Kindle Unlimited!

Connect with Tony:

Tony Riches is a full-time UK author of best-selling historical fiction. He lives in Pembrokeshire, West Wales and is a specialist in the lives of the Tudors. He also runs the popular ‘Stories of the Tudors ’podcast, and posts book reviews, author interviews and guest posts at his blog, The Writing Desk. For more information about Tony’s books please visit his website and find him on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.