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Modern War Studies
Soldiers and Scholars

Soldiers and Scholars

The U.S. Army and the Uses of Military History, 1865-1920

by Carol Reardon

Series: Modern War Studies

Sales Date: July 27, 1990

280 Pages, 6.00 x 9.00 in

Paperback
9780700611126
Published: July 1990

$30.00

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The use and abuse of military history is the theme of this book. Historian Carol Reardon scrutinizes the Army’s relationship to its own history and traces the Army’s attempts, from the end of the Civil War through the Progressive Era, to lay claim to the discipline of military history.

“Owning” military history was important to the Army, Reardon maintains. Not only was military history a cornerstone in the Army’s emerging education system, but it carried with it a professional image and social respectability as well.

As a result, the Army tenaciously defended the discipline from the incursions of civilian academics, arguing that military professionals should set the standards for the study of military history. The American Historical Association, on the other hand, countered that military history should not be left to amateurs.

In this well-researched study Reardon argues that the lengthy, unresolved debate over proprietorship of military history was largely responsible for its demise as a discipline during the half century following World War I.

Carol Reardon is associate professor of history at Penn State University and the author of Soldiers and Scholars and Pickett’s Charge in History and Memory.

"Solidly researched and written with skill and sophistication, this valuable monograph on an interesting topic spans both military and intellectual history."—Journal of American History
"An excellent description and analysis of the Army’s first real effort to include military history in the professional education of its officers. Solidly researched, well written and carefully balanced, it is a valuable contribution to our understanding of the intellectual heritage of the modern U.S. Army."—Army
"This is a solid, well-researched book that firmly places the US. army’s development in its societal context."—Canadian Military History
"This commendable study is essential reading for those interested in the intellectual history of the U.S. Army, and is indispensable background to understand the military world view of American command and staff during the First World War."—Georgia Historical Quarterly
"An original and important study that breaks new ground in the fields of military history and historiography."—George C. Herring, author of America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950–1975
"A sophisticated work that addresses problems in military education that are far from being resolved today. It is at once an intellectual history of the U.S. Army at a most interesting time in its evolution and an illuminating commentary on the ways that an army can utilize history. Civil War buffs will be especially pleased by Reardon’s analysis of the Army’s study of the Civil War during this period."—Jay Luvaas, Army War College, author of The Military Legacy of the Civil War
"An excellent and original study of the development of American military thought and literature in the era before World War I."—Timothy K. Nenninger, National Archives, author of The Leavenworth Schools and the Old Army