E. B. Slæde – Med den gamle race: Ved Peleliu og Okinawa

In "The Wall Street Journal", Victor Davis Hanson named "With the Old Breed" one of the top five books on epic twentieth-century battles. Studs Terkel interviewed the author for his definitive oral history, "The Good War". Now E. B. Sledge’s acclaimed first-person account of fighting at Peleliu and Okinawa returns to thrill, edify, and inspire a new generation. An Alabama boy steeped in American history and enamored of such heroes as George Washington and Daniel Boone, Eugene B. Sledge became part of the war’s famous 1st Marine Division–3d Battalion, 5th Marines. Even after intense training, he was shocked to be thrown into the battle of Peleliu, where “the world was a nightmare of flashes, explosions, and snapping bullets.” By the time Sledge hit the hell of Okinawa, he was a combat vet, still filled with fear but no longer with panic. Based on notes Sledge secretly kept in a copy of the New Testament, With the Old Breed captures with utter simplicity and searing honesty the experience of a soldier in the fierce Pacific Theater. Here is what saved, threatened, and changed his life. Here, too, is the story of how he learned to hate and kill–and came to love–his fellow man.

E. B. "Sledgehammer" SLEDGE blev født og voksede op i Mobile. I slutningen af 1943 meldte han sig til US Marine Corps. Efter grundlæggende træning blev han sendt til Pacific Theatre, hvor han kæmpede ved Peleliu og Okinawa, to af de hårdeste slag under Anden Verdenskrig. Efter den japanske overgivelse gjorde Sledge tjeneste i Kina som en del af besættelsesmagten. Efter sin hjemkomst opnåede han en ph.d. i biologi og sluttede sig til fakultetet for Alabama College (senere University of Montevallo), hvor han underviste indtil pensionering. Sledge skrev oprindeligt om sine krigsoplevelser for at forklare dem for sin familie, men han blev overtalt af sin kone til at søge offentliggørelse. Sledge døde den 3. marts 2001.