E. B. Sledge – S staro pasmo: Na Peleliu in 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 se je rodil in odraščal v Mobile. Konec leta 1943 se je vpisal v ameriški marinski korpus. Po osnovnem usposabljanju so ga poslali v pacifiško gledališče, kjer se je boril v Peleliuju in Okinawi, dveh najhujših bitkah druge svetovne vojne. Po japonski predaji je Sledge služil na Kitajskem kot del okupacijske sile. Po vrnitvi domov je doktoriral iz biologije in se zaposlil na fakulteti Alabama College (kasneje Univerza v Montevallu), kjer je poučeval do upokojitve. Sledge je sprva pisal o svojih vojnih izkušnjah, da bi jih razložil svoji družini, vendar ga je žena prepričala, naj išče objavo. Sledge je umrl 3. marca 2001.