R F Laird

100 Years On R F Laird

A world war all the European nations wanted, started by the assassination of a minor aristocrat, pursued by incompetent generals who thought they'd win in a week and then slew an entire generation of young men in a single blood-soaked trench called the Western Front. Who do you call? The Americans. Who had fought the first Modern War half a century before and knew how to win them. You need a Grant, a Sherman, a Pershing. Which we had. The point of Pershing's spear was the Rainbow Division. My grandfather was a captain of infantry in one of the most illustrious regiments in the Rainbow Division. The 166th. This book consists of his letters home and his 1918 journal from the ghastliest front of the twentieth century.