The Last Campaign: Sherman, Geronimo, and the War for America

The Last Campaign: Sherman, Geronimo, and the War for America by H.W. Brands

In its history, the United States government fought many battles for control of the American continent, the longest being its war against the Native American tribes. In the years after the Civil War, when the construction of the transcontinental railroads made a unified nation a real possibility, pressure built on the government to deal with the tribes once and for all. In The Last Campaign, master storyteller H.W. Brands uses his dramatic, character-driven style to relate the climax of this epic clash through the lives of the men who epitomized the values of the opposing sides.

William Tecumseh Sherman served in the U.S. Army for decades, helping evict the Seminoles from their home in Florida and bearing witness to the Gold Rush that fueled the peopling of California. In Brand's memorable portrayal, he is a man who experiences personal anguish but is outwardly stoic. During the Civil War, he begged President Lincoln not to give him a command of his own, but when Lincoln did, Sherman proved crucial to the North's victory, pioneering the use of "total war." Geronimo grew up in the Apache tribe, spending an idyllic childhood hunting wild game for survival, roaming freely on the land. Only later, after the shocking murder of his wife, children, and mother by Mexican soldiers, did he become a relentless avenger, raiding Mexican settlements across the American border.

By the 1870s, Sherman had risen to General of the U.S. Army. He was tasked with bringing peace to the West. The effort involved negotiations with leaders of many tribes, some of whom accepted that their traditional way of life was doomed and that the future of their peoples lay on reservations. Others -- Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse of the Lakotas, Quanah Parker of the Comanches, Captain Jack of the Modocs, Joseph of the Nez Perce -- resisted fiercely. But none fought more stubbornly or successfully than Geronimo.

This final phase of the war for America, Brands writes, determined what the American West would be: a sparsely settled, wild home where Indian tribes could thrive, or a more densely populated extension of America as it existed east of the Mississippi. The Last Campaign is a powerful history of a turning point in the making of our nation and a searing elegy for a way of life that is gone.

DOUBLEDAY, HARDCOVER, 1ST EDITION, 1ST PRINTING, 2022