My Life in the Irish Brigade; The Civil War Memoirs of Private William McCarter, 116th Pennsylvania Infantry

Campbell, CA: Savas Publishing Company, 1996. First Hardcover Edition [stated]. First printing [stated]. Hardcover. Very good/very good. Don Troiani (Cover illustration). [8], xiii, [1], 266 pages. Occasional footnotes. Maps. Illustrations. Endnotes. Bibliography. Index. Here is an opportunity to own a Kennedy related item. Inscribed on the title page "To Honorable Ted Kennedy, Happy Birthday! A gift from Tom Keneally. Faugh A Ballagh! Battle Cry of the 28th Massachusetts, Irish Brigade. Clear the Way! Kevin E. O'Brien". William McCarter's diary is an important addition to primary information on Civil War soldiers. The reason it is important is that firsthand accounts of the Union Army's famed Irish Brigade are all by officers. McCarter's account is the only one known from an Army private. A down-to-earth person, he was 21 when he entered the Union Army. He was at the Battle of Fredericksburg, where he was wounded trying to take Marye's Heights and the horrible stone wall where many Union soldiers were wounded and killed. McCarter came to the attention of General Thomas Meagher, the Irish Brigade's commander, who pressed McCarter to be his orderly. Because of his closeness to the general and others, he observed many things about them. He was asked by his fellow soldiers to write letters and other things for them since he was known to have good penmanship. He wrote his memoir for his family in 1879 using his diary as the main source. Kevin O'Brien edited this memoir to make it even more readable, and he added the maps and photos. Kevin E. O'Brien balanced a career in Law and the Administration of Justice with an active career as a Civil War historian who was published widely on the Irish Brigade in the Civil War. Thomas Michael Keneally, AO (born 7 October 1935) is an Australian novelist, playwright and author of non-fiction. He is best known for writing Schindler's Ark, the Booker Prize-winning novel of 1982 which was inspired by the efforts of Poldek Pfefferberg, a Holocaust survivor. The book would later be adapted to Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture. Edward Moore "Ted" Kennedy (February 22, 1932 - August 25, 2009) was a United States Senator from Massachusetts and a member of the Democratic Party. He was the second most senior member of the Senate when he died and was the fourth-longest-serving senator in United States history, having served there for almost 47 years. The most prominent living member of the Kennedy family for many years, he was the last surviving son of Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. and Rose Kennedy; the youngest brother of President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert F. Kennedy, both victims of assassination; and the father of Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy. Kennedy championed an interventionist government emphasizing economic and social justice, but was also known for working with Republicans to find compromises between senators with disparate views. Kennedy played a major role in passing many laws, including laws addressing immigration, cancer research, health insurance, apartheid, disability discrimination, AIDS care, civil rights, mental health benefits, children's health insurance, education and volunteering. Over the course of his Senate career and continuing into the Obama administration, Kennedy continued his efforts to enact universal health care, which he called the "cause of my life." By the later years of his life, he had come to be viewed as a major figure and spokesman for American progressivism.