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Gideon's War — Douglas Rees
"Gideon's War: A Tale of the Rough Riders" is a classic tale of a young boy forced to grow up fast in a war he has no business waging.
As Gideon puts it:
"The war with Spain. The war for Cuban independence. It seems like such a little thing. It lasted one short summer. We won every battle, and were home for harvesting. It cost us exactly 365 deaths in combat.
"We fought it with an army that was mostly boys who'd never given a thought to war until it was upon us. Then we leapt to arms, though our arms were outdated and worn. We marched to two-steps and Civil War camp songs. Then we came home, most of us with our single-shot rifles still unfired, our antique sabres bright and unused.
"A dog-and-pony show, most of it. That's the myth. And as Chance Vavasour once said, ‘A myth is something that is true whether it ever happened or not.'"
As Gideon puts it:
"The war with Spain. The war for Cuban independence. It seems like such a little thing. It lasted one short summer. We won every battle, and were home for harvesting. It cost us exactly 365 deaths in combat.
"We fought it with an army that was mostly boys who'd never given a thought to war until it was upon us. Then we leapt to arms, though our arms were outdated and worn. We marched to two-steps and Civil War camp songs. Then we came home, most of us with our single-shot rifles still unfired, our antique sabres bright and unused.
"A dog-and-pony show, most of it. That's the myth. And as Chance Vavasour once said, ‘A myth is something that is true whether it ever happened or not.'"
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