PETER COZZENShas enjoyed a career of remarkable achievement. From four years’ service as a captain in the U.S. Army, he went on to serve for 30 years as a Foreign Service officer with the U.S. State Department, with tours throughout Latin America.
In addition to his day job, Cozzens has indulged his passion for American history by researching and writing 18 equally remarkable books on the Civil War and the American West. Students of his work are likely familiar with his classic and award-winning The Earth Is Weeping, which chronicles the Indian Wars of the West beginning with Red Cloud’s War in 1866 and has been translated widely, including in Russian and Chinese editions. His next book went on to research and analyze the life and career of one of the most remarkable American Indians, the Shawnee leader Tecumseh, and his brother the prophet Tenskwatawa, who together assembled the greatest alliance of tribes in North America.
Cozzens has now completed a trilogy of books on American Indian history. His latest volume is a brilliant account of a less readily recognized but even more significant episode in American history. A Brutal Reckoning: Andrew Jackson, The Creek Indians, and the Epic War for the American South is a thoughtful and ultimately disturbing examination of the Creek Indian War of 1813 – 1814. It is without a doubt the best and most thorough history of this conflict.
It all began
