A Reluctant Hero's Footsteps

By John R. Scales

In 2011, by chance I discovered the after-action reports of the 329th Infantry Regiment, my fathers World War II unit, on the Internet. An idea was born: use these to reconstruct my fathers path in Europe. I would take my three children, Richard, Mary, and Stephen, on a trip to retrace those footsteps. This book is about our travels, but it is much more. It documents the life of a man and his family, the history of a unit, and how, through research and luck, we were able piece together the story. As far as possible, I tell the tale of my fathers life with pictures and artifacts from that life. In parallel, I relate the history of the unit he joined in combat, inserting pictures where I can. In fitting all the records together with the trip itself, I discovered my father in new ways and built a memory for my children. In an appendix, I give you a guide as to how you can do this for your veterans as well.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jun 3, 2013
• ISBN: 9781449796495

John R. Scales

John R. Scales is a retired Special Forces brigadier general with more than three decades of service, including combat tours in Vietnam and Afghanistan. He also has a Ph.D. in engineering and worked in that field after retiring from the military. In addition to receiving five patents for inventions, General Scales has written two previous books: Sherman Invades Georgia (Naval Institute Press, 2006) and A Reluctant Hero’s Footsteps (Westbow Press, 2012). A past president of the Tennessee Valley Civil War Roundtable, he leads Civil War campaign tours in Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia.

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