Background
Hedren, Paul Leslie was born on November 12, 1949 in New Ulm, Minnesota, United States. Son of Thomas Harry and Muriel Mary Hedren.
(In 1875, a young man from Pennsylvania joined the Dodge E...)
In 1875, a young man from Pennsylvania joined the Dodge Expedition into the Black Hills of Dakota Territory, from where he penned letters to the Omaha Daily Bee . Not content with accompanying Dodge, Captain Jack returned to the Black Hills in 1876 for a further six months. John Wallace Crawford, who became better known as Captain Jack, wrote a vibrant account of this fascinating time in the American West. His correspondence featured his adventures in the early Black Hills gold rush as he played the parts of reporter, plainsman, scout, and raconteur. Captain Jack met and worked with Buffalo Bill Cody and quickly seized the opportunity to scout for Brigadier General George Crook on his Indian campaign. Jack's correspondence from the Starvation March and the fight at Slim Buttes offers detailed and intimate accounts of these dramatic episodes of the Great Sioux War. Award-winning historian Paul L. Hedren has compiled these almost unknown letters, writing an introduction and essays that place the correspondence in the greater context of the Black Hills gold rush and the Great Sioux War. The result is a treasure trove of hitherto hidden primary documents as well as a ripping yarn in the traditions of the old West.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0985281782/?tag=2022091-20
( Founded in 1834 on the high plains of present-day easte...)
Founded in 1834 on the high plains of present-day eastern Wyoming. Fort Laramie evolved into an organizational hub and chief supply center for the U.S. Army in its campaigns against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. Fort Laramie and the Great Sioux War focuses on a crucial year in the history of the fort, 1876. That was the year of General George Crook’s Big Horn; the Black Hills gold rush; and chaos at the Red Cloud and Spotted Tail Indian agencies. Paul Hedren draws upon official army records, diaries, and journals to illuminate a fort-based history of the Great Sioux War, and for this edition he also provides a new preface.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0806130490/?tag=2022091-20
( A unique resource with a new perspective on the U.S. Ar...)
A unique resource with a new perspective on the U.S. Army in the Great Sioux War Lasting nearly two years, the Great Sioux War pitted almost one-third of the U.S. Army against Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyennes. By the time it ended, this grueling war had played out on twenty-seven different battlefields scattered across five states, resulted in hundreds of casualties, cost millions of dollars, and transformed the landscape and the lives of survivors on both sides. It also entrenched a view of the army as largely inept. In this compelling sourcebook, Paul Hedren uses extensive documentation to demonstrate that the American army adapted quickly to the challenges of fighting this unconventional war and was more effectively led and better equipped than is customarily believed. While it lost at Powder River and at the Little Big Horn, it did not lose the Great Sioux War. In the first part of this volume, Hedren considers concepts of doctrine, training, culture, and matériel to aid understanding of the army’s structure and disposition. In part two he dissects the twenty-eight Great Sioux War deployments in chronological order, including documentation of command structures, regiments, and companies employed. In the concluding section, the author addresses how an otherwise sound American army was defeated in two battles and nearly lost a third. The book also features seven helpful appendices, a glossary, and an oversized map showing forts, encampments, and battle sites. By expanding his purview to encompass all of the war’s battlesalong with troop movements, strategies, and tacticsHedren offers an authoritative account of the conduct of U.S. forces in a campaign all too frequently misunderstood. The leather-bound collector's edition is limited to fifty numbered and signed copies.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870623982/?tag=2022091-20
( Of all the U.S. Army posts in the West, none witnessed ...)
Of all the U.S. Army posts in the West, none witnessed more history than Fort Laramie, positioned where the northern Great Plains join the Rocky Mountains. From its beginnings as a trading post in 1834 to its abandonment by the army in 1890, it was involved in the buffalo hide trade, overland migrations, Indian wars and treaties, the Utah War, Confederate maneuvering, and the coming of the telegraph and first transcontinental railroad. Douglas C. McChristian has written the first complete history of Fort Laramie, chronicling every critical stage in its existence, including its addition to the National Park System. He draws on an extraordinary array of archival materials–including those at Fort Laramie National Historic Site–to present new data about the fort and new interpretations of historical events. Emphasizing the fort's military history, McChristian documents the army's vital role in ending challenges posed by American Indians to U.S. occupation and settlement of the region, and he expands on the fort's interactions with the many Native peoples of the Central Plains and Rocky Mountains. He provides a particularly lucid description of the infamous Grattan fight of 1854, which initiated a generation of strife between Indians and U.S. soldiers, and he recounts the 1851 Horse Creek and 1868 Fort Laramie treaties. Meticulously researched and gracefully told, this is a long-overdue military history of one of the American West's most venerable historic places.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870623605/?tag=2022091-20
( Waged over the glitter of Black Hills gold, the Sioux W...)
Waged over the glitter of Black Hills gold, the Sioux War of 1876-77 transformed the entire northern plains from Indian and buffalo country to the domain of miners, cattlemen, and other Euro-American settlers. Keyed to official highway maps, this richly illustrated guide leads the traveler to virtually every principal landmark associated with the war, from Fort Phil Kearny where the Sioux besieged soldiers sent to guard the Bozeman Trail in the 1860s to Fort Buford, the site of Sitting Bull's surrender in 1881.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0917298381/?tag=2022091-20
( Fort Laramie had a long and illustrious history as a wa...)
Fort Laramie had a long and illustrious history as a way station on the Oregon Trail, trading center, rendezvous point, Indian agency, and military installation. Founded in 1834 on the high plains of present-day eastern Wyoming, the fort evolved into an organizational hub and chief supply center for the U.S. Army in its campaigns against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. Fort Laramie in 1876 focuses on a crucial year in the history of the fort, a year that saw General George Crook's Big Horn, Yellowstone, and Powder River expeditions; the defeat of Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer at the Little Big Horn; a fevered rush to the Black Hills gold fields; and chaos at the Red Cloud and Spotted Tail Indian agencies. Many historians have written about these events, but Paul L. Hedren is the first to dwell on the operations of the most important military post on the northern plains during that time. He has drawn on the official army records of Fort Laramie—a vast body of correspondence, orders, and directives from all command levels—in addition to diaries and journals. Collectively, they illuminate the scene of a frontier military outpost making history in its support of General Crook in the Great Sioux War.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0803223455/?tag=2022091-20
( Lasting nearly two years, the Great Sioux War pitted al...)
Lasting nearly two years, the Great Sioux War pitted almost one-third of the U.S. Army against Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyennes. By the time it ended, this grueling war had played out on twenty-seven different battlefields scattered across five states, resulted in hundreds of casualties, cost millions of dollars, and transformed the landscape and the lives of survivors on both sides. It also entrenched a view of the army as largely inept. In this compelling sourcebook, Paul Hedren uses extensive documentation to demonstrate that the American army adapted quickly to the challenges of fighting this unconventional war and was more effectively led and better equipped than is customarily believed. While it lost at Powder River and at the Little Big Horn, it did not lose the Great Sioux War. In the first part of this volume, Hedren considers concepts of doctrine, training, culture, and matériel to aid understanding of the army’s structure and disposition. In part two he dissects the twenty-eight Great Sioux War deployments in chronological order, including documentation of command structures, regiments, and companies employed. In the concluding section, the author addresses how an otherwise sound American army was defeated in two battles and nearly lost a third. The book also features seven helpful appendices, a glossary, and an oversized map showing forts, encampments, and battle sites. By expanding his purview to encompass all of the war’s battles—along with troop movements, strategies, and tactics—Hedren offers an authoritative account of the conduct of U.S. forces in a campaign all too frequently misunderstood.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0806143223/?tag=2022091-20
(This book provides a detailed, well-researched military n...)
This book provides a detailed, well-researched military narrative of the Fifth Cavalry's operations near Warbonnet Creek. Introduction by Don Russell.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0933307306/?tag=2022091-20
historian national park administrator
Hedren, Paul Leslie was born on November 12, 1949 in New Ulm, Minnesota, United States. Son of Thomas Harry and Muriel Mary Hedren.
Bachelor, St. Cloud State College, 1972.
Park ranger, historian Fort Laramie (Wyoming) National History Site, 1971-1976. Historian Big Hole National Battlefield, Wisdom, Montana, 1976-1978. Chief ranger, historian Golden Spike National History Site, Brigham City, Utah, 1978-1984.
Superintendent Fort Union Trading Post National History Site, Williston, North Dakota, 1984-1997, Niobrara National Scenic River/Missouri National Recreational River, O'Neill, Nebraska, 1997—2007.
( Waged over the glitter of Black Hills gold, the Sioux W...)
(In 1875, a young man from Pennsylvania joined the Dodge E...)
( Fort Laramie had a long and illustrious history as a wa...)
(This book provides a detailed, well-researched military n...)
( The Great Sioux War of 1876–77 began at daybreak on Ma...)
( Lasting nearly two years, the Great Sioux War pitted al...)
( Founded in 1834 on the high plains of present-day easte...)
( A unique resource with a new perspective on the U.S. Ar...)
(Publisher: Stackpole Books)
(approx 8x10 size paperback)
( Of all the U.S. Army posts in the West, none witnessed ...)
Board directors Convention and Visiting Bureau, Williston, 1984-1996, president, 1994-1996. Member Western Writers Association (Spur award 2005), Western History Association (member council 1990-1993).
Married Janeen Margaret Wolcott, June 19, 1974 (divorced 1997). Children: Ethne Olivia, Whitney Elizabeth. Married Connie Joyce Burns, September 10, 2005.