Description
First edition of With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa by Eugene B. Sledge, inscribed by the author on notecard affixed to the front endpaper.
Octavo, xvi, 326pp. Brown hardcover, title stamped in gilt on spine. First edition, with no additional printings on copyright page. Clean text throughout, light wear to bottom edge of spine, largely unread. In the publisher’s first state dust jacket, $15.95 retail price on front flap, ISBN on rear flap, bright illustrations, a near fine example.
Inscribed by the author on a notecard, affixed to the front free endpaper:
“March 17, 1992 / Best regards to Richard Bishop, Sqt., USMC, who shares my loyalty to the Marine Corps + my love of its history + high standards / Semper Fidelis, Gene Sledge.”
This memoir by E.B. Sledge, which recounts his time as a Marine during World War II in the South Pacific, is considered one of the finest war memoirs ever written by a soldier. It began as notes that Sledge kept in his bible during the battles and which he sporadically wrote down after returning to the United States. This work, which went largely unnoticed when it was first published in 1981, has become an important first-person narrative of the Pacific theater. It was the inspiration for the HBO miniseries, The Pacific, and the Ken Burns PBS series, The War.
