With The Old Breed

Description

Inscribed copy of With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa by Eugene B. Sledge, from the Naval Institute Press.

Octavo, xxxiv, 326pp, [7]. Blue-gray cloth, title stamped on spine. The first printing from the Naval Institute Press, with a full number line. Originally published Presidio Press in 1981. Silk ribbon, clean text block. Shelf wear to cloth, previously read, a few dog-eared leaves. Ownership inscription on front endpaper.

Inscribed by the author on the title page: “May 27, 1998 / To Clyde_, Congratulations on your 30th wedding anniversary. Sincerely, E.B. 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 Ken Burns PBS series, The War.