The American Expeditionary Force: Coming Over Here

I own 127 books about the First World War, John J. Pershing and the American Expeditionary Force. These I have collected over the last five years.

I have plenty of general histories, usually I rely on the work of John Keegan or Liddell-Hart but there are others. I have also amassed a half dozen books each on the French, British, and German armies. What's left is about a hundred books all covering the AEF. the pride of the collection is original printings of Pershing's memoirs and those of his two army commanders, Robert Lee Bullard and the very underrated Hunter Liggett. I also own books on all the individual American battles, these are Cantigney, the Marne defense, Belleau Wood, the Marne Offensive, St. Mihiel, and the grand finally at Meuse-Argonne.

There are many personal memoirs from guys in the trenches to be had, and I have most of them. One can also spend a lot of time looking into Pershing's dealings with the Allies and with the U.S. government.

Interestingly, most of the divisions raised during the war formed alumni societies after the war. Each published its own official history. Original copies can be had or digital reprints. These official histories are pretty useful and usually beam with pride at their division's accomplishments. Here's the Big Red One recounting its exploits at Cantigny and there is the 'Rainbows' describing its actions on the Marne, and the 82md describing how it rescued the 'Lost Battalion'. Many volumes include after action reports and official citations.

Well, the reader might be wonder, why is Stroock telling us all this?

I have for the last several years I've been working on a history of Pershing and the AEF. Many of the early chapter drafts have been published in magazines such as Strategy & Tactics, Military Heritage and Against the Odds. So far the ToC looks like this:

-Intro

-The Old Army

-The Man Pershing

-Over There

-The Legacy of the Blue & the Gray

-The Bureaucratic Struggle

-The First Fights

-The Marne Attack

-St. Mihiel and preparation

-Meuse-Argonne: John J. Pershing

-The Ordeal of the 79th Division at Montfaucon

-Meuse-Argonne: Hunter Liggett

-The Fighting 89th

-What if?: Pershing's War, 1919

-Was John J. Pershing Right?

 Most of the chapters are written and I expect to be done by the end of this year