Gene E Salecker's Books

Fortress Against The Sun

The B-17 Flying Fortress In The Pacific

By: Gene E. Salecker,E Salecker

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Fortress Against The Sun

The B-17 Flying Fortress In The Pacific

By: Gene E. Salecker,E Salecker

Most often remembered for its role in the air war against Germany, no book has ever before been devoted to the B-17's Pacific operations. The author combines technical and operational detail with eyewitness accounts by crews and commanders to present a fascinating account of a famous aircraft at war.

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Page Count

490

Publisher

Da Capo Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0306817152

ISBN 13

9780306817151

Disaster on the Mississippi

The Sultana Explosion, April 27, 1865

By: Gene E Salecker

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Disaster on the Mississippi

The Sultana Explosion, April 27, 1865

By: Gene E Salecker

At two o’clock in the morning on 27 April 1865, seven miles north of Memphis on the Mississippi, the sidewheel steamboat Sultana’s boilers suddenly exploded. Legally registered to carry 376 people, the boat was packed with 2,100 recently released Union prisoners-of-war. Over 1,700 people died, making it the worst marine disaster in U.S. history. This book looks at the disaster through the eyes of the victims themselves. It offers a concise, minute-by-minute account on the cause of the explosion and its effect on different parts of the boat. To focus on the personal stories of the victims, both civilian and soldier, Gene Eric Salecker patiently collected material from hundreds of letters, period newspaper stories, and other sources. Readers are first introduced to victims while they are languishing in Confederate prisons and follow their release to an exchange camp outside of Vicksburg to their eventual crowding onto the Sultana. His knowledgeable narrative is interwoven with individual reminiscences, including those of the heroic rescuers. He offers unprecedented details about the captain’s handling of the steamboat and corrects some long-held myths about the placement of the soldiers on the Sultana and newspaper coverage of the disaster. A large portion of the book covers rescue attempts, both successful and failed, and the aftermath of the disaster as it affected those involved. With its emphasis on the human-interest aspect of the Sultana, this book brings to the literature a critical point of view and much new information.

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Page Count

377

Publisher

Naval Institute Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1612517730

ISBN 13

9781612517735

Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana

The Worst Maritime Disaster in American History

By: Gene E Salecker

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Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana

The Worst Maritime Disaster in American History

By: Gene E Salecker

The Sultana was a sidewheel Mississippi steamboat carrying almost two thousand recently-released Union prisoners-of-war back north at the end of the Civil War. At 2:00 a.m. on April 27, 1865, when the boat was seven miles above Memphis, her boilers exploded. Almost 1,200 people perished in the worst maritime disaster in United States history. Gene Eric Salecker covers this disaster in detail and dispels the many myths that have been connected to the Sultana for too long. Almost every author who has written about the Sultana has relied on the words of a few survivors or referred to the works of previous authors to get their story. Advancing the scholarship, the author has visited the National Archives in Washington, DC, to comb through the handwritten transcripts of the three investigative bodies that looked into the disaster or poured over the handwritten testimony from the court-martial trial of Capt. Frederic Speed, the only person tried for the overcrowding of the vessel. In 1996, after extensive research and using the most current sources available at that time, Salecker wrote Disaster on the Mississippi: The Sultana Explosion, April 27, 1865. Still, there were inevitable omissions. After almost twenty-five years of continued research on the Sultana, and all those involved in the disaster, Salecker has gleaned unparalleled knowledge into every aspect of the disaster. His research, covering the National Archives, and thousands of pages of newspapers from around the world and government documents, including pension records and service records, has allowed Gene to tell the story of the Sultana as completely as possible. By bringing his research back to primary sources, Salecker dispels myths and adds to the story of the Sultana. In Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana: The Worst Maritime Disaster in American History paroled prisoners, civilian passengers, guards, crew members, rescuers, and eyewitnesses tell their stories in their own words. The true, and complete, story about the Sultana and the disaster has finally, and fully, been told.

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