THIRTEEN SOLDIERS is a personal history of Americans who fought in the 13 major wars in which the United States has waged battle. Senator John McCain is well-qualified to write this book, not only because he served and was imprisoned, but because he feels deep respect for the sacrifices made by our veterans. Co-author Mark Salter has been a part of McCain’s staff for 18 years and has collaborated with him on other books. 

The stories chronicle soldiers serving in the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Civil War, the Cuban conflict, a campaign in the Philippines, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf War, Afghanistan and, finally, Iraq. These individuals have been chosen because they exhibit the love of country, sacrifice and valor embodied in the best that America has to offer. According to McCain and Salter, they “were not looking for thirteen stories of supermen or superwomen. We wanted to write straightforward, honest accounts of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.”

For war story enthusiasts, McCain and Salter detail important aspects of the overall objectives American leaders desired to achieve, at times leading readers into generalities. Well-known leaders from these conflicts are introduced when an individual’s service can be identified with that leader or his direct subordinates. The authors depict in each story the “afterward” life or legacy of each soldier, a tribute to the extensive research done to portray the sacrifices made.

"Senator John McCain is well-qualified to write this book, not only because he served and was imprisoned, but because he feels deep respect for the sacrifices made by our veterans.... The soldiers chosen for these stories are not sentimentalized, and neither are their wars."

Twelve stories could not have been written if not for the facts derived from the first: the Revolutionary War. At 15, Joseph Plumb Martin errantly placed his mark on a recruitment paper for the Connecticut Militia. His regiment met General George Washington astride his white charger at Kip’s Bay during a furious rant at his men, who retreated from a British/Hessian bayonet charge. Re-formed, the Militia waited for a British Naval charge from the Hudson River. Throughout his military service, Martin wrote in a journal of starving, often without warm clothing, lacking adequate firepower and often being lost, separated from a unit. Upon returning home at 16, Martin took up arms again, this time as a regular in the new Continental Army. In his telling, he went to war first for adventure and then later for money. He recalls “marching and countermarching, starving and freezing” before he happened upon a slaughtered cow whose spleen he extracted, took back to camp and roasted.

The worst memory of Martin’s wartime experience was the defense of Fort Mifflin. His narrative devotes more than 50 pages to the suffering in that battle. Under fierce siege by the British, Continental forces endured shelling by five British batteries, heavy guns, mortars and incoming warships approaching with nearly 480 total land and naval guns to fire on a single day. When the forts lay destroyed, Martin writes to lament that no Washington, Putnam or Wayne had been there to stem the attacks by Lord Cornwallis.

Later, Martin joined Washington’s army in Valley Forge but was shortly ordered to march again, to Philadelphia. When the war finally ended, he received his discharge documents, which were delayed by months, and returned home. Denied farmlands to work as the government had promised, countless veterans never did take title to land they had formerly owned. Martin was one of these men. Poor and nearly destitute, he represented a majority of those who had fought to preserve liberty for a new America. His published memories of his service open a vast window on the misery endured by those who gallantly fought the first American conflict. 

Given a taste of the deeply personal stories told by these 13 soldiers, a reader is encouraged to bore into subsequent tales. One meets those who endure tropical jungle climates, sloshing through snake-infested marshes in island nations, fierce cruelty in harsh, cold climates, especially after capture by enemy insurgents, plodding into desert platforms of intense warfare, lined by mines and explosives, and damaging conflicts with surface-to-air missiles and warplanes manned by brave pilots. 

The soldiers chosen for these stories are not sentimentalized, and neither are their wars. Perhaps a summary for their purposes can be gleaned from the authors’ direct quote from the Navy SEAL code: “I will never quit. I will not fail…”