Over There: The United States in the Great War, 1917-18 [Hardcover]

Byron Farwell (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 1999

Our last-minute intervention in this European war would save the Allies in their hour of need and change forever the way Americans saw their country and the world. When the United States finally declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917, the British and French armies were at a point of total exhaustion; within two weeks the French troops had mutinied, leaving the Western Front practically undefended. In the same month, Lenin arrived in Moscow on the heels of the Russian Revolution and vowed to make peace with Germany. In the course of a few months the American army would grow from 200,000 ill-equipped and untrained men to over one million, but it was longer still before the French and British commanders took General Pershing and his recruits seriously. Byron Farwell's informed and colorful narrative covers all phases of the American effort, from the home front, where the war introduced rapid technical and social changes that were difficult to absorb, to the desperate encounters in the front lines of Belleau Wood and the St. Mihiel salient, where American troops proved their valor and altered the course of the war. The author, whose previous books include Stonewall Jackson and Queen Victoria's Little Wars, paints a vivid and memorable picture of the intense national experience whereby America came of age in the twentieth century.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A wonderfully concise history of America's first conflict overseas, Over There successfully balances a great body of scholarship with the need to tell a good story. It starts out in 1914, with the United States unprepared (both physically and politically) to fight, then tells how, in 1917, the country quickly created a combat force that helped break a long stalemate on the Western front of Europe. Farwell, a veteran author of military history, offers important insights into the nature of the Great War: "Strategy was replaced by logistics and battles were fought with strange, unfamiliar weapons of previously unimagined frightfulness," such as tanks, planes, and flame-throwers. Despite these technological advances, other aspects of the war were strikingly primitive. Officers on the front sometimes relied on carrier pigeons to send messages to headquarters, even releasing these poor birds in the middle of intense combat.

Farwell has the good sense to populate his narrative with cameo appearances by familiar figures such as Harry Truman, who fought with an artillery company, and Dwight Eisenhower, who narrowly missed seeing combat and regretted the war's end because, as a West Point-trained trooper, he desperately wanted to fight. Farwell also offers a glossary of soldier slang (to "read a shirt" was to inspect it for lice, for example). An appendix describes the exploits of "rough-cut hillbilly hero" Sergeant York, as well as the famed "Lost Battalion," which was trapped behind enemy lines without food for more than 100 hours, suffered terrible casualties, and refused to surrender. In all, Over There is hard to beat as introduction to the American role in the First World War. --John J. Miller

From Publishers Weekly

Although breaking no new ground in research or interpretation, Farwell (Armies of the Raj, etc.) does a workmanlike job of narrating the WWI battles in which U.S. soldiers fought, thus providing a good summary of the relatively brief history of U.S. forces in the Great War. The very worst land battles of the war were fought by the French, British and Russians during the years of American neutrality (1914 through early 1917). In 1916, the French absorbed one million casualties at Verdun. In the same year, the British lost 66,000 men in just the first day of fighting at Passchendaele, Belgium; a million Russian soldiers died during Brusilov's breakthrough on the Eastern Front. In comparison, the total American casualties by the end of war in November 1918 were just 52,947 killed and 202,628 wounded?in key fights such as the second battle of the Marne, the turning back of Ludendorff's troops at Soissons and the liberation of the hotly contested Saint-Milhiel salient. Pershing's doughboys also opened the Saint-Quentin Canal complex of the main Hindenburg Line, captured the bastion of Blanc Mont near Rheims and? most importantly?dove into the hell of the Meuse-Argonne front to forestall German retreat to the Rhine. Farwell's accounts of these engagements are accurate and well written. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc; First edition (February 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393046982
• ISBN-13: 978-0393046984
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.4 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,793,845 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good intro or overview, January 11, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Over There: The United States in the Great War, 1917-18 (Hardcover)

This books is a good introduction or overview of America's involvement in World War I. It's clearly written and not to dense, although I have noticed several editorial errors throughout the text (one paragraph refers to the same person with two different names). I also like that Farwell has included chapters about the home front during the war, giving us an idea of what the rest of America was doing during the war, not just the soldiers. If you're looking for a strictly military history of World War I or a book that goes into a lot of detail about the war, this one isn't for you. Likewise, it doesn't cover much of the three or four years before America entered the war (which is beyond the scope of this book). But it is enjoyable and informative reading that can serve as a springboard for further study of WWI.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars World War I: The American Experience, October 14, 2003

By 

James Gallen (St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A.) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Over There: The United States in the Great War, 1917-1918 (Paperback)

"Over There" is an eloquent telling of the story of the American involvement in World War I. It covers all aspects of the American experience including domestic society and politics, army organization and soldier heroism.

In the early parts of the book, Farwell explains the series of German actions which gradually drove an isolationist nation to war. The tug of war, between interventionists such as Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge, and isolationists lead by Sen Robert LaFollette, left Woodrow Wilson in the middle, his actions pleasing to no one. We read of the extreme Anti-German frenzy which arose after the declaration of war. The frenzy manifested itself in drill sergeants who repeated false reports of German atrocities, Billy Sunday's assertion that "If you turned Hell upside down you would find "Made in Germany" on the bottom' and mobs which stoned dashounds. Although Liberty Cabbage and Liberty Pups reverted to Sauerkraut and dashounds, German Shepherds remained Police Dogs and wristwatches, necessitated by uniforms devoid of watch pockets, remained popular.

With the declaration of war the problems turned to mobilization and equipment. One thing which surprised me was the meager American industrial contribution to the war. Where were the railroads and industry which had been so crucial to North victory in the Civil War, the arsenal of Democracy to come in World War II or the creators of cruise missiles and smart bombs? In World War I the U. S. was definitely a supplier of raw man power to use French and British aircraft and artillery.

General Perhsing's struggle to organize and preserve an American Army gets appropriate attention. With the introduction of U. S. Troops into battle the focus shifts to heroes and battles. Eddie Richenbacher, Quintin Roosevelt and Alvin York are just a few of the heroes mentioned. This book is not all praise, however. American shortfalls are reported and Pershing's leadership is critically examined.

Woodrow Wilson is the leader whose performance seemed to alienate almost everyone. To interventionists, including Theodore Roosevelt, Wilson was slow to enter the war, deficient in mobilization and weak in accepting an armistice, rather than demanding unconditional surrender.

This book is readable, enjoyable and informative. I highly recommend it for anyone with an interest in U. S. involvement in World War I.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A starting point on the US & WWI, March 11, 2002

By 

J. Liesenfelt (Florida) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Over There: The United States In The Great War, 1917 - 1918 (Audio Cassette)

I listened to the Audio Cassette version of this book. Mr. Farwell provides an overview of the United States' participation in the war from the US's total lack of preparedness in the beginning to the large American Expeditionary Force (AEF) turning the tide at the end of the war.

Farwell spends a lot of time describing President Wilson's effort to manage the war, US troop strength and training, supply problems, the effect of the war on the home front, the difficulty of black soldiers and the view of the war through the eyes of common soldiers and not so common soldiers such as George Patton and Harry Truman.

Along the way, Farwell debunks several commonly held (at least to me) notions about the war, such as: the air war had no strategic effect on the outcome; Germany's U-Boat war caused big problems for US shipping before and during the war; and that the US had to rely on France for guns and Britain to ship the troops to Europe.

John Richmond provides wonderful narration throughout, including French accents where appropriate and providing the proper pronunciations to the French towns and villages.

All in all, a good primer, though not in-depth narration, for how the US fought WWI.