The quickest way to get from eastern Kansas to Denver in 1867, was The Smoky Hill Trail. It was 500 miles of open prairie where stage coaches and freight wagons could be high and dry one day and swimming in mud the next. Five hundred miles of surprise snowstorms, oppressive heat, violent thunderstorms, choking dust, and if Mother Nature's threats weren't enough, there were vast herds of bison covering a land that was the ancestral home Cheyennes and Arapahoes bent on securing their native ...

"The importance of the area to early America . . . make the book a must-read for anyone interested in the dark side of New England history" ( Early American Crime).The idea of a criminal record originated in the early seventeenth century when the magistrates of the Massachusetts Bay Colony began recording dates, places, victims and criminals. Despite, or perhaps because of, the strict code of the Puritans, some early settlers earned quite the rap sheet tha...

" An entertaining and well-illustrated anecdotal survey of 'vice' and efforts to control it in mid- and late 19th century Boston" ( The Boston Guardian).Victorian Boston was more than just stately brownstones and elite society that graced neighborhoods like Beacon Hill. As the population grew, the city developed a seedy underbelly just below its surface. Illegal saloons, prostitution, and sports gambling challenged the image of the Puritan...

In this third book of "Tales of the Sergeant Major," the 18th U.S. Infantry's senior enlisted man, Sergeant Major Thomas Barrett, stationed at Fort Hays, Kansas in 1888, continues with the struggles of training five misfit soldiers. It is a job no one asked him to do, which most considered no more than a fool's errand, and that he, himself is unsure of his motivation. But he has persevered and his intense training has included something no other soldier has experienced: tales of those sold...

In the early fall of 1867, on the plains of Western Kansas, a little-known but important fight took place between a large number of experienced Southern Cheyenne warriors and a small detachment of inexperienced 10th Cavalry troopers. It was the Battle of the Saline River and it was the first major engagement of a group of soldiers who came to be called "The Buffalo Soldiers." Follow the desperate battle through the eyes of both the cavalry troopers and the Cheyenne warriors. But not all ba...

This "immensely stimulating story of true crime down the ages" tells the history of human violence, from Peking Man to the Mafia ( The Times, London).This landmark work offers a completely new approach to the history and psychology of human violence. Its sweep is broad, its research meticulous and detailed. Colin Wilson explores the bloodthirsty sadism of the ancient Assyrians and the mass slaughter by the armies led by Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, Ivan the Te...

For this edition, Rashke has added a preface and three short chapters that explore what has been released and learned about the Silkwood case since the book's original publication.Karen Silkwood, an employee of the Kerr-McGee plutonium processing plant, was killed in a car crash on her way to deliver important documents to a newspaper reporter in 1974. Silkwood was a union activist concerned about health and safety issues at the plant, and her death at age 28 was c...

From Hollywood's Black Dahlia to the Arkansas Bluebeard: an anthology of true crime profiles by "the grand dame of mystery" (Ed Gorman).Whether venturing into a blood-spattered farm in Texas, down a lonely mountain road in Alabama, or into the deceptively sunny Ohio suburbs, acclaimed mystery writer Craig Rice lends her hard-boiled style and a wicked irony to this gallery of real-life murders. Among them . . .A saintly middle-aged widow bludgeoned to death ...

A real-life murder mystery in turn-of-the-century London, and Scotland Yard's "greatest detective of all time" who was determined to discover whodunit.By 1919, Det. Chief Inspector Fred Wensley was already a legend, having investigated the Jack the Ripper slayings, busted crime syndicates, and risked his life at the notorious Siege of Sidney Street. But the brutal murder of kindly fifty-four-year-old widow and shopkeeper Elizabeth Ridgley was an unexpected challeng...

"With these incredible and often heartbreaking stories, John Paul Davis clearly demonstrates how the fortress acquired its sinister reputation." — History . . . the Interesting Bits!Famed as the ultimate penalty for traitors, heretics and royalty alike, being sent to the Tower is known to have been experienced by no less than 8,000 unfortunate souls. Many of those who were imprisoned in the Tower never returned to civilization and those who did, often did s...

Newly updated: "An enjoyable introduction to American working-class history." — The American ProspectPraised for its "impressive even-handedness", From the Folks Who Brought You the Weekend has set the standard for viewing American history through the prism of working people ( Publishers Weekly, starred review). From indentured servants and slaves in seventeenth-century Chesapeake to high-tech workers in contemporary Sil...

This "lively" study of female lawbreakers across centuries and cultures is "chock full of disquieting stories and truly twisted personalities" ( Booklist).Organized A-to-Z under six categories, this book offers insight into the lives and minds of women in different centuries and different countries, with diverse cultures and backgrounds from the poverty-stricken to royalty, who have defied law and order and social taboos. Read about mistresses, murderers, ...