Review: The National Guard

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Michael D. Doubler, Ph.D., is a retired Army National Guard colonel and author of Closing with the Enemy: How GIs Fought the War in Europe, 1944–1945, winner of the Forrest C. Pogue and New York Military Affairs Symposium awards.

John W. Listman, Jr., a retired Army National Guard chief warrant officer, is the coauthor of The Tradition Continues: A History of the Virginia National Guard, 1607–1985. Both authors live in Alexandria, Virginia.

Foreword author Donald M. Goldstein initiated the America Goes to War series with The Way It Was: Pearl Harbor—The Story and Photographs.

THE
NATIONAL GUARD

An Illustrated History
of
America's Citizen Soldier

Michael D. Doubler & John W. Listman, Jr.

Brassey's, Inc.
22841 Quicksilver Drive
Dulles, VA 20166

192 Pages 450 photos
March 2003
Hardcover $29.95
ISBN: 1574883895

Review by K. L. Jamison

This oversized, work does more than the usual coffee-table book to give a history of the National Guard. The photos are fleshed out with ample text to explain the growth of the National Guard from the amateur militia of the early colonists, to its use as a primitive mobilization system, to semi-permanent Rangers, to Volunteer Companies, to National Guard Regiments, to its place in the current war on terrorism.

The work goes beyond most popular histories to provide rare photos and obscure information important to understanding the growth of the National Guard. The work will be of interest to military historians as well as proud members of the National Guard and their families.