Dispatches from the Front: A History of the American War Correspondent

Since the founding of the United States, war has been a recurring phenomenon in American history. We have fought for many reasons: independence, national unity, manifest destiny, international democracy. Americans have fought in almost every corner of the world, from deserts to mountains to jungles. And in every war on every front, we have paid intense attention. Typewriter patriots, equipped with telegraphs, radio microphones, or satellite links, have been the conduit for a public eager to imagine and feel every musket fire and missile blast from Lexington to Baghdad.
In Dispatches from the Front we have unique and special dispatches from ten American wars. In the correspondents' words ring the passion and drama of war from the American Revolution to the Persian Gulf War. The work of Thomas Paine, Stephen Crane, Ernest Hemingway, Ernie Pyle, Edward R. Morrow, Sydney Schanberg, and more than sixty other correspondents tell us of America's wars as they happened, on the battlefield and on the home front. Brief essays introduce each war by discussing the important changes taking place in American society and providing a series of "national snapshots" of the economic, political, and technological character of the world and the country at the time. The impact of these factors on each episode of warfare is considered, followed by a focus on the experiences of the war itself.
Over the years, the words of press observers have been central in fostering wartime nationalism. Reporters functioned as frontline poets, scratching the first impressions into the culture's consciousness. The tone and character of the press coverage shaped the nation's understanding of itself. Dispatches from the Front offers insight into the culture of the United States at each crisis point, from its beginnings to the present time.