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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie Mass market paperbound - 1987

by Harold Keith

"This full-length junior novel should hold a place with the best Civil War fiction for young people. The fighting takes place in the West. . . . A young farm boy joins the Union forces, becomes a scout . . . There is suspense in the telling and many a colorful character".--The Horn Book.


From the publisher

Winner of the Newbery Medal * An ALA Notable Children's Book * Winner of the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award

A captivating and richly detailed novel about one young soldier who saw the Civil War from both sides and lived to tell the tale.

Earnest, plain-spoken sixteen-year-old Jeff Bussey has finally gotten his father's consent to join the Union volunteers. It's 1861 in Linn County, Kansas, and Jeff is eager to fight for the North before the war is over, which he's sure will be soon.

But weeks turn to months, the marches through fields and woods prove endless, hunger and exhaustion seem to take up permanent residence in Jeff's bones, and he learns what it really means to fight in battle--and to lose friends. When he finds himself among enemy troops, he'll have to put his life on the line to advance the Union cause.

Thoroughly researched and based on firsthand accounts, Rifles for Watie "should hold a place with the best Civil War fiction for young people" (The Horn Book).

A strong choice for independent reading and for sharing in a classroom and for homeschooling. As a homeschool cooperative teacher commented: "The book has launched many discussions in our class. When a person is on one side of a conflict, it is important to remember that people on the other side are also people. Jeff is a perfect model for how treating people with respect can happen even in war."

First line

"The mules strained forward strongly, hoofs stomping, harness jingling."

From the rear cover

Jeff Bussey walked briskly up the rutted wagon road toward Fort Leavenworth on his way to join the Union volunteers. It was 1861 in Linn County, Kansas, and Jeff was elated at the prospect of fighting for the North at last.

In the Indian country south of Kansas there was dread in the air; and the name, Stand Watie, was on every tongue. A hero to the rebel, a devil to the Union man, Stand Watie led the Cherokee Indian Na-tion fearlessly and successfully on savage raids behind the Union lines. Jeff came to know the Watie men only too well.

He was probably the only soldier in the West to see the Civil War from both sides and live to tell about it. Amid the roar of cannon and the swish of flying grape, Jeff learned what it meant to fight in battle. He learned how it felt never to have enough to eat, to forage for his food or starve. He saw the green fields of Kansas and Okla-homa laid waste by Watie's raiding parties, homes gutted, precious corn deliberately uprooted. He marched endlessly across parched, hot land, through mud and slash-ing rain, always hungry, always dirty and dog-tired.

And, Jeff, plain-spoken and honest, made friends and enemies. The friends were strong men like Noah Babbitt, the itinerant printer who once walked from Topeka to Galveston to see the magnolias in bloom; boys like Jimmy Lear, too young to carry a gun but old enough to give up his life at Cane Hill; ugly, big-eared Heifer, who made the best sourdough biscuits in the Choctaw country; and beautiful Lucy Washbourne, rebel to the marrow and proud of it. The enemies were men of an-other breed - hard-bitten Captain Clardy for one, a cruel officer with hatred for Jeff in his eyes and a dark secret on his soul.

This is a rich and sweeping novel-rich in its panorama of history; in its details so clear that the reader never doubts for a moment that he is there; in its dozens of different people, each one fully realized and wholly recognizable. It is a story of a lesser -- known part of the Civil War, the Western campaign, a part different in its issues and its problems, and fought with a different savagery. Inexorably it moves to a dramat-ic climax, evoking a brilliant picture of a war and the men of both sides who fought in it.

Details

  • Title Rifles for Watie
  • Author Harold Keith
  • Binding Mass Market Paperbound
  • Edition 1st Harper Troph
  • Pages 352
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Harperteen, New York, New York, U.S.A.
  • Date 1987-09-25
  • Features Maps, Table of Contents
  • ISBN 9780064470308 / 006447030X
  • Weight 0.35 lbs (0.16 kg)
  • Dimensions 6.9 x 4.2 x 0.9 in (17.53 x 10.67 x 2.29 cm)
  • Ages 13 to UP years
  • Grade levels 8 - UP
  • Reading level 910
  • Themes
    • Chronological Period: 19th Century
    • Chronological Period: 1851-1899
    • Topical: Civil War
  • Library of Congress subjects United States - History - Civil War,, Watie, Stand
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 57010280
  • Dewey Decimal Code FIC
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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

Rifles for Watie

by Harold Keith

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Rifles for Watie

Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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  • Paperback
Condition
Used - Good
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Paperback
ISBN 13
9780064470308
ISBN 10
006447030X
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Harperteen, 1987. Mass Market Paperback. Good. Former library book; Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less.Dust jacket quality is not guaranteed.
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$6.01
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Rifles for Watie

Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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  • Paperback
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Binding
Paperback
ISBN 13
9780064470308
ISBN 10
006447030X
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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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ISBN 13
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ISBN 10
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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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Condition
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ISBN 13
9780064470308
ISBN 10
006447030x
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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

  • Used
Condition
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ISBN 13
9780064470308
ISBN 10
006447030x
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Rifles for Watie
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Rifles for Watie

by Keith, Harold

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ISBN 13
9780064470308
ISBN 10
006447030x
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