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  Sherman's Recollections of...

  William Tecumseh Sherman

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  This librivox recording comprises three chapters from American Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman’s Memoirs.  The chapters deal with a posting to California in his pre-Civil War military career in the years 1846-1848.  While many of his colleagues saw action in the Mexican-American War, Sherman performed administrative duties in the captured territory of California. Along with fellow Lieutenants Henry Halleck and Edward Ord, Sherman embarked from New York on the 198-day journey around Cape Horn aboard the converted sloop USS Lexington. Due to the confined spaces aboard-ship, Sherman grew close to Halleck and Ord, and in his Memoirs references a hike with Halleck to the summit of Corcovado, notable as the future spot of the Cristo Redentor statue. Sherman and Ord reached the town of Yerba Buena, in California, two days before its name was changed to San Francisco. In 1848, Sherman accompanied the military governor of California, Col. Richard Barnes Mason, in the inspection that officially confirmed that gold had been discovered in the region, thus inaugurating the California Gold Rush. Sherman, along with Ord, assisted in surveys for the sub-divisions of the town that would become Sacramento.  In 1853 Sherman resigned from the Army.  In 1855-1857 he was in California as part of his bank duties.    He returned to the Army in May 1861.  Sherman was one of the premier generals fighting for the North in the Civil War.      [Sherman] steadfastly refused to be drawn into politics and in 1875 published his Memoirs, one of the best-known first-hand accounts of the Civil War. British military historian B. H. Liddell Hart famously declared that Sherman was "the first modern general". Summary by wikipedia and david wales

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  The Best of America - Seven...

  Washington Irving, Nathaniel...

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  This anthology of unabridged short stories represents some of the most significant works from the most influential American authors of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Included are Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving, Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe, Mermaids by Louisa May Alcott, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain, An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce, and The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry.

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  Hadji Murat - A Gripping Tale of...

  Leo Tolstoy, Tim Zengerink

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  What if your only path to freedom meant trusting your sworn enemies? 
  Hadji Murat is Leo Tolstoy’s fierce and haunting story of honor, survival, and impossible choices.  
  Based on a true historical figure, this modern adaptation follows the Avar warrior Hadji Murat as he deserts Imam Shamil and allies with the Russian Empire—his enemy—in a desperate attempt to save his family. 
  Caught between betrayal and bravery, Murat’s struggle becomes a symbol of personal integrity in a world of political cruelty and deception. 
  What You’ll Hear in This Adaptation: 
  - A powerful historical drama based on real-life events in the Caucasus 
  - A deeply personal tale of divided loyalties, inner strength, and sacrifice 
  - A modern, immersive retelling of Tolstoy’s masterful final novella 
  - A story that questions the meaning of courage, freedom, and betrayal 
  Perfect for fans of war literature, historical fiction, and moral complexity—Hadji Murat remains one of Tolstoy’s most unforgettable final achievements.

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  The Golden State Killer Case

  William Thorp

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  In 2018, police announced that they had finally arrested the "Golden State Killer," a man responsible for over 140 burglaries, fifty rapes, and at least thirteen murders committed in California throughout the 1970s and '80s. That man turned out to be a former California police officer, Joseph James DeAngelo Jr. 
   
   
   
  Just two months earlier, the publication of I'll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara had rocked the world of true crime. Published two years after her death, the book charts McNamara's obsessive search for the prolific criminal who had been known over the years as the East Area Rapist, the Original Night Stalker, and the Visalia Ransacker, among other epithets. McNamara is credited with coining the "Golden State Killer" moniker and heightening public awareness of the—at the time—still unsolved case. 
   
   
   
  William Thorp dives into the investigation, exploring the dark side of sunny California, the advances in forensic innovation that made solving this case possible, and the story inside the story—one of an amateur sleuth who dedicated the last years of her life to understanding how one of the country's worst criminals could have spent so many decades undetected.

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  Short Story Collection Vol 008

  Various

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  Librivox’s Short Story Collection 008: a collection of 20 short essays and fiction in the public domain read by a variety of Librivox members.

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  The Maltese Cat - Celebrated...

  Rudyard Kipling

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  Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born in Mumbai, India on 30th December 1865.   
   
  As was the custom in those days, he and his sister were sent back to England when he was 5.  The ill-treatment and cruelty by the Portsmouth couple they boarded with Kipling said contributed to the onset of his literary life.  
   
  At 16 he returned to India to work on a local paper where he was soon contributing and writing.  It also exposed him to the issues of identity and national allegiance which pervade much of his work.  
   
  In 1886, his ‘Departmental Ditties’, collection of verse appeared in print followed by 39 short stories for his newspaper over only 8 months.  These were then published as ‘Plain Tales from the Hills’, shortly after his 22nd birthday.  
   
  He continued his prolific pace of writing before being dismissed in a dispute and, taking his pay-off and the profits from the sale of some publishing rights, decided to return to London, travelling via Rangoon, Hong Kong, Japan and the United States, all the while writing articles, and arriving at Liverpool in October 1889. 
   
  Over the next two years he saw further works published as books and in magazines, as well as a nervous breakdown for which he was prescribed a sea voyage, to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and India.  
   
  Happier times came with marriage to Caroline Starr Balestier in January 1892.  The honeymoon began in Vermont and ended in Yokahama where they heard their bank had failed.  They returned to Vermont and settled.  Caroline was now pregnant and he was planning the ‘Jungle Books’.  
   
  A failed arbitration between the US and England resulted in an argument between Caroline’s brother and Kipling, and then his arrest.  At the hearing he was mortified by the exposure of his private life and after settling the matter they returned to England and life in Torquay.  ‘Kim’ was published in 1902, and ‘Just So Stories for Little Children’, a year later.  
   
  In 1907 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature with the citation “in consideration of the power of observation, originality of imagination, virility of ideas and remarkable talent for narration which characterise the creations of this world-famous author”.   
   
  When the Great War erupted, he scorned those who refused conscription.  His son enlisted and was killed at the Battle of Loos in September 1915, at 18, an exploding shell had ripped his face apart.  This death inspired Kipling’s writing thereafter, but the tragedy broke his life and by 1930 his prolific pen had almost ceased. 
   
  Rudyard Kipling died on 18th January 1936 from a perforated duodenal ulcer.  He was 70.  His ashes are buried at Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey. 
   
  In the Maltese Cat Kipling returns once more to India and the British Empire.  A polo match is being played.  The fierce competitive instincts of two social classes are fighting for dominance.  All told through the voice of the Maltese Cat, the most cunning of the horses.

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