Cross-Border Warriors

Book excerpt: For well of a hundred years, Canadians and Americans have crossed the border that separates their two countries to serve in one another’s armed forces. The American Civil War, the two world wars, Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War - Cross-Border Warriors presents anecdotes, letters, and diaries by or about individuals who left family and native land to engage in these far-away struggles. There was Emma Edmonds, a woman from New Brunswick who disguised herself as a man and served as a field nurse and spy for the Yankees during the civil war; American Lucien Thomas, who flew 400 combat missions in WW II and Korea; Fred Demara, "The Great Impostor," who used his surgical skills on unsuspecting patients ... More than ninety photos, together with Fred Gaffen’s analysis of this cross-border phenomenon, complement the soldiers’ words.