Forty Miles a Day on Beans and Hay

"This account of the enlisted men of the United States Regular Army on the frontier, from 1865 to the 1890's, is not a history of the Indian Wars (which, to be sure, shaped the experiences of these men) but a study of the rank and file who served through the Indian campaigns. The labors, endurance, and combats of the western regular created the framework of law and order that made settlement and social development possible. As members of the Regular Army, these men formed an important segment of our usually slighted national military continuum, upon and around which our massive armies have been created in times of crisis. We need to know more about our military past and the men who lived it, just as we need to deepen our understanding of all facets of the American experience.