Formed in 1801 to protect sea captains against attack from the British navy and Barbary Pirates, the Providence Marine Corps of Artillery remains one of the most famed regiments in the U.S. Army. It distinguished itself during the War of 1812, the Dorr Rebellion, and in nearly every major engagement of the Civil War. After assuming the identity of the 103d Field Artillery Regiment of the Rhode Island National Guard, the unit battled amid the carnage of the Western Front in World War I, fought the enemy in the mosquito- infested South Pacific islands during World War II, and weathered the scorching deserts of Iraq in the twenty-first century. Based on extensive primary research and interviews with veterans of the corps, this narrative offers an insider’s look at the illustrious regiment in its first full history.

The author of fifteen books on American military history, Robert Grandchamp lives in Jericho, Vermont, where he works as an analyst with the government.
Cynthia Comery Ferguson is the author of several organizational histories and a number of articles on Rhode Island History. She heads the communications department of Ready to Learn Providence, a large nonprofit agency in Rhode Island.

Robert Grandchamp, Jane Lancaster and Cynthia Ferguson
Format: softcover (7 x 10)
Pages: 269
Bibliographic Info: 192 photos & illustrations, appendices, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2012
pISBN: 978-0-7864-6375-6
eISBN: 978-0-7864-8582-6
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments      ix
Foreword by Col. Howard F. Brown      1
Preface      3
Introduction: Citizen-Soldiers      5
In Memoriam: Major General Harold Newton Read      7

1. Early Beginnings, 1801–1829      9
2. The PMCA and the Napoleonic Era      17
3. The Dorr Rebellion      23
4. The Golden Age of the PMCA      33
5. Colonel William Sprague and the PMCA      42
6. Artillery Primer      50
7. The Civil War      65
8. A Push for Professionalism      99
9. Restoring the Legacy      110
10. The Mexican Border      117
11. World War I      125
12. Between the Wars      144
13. World War II      152
14. Korea and the Cold War Era, 1946–1989      178
15. The War on Terror      193

Appendices
I: Commanders of the Providence Marine Corps of Artillery      213
II: The Original Members of the PMCA      214
III: The Bicentennial of 2001      215
IV: Rhode Island Batteries in the Civil War      216
V: The Forlorn Hope      219
VI: Memorial Roster of the First Rhode Island Light Artillery      226
VII: 24 July 1943 General Barker Letter      232
Chapter Notes      239
Bibliography      249
Index      255

“a worthwhile investment”—Civil War News; “the volume offers chronological chapters detailing the deployments and institutional development of the PMCA from its founding to the present”—Reference & Research Book News.