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Growing up in the Tennessee hills, Alvin York was equally renowned as a marksman and as a hard-drinking brawler. A dramatic New Year's conversion convinced him that killing was against God's will, and yet this shy, big-boned mountaineer singlehandedly dispatched two dozen Germans and captured 132 in the closing days of World War I. He earned the Medal of Honor and a ticker tape parade but refused to cash in on his fame, insisting "Uncle Sam's uniform ain't for sale." This succinct and gripping new account of Sgt. York's remarkable life includes details from exclusive interviews with the sergeant's three surviving children and information drawn from battlefield eyewitness reports and original film studio archives: fresh reminders of the legacy of one of America's great Christian patriots. We learn about life through the lives of others. Their experiences, their trials, their adventures become our schools, our chapels, our playgrounds. Christian Encounters, a series of biographies from Thomas Nelson Publishers, highlights important lives from all ages and areas of the Church through prose as accessible and concise as it is personal and engaging. Some are familiar faces. Others are unexpected guests. Whether the person is D.L. Moody, Sergeant York, Saint Nicholas, John Bunyan, or William F. Buckley, we are now living in the world that they created and understand both it and ourselves better in the light of their lives. Their relationships, struggles, prayers, and desires uniquely illuminate our shared experience.… (more)
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But Sergeant York was more than that, a man from the backwoods of Tennessee, used to hunting and farming, and had strong principles. After being drafted he filed to
The first sixty pages is pre-WWI and his return to the USA, and the rest of the book details his work establishing schools for the poor children of the hills who had no access to education. I liked how Alvin York stood by his principles, butting heads with those who wanted to use his name to fill their own pockets, or further their own political careers.
Sergeant York was not perfect, had flaws, and this bio did not hide them, but told his story in a well-balanced way, and without heavy religious themes that might keep non-Christians from reading his story.