The Ranks of Death: a Medical History of the Conquest of America

". . . how did it happen that the two immense continents could be conquered in so short a time by a handful of men? [. . .] Neither party knew how to arm against them, but each knew well this remorseless, conscienceless, pitiless, and impartial antagonist had been near because there were the sick, the maimed, the dead, and the dying who lay in evidence. And this mortal invisible army of disease killed more white man than Indians did and more Indians than white man did and, as time went on, more black men than either of the others." Percy Moreau Ashburn (1892-1940), a physician in the US Army, writes about the early settlement and the history of the conquest of America, with emphasize on the effects of man battling diseases from the viewpoint of medicine. This is one of the few well documented books contributing to the general history of America and, additionally, a chronicle as well as an appreciation of the struggle of survival.