They Came to Cordura

An almost forgotten segment of our military history provides the substance for this story of Pershing's punitive expedition into Mexico, when the bandit Villa was terrorizing the frontier. The time was 1916; the American forces were undermanned, badly equipped, inexperienced in guerrilla warfare -- and outnumbered and out manoeuvred by the Villistas. The particular segment of the sporadic fighting involved in this story concerns a Major Thorn, West Pointer, who has been relieved of his command and assigned the dubious post of Award Officer, whose role is the recommending of men for the DSO. The cause is presumably a secret, for his superior officers respected his father's memory and wished to spare the son. But it hangs over him like a sword of Damocles, and before his special assignment is completed, he learns that it is no secret. This specifically retails the minute procedure as Thorn escorts to a safe base, several men to whom the award will be made; and a woman accused of giving aid and comfort to the enemy. It is a grim march; the food and water give out; threat of attack from marauding bands ends in Thorn's giving up the horses; illness and wounds decimate the little group; and worst of all, the 'heroes' turn out to be men with clay feet, no one of them wanting the award, and all of them scorning their commanding officer. The final tragedy -- almost within reach of Cordura -- reveals the ultimate in human beings succumbing to animal need. There's material for a novel of the stature of The Horse Soldiers here; but the handling is pedestrian. [Kirkus Reviews]