Homer Lea: American Soldier of Fortune

by Lawrence M. Kaplan

Overview

As a five-feet-three-inch hunchback who weighed about 100 pounds, Homer Lea (1876–1912), was an unlikely candidate for life on the battlefield, yet he became a world-renowned military hero. Homer Lea: American Soldier of Fortune paints a revealing portrait of a diminutive yet determined man who never earned his valor on the field of battle, but left an indelible mark on his times.

Lawrence M. Kaplan draws from extensive research to illuminate the life of a "man of mystery," while also yielding a clearer understanding of the early twentieth-century Chinese underground reform and revolutionary movements. Lea's career began in the inner circles of a powerful Chinese movement in San Francisco that led him to a generalship during the Boxer Rebellion. Fixated with commanding his own Chinese army, Lea's inflated aspirations were almost always dashed by reality. Although he never achieved the leadership role for which he strived, he became a trusted advisor to revolutionary leader Dr. Sun Yat-sen during the 1911 revolution that overthrew the Manchu Dynasty.

As an author, Lea garnered fame for two books on geopolitics: The Valor of Ignorance, which examined weaknesses in the American defenses and included dire warnings of an impending Japanese-American war, and The Day of the Saxon, which predicted the decline of the British Empire. More than a character study, Homer Lea provides insight into the establishment and execution of underground reform and revolutionary movements within U.S. immigrant communities and in southern China, as well as early twentieth-century geopolitical thought.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813126166
Publisher:	University Press of Kentucky
Publication date:	10/01/2010
Series:	American Warriors Series
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Lawrence M. Kaplan is the historian for the U.S. Missile Defense Agency.

What People are Saying About This

Mac Coffman

An excellent biography of a largely forgotten extraordinary man. Despite ill health throughout his 35 years, Lea served briefly as a general in the Chinese Army and was Sun Yat Sen's military advisor. He became famous because of his book in 1909 about a future war with the United States that Japan would initiate with a surprise attack. Three years later, in another book, he predicted that Germany and Russia would be major threats to Britain and the United States. His fascinating life is well told in this biography. (Mac Coffman, author of The War to End All Wars)

From the Publisher

"An excellent biography of a largely forgotten extraordinary man. Despite ill health throughout his 35 years, Lea served briefly as a general in the Chinese Army and was Sun Yat Sen's military advisor. He became famous because of his book in 1909 about a future war with the United States that Japan would initiate with a surprise attack. Three years later, in another book, he predicted that Germany and Russia would be major threats to Britain and the United States. His fascinating life is well told in this biography."—Mac Coffman, author of The War to End All Wars

Editorial Reviews

Kaplan has undertaken a difficult task, well accomplished, in reconstructing a biography of a figure who was controversial while living and continued to be after his death. This book will be of value to those whose interests are in the areas of Sino-American relations, American adventurers, or the events leading to the Pacific War.

Journal of Military History

"The story of Homer Lea's involvement and adventures with Chinese reformers and revolutionaries both in the United States and China in the early-twentieth-century could come directly from a modern novel of international intrigue."—John T. Greenwood, editor of Normandy to Victory: The War Diary of General Courtney H. Hodges and the First U.S. Army

From the Publisher