Steven Mayeux's Earthen Walls, Iron Men takes a footnote of history and imbues it with a rich sense of human drama. Fort DeRussy was the key to the Confederate defense of the Red River in central Louisiana, and its fall came at a high cost to Union command. Though rich in military strategy and tactics, Earthen Walls, Iron Men also ventures outside the walls of the fort to explore the lives of the people who lived around it, providing a vivid, memorable portrait of life in Louisiana during the Civil War.

Steve Mayeux
Steve Mayeux is the quintessential "Louisiana Man." Born in the Cottonport Clinic on Bayou Rouge in 1950, he has paddled across the Mississippi River in a pirogue, run a trap line, managed a cotton gin, kept bees, farmed the family land, wrestled a few alligators, and never had a true bill returned by any Grand Jury before which he has ever appeared. He graduated from LSU in 1972, served a tour as a Marine Tank Platoon Commander, and returned to LSU for his Master’s Degree in Entomology in 1976. For the past thirty years, he has worked as an Agricultural Consultant in central Louisiana. He has served as President of "Friends of Fort DeRussy" since 1994, and in 1999 was named the Avoyelles Parish "Avoyellean of the Year" for his work in having the fort named a State Historic Site. Earthen Walls, Iron Men is his first book.


Another overlooked corner of American history receives its due in Marc Leepson’s Desperate Engagement. In 1864, Ulysses S. Grant was closing in on the Confederate capital of Richmond, unaware that a determined Rebel force was preparing to move on Washington, D.C. A small Union army stood in their way, suffering a crushing defeat at the hands of more than 12,000 Confederate soldiers, but held out long enough for Grant’s armies to rush back and protect Washington. Desperate Engagement traces the complex interplay of possibilities and personalities before, during and after the battle – and how unforeseen events can change the course of history.

Marc Leepson
Marc Leepson is a journalist, historian and the author of six books. A former staff writer for Congressional Quarterly in Washington, D.C., he has written for many newspapers and magazines, including Preservation, Smithsonian, Military History,  the Washington Post, New York Times, Baltimore Sun, Chicago Tribune, Dallas Morning News, Christian Science Monitor, Newsday, The Arizona Republic, and USA Today. After serving in the U.S. Army from 1967-69, including a year in the Vietnam War, he received his honorable discharge and went on to earn a Masters Degree in history from George Washington University in 1971. Since 1986, he has been arts editor and columnist for The VVA Veteran, the newspaper published by Vietnam Veterans of America. He teaches U.S. history at Lord Fairfax Community College in Warrenton, Virginia.