The Ragged Rebel: A Common Soldier in W. H. Parsons’ Texas Cavalry, 1861-1865

Here is the adventurous, eloquent, true story of David Carey Nancea young, Northern-born Texas farmer who opposed slavery but got caught up in the carnage of the Civil War as a soldier in a Texas cavalry. After enlisting against his father’s will, Nance initially reveled in the camaraderie and excitement of military life, but his romantic concepts were quickly dashed by the grim realities of deprivation, sickness, and the horrors of armed combat. Fourteen years in preparation, THE RAGGED REBEL is a delightfully written, well-documented narrative, often in Nance’s own words, about a sensitive and deeply religious farm boy’s fight for survival amid wartime conditions in the frontier regions of the western Confederacy. It both reveals the day-to-day experiences of a common soldier in the core regiment of perhaps the most famous brigade in the Trans-Mississippi West and provides valuable insights into the military operations of mounted troops west of the river.