num_pages: 109
description: On the night of 5 February 1918, the American troopship, Tuscania, was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Scotland - the first great disaster to befall American troops in World War I. Among the many men killed was a young soldier from Bend, Oregon, Percy Stevens. The tragic loss of life touched Bend (Percy's death was the central Oregon's town's first fatality in a foreign was) as well as other communities around America. After grieving over the loss of life on the Tuscania and throughout the war ( also known as "The Boy's War" at the time), many of the women whose sons had died banded together to form the Gold Star Mothers. This organization successfully lobbied Congress in the 1920s for funds that allowed them to visit their sons' graves in Europe. The author's grandmother, Laura Stevens, was one such visitor. Percy's eager crusade to fight for democracy and his mother's quiet pilgrimage are the strands the author weaves together in this well-illustrated narrative. His assiduous research recounts interviews with survivors of the disaster, and he has managed to reconstruct the career of the U-boat commander who fired the fatal torpedo. The care he has taken in following the passage of the Gold Star Mothers bill through Congress gives the reader a view of the joys and burdens of motherhood in a more sentimental age. It is also shows a nation keeping faith with the women who gave their sons for their country. Crusades &amp; Pilgrimage is history deeply felt, simply told. It is an evocative and memorable book, filled with the touching history of persons, families, and communities affected by world events far from home.
language: English
title: Crusade & Pilgrimage: A Soldier's Death, a Mother's Journey & A Grandson's Quest
titlecomplete: Crusade & Pilgrimage: A Soldier's Death, a Mother's Journey & A Grandson's Quest
publisher: Oregon Historical Society Pr