ABOUT THE BOOK

The Butcher’s Cleaver by W. Patrick Lang published in 2007 is one in a series of historical fiction novels on the American Civil War. The trilogy is called: “ Strike The Tent: A Tale of the Confederate Secret Services.” In the novels he portrays the real characters of the Confederacy like Robert E. Lee or Judah Benjamin in the roles like they played in real life. He places them in fictional situations that are plausible and believable. His main character is Claude Devereux who is from a wealthy aristocratic Alexandria, Virginia family of bankers. The family neither supports slavery nor secession, but is sympathetic to the South by way of culture. All of the black servants of the Devereux family were born free and are lifetime family employees. Claude’s brother serves in the Confederate Army as has Claude where he is wounded. As a banker who often travels to their branches in France and can claim long residences overseas, Claude is accepted by the Union as a loyal American citizen thus setting him up to be a Confederate spy.

The book is an easy fun read especially for those who are interested in Confederate history.

The second volume, Death Piled Hard, was published in 2009 and in which Claude Devereux worms his way into command circles behind enemy lines.

The third volume, Down the Skies, was published in 2012. In the book, Confederate spy Claude Devereux finds himself a Brigadier General of the Volunteer Union Forces.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

W. Patrick Lang, is a retired U.S. Army officer, a private intelligence analyst, and an author. He graduated from VMI with a BA in English and from The University of Utah with a MA in Middle East Studies. In the Army, Lang was a combat veteran of Vietnam where he served in the Special Forces and Military Intelligence and served in a very senior capacity with the Defense Intelligence Agency as the Defense Intelligence Officer for the Middle East, South Asia and counter-terrorism. He is a graduate of The U.S. Army War College, the U.S. Army Command & General Staff College and the Armed Forces Staff College.