Gen. Leonard Wood's meteoric career was no fluke. The ambitious Wood (1860-1927), serving as an army physician, strategically took on tasks and assignments that led him from the pursuit of Geronimo in the deserts of the Southwest (for which he won the Medal of Honor) to chief of staff of the U.S. Army and almost to the presidency of the United States. During his rise to high office, the darker side of Wood's personality became legend. Able administrator and sincere patriot, Wood, together with friend Theodore Roosevelt, organized the famous "Rough Riders" during the...

This diary of Leonard Wood, a medical officer, tells the dramatic story of the last campaign against the Apache chief Geronimo. It is the only journal kept by anyone on that expedition.

Under the command of Capt. Henry Lawton, Wood's first field duty was to pursue Geronimo on a hard-driving chase from Arizona deep into Old Mexico. Although this expedition never actually seized Geronimo, it wore him down to the point of surrender. Wood's journal is a firsthand account of what men saw and felt on that dirty, brutal chase through desolate country where the temperature soared...