"A private may think all or anything he pleases, but he does not have an opportunity to say very much about anything. He must obey the commands of his officers." Needom Freeman gives us this memoir of his time as a private in the United States Army. He enlisted at Dallas before proceeding to Fort McIntosh in Laredo, Texas. The book follows the details of his training there and his subsequent postings to different Army bases before ultimately being stationed as a soldier in the Philippines during the Spanish-American war in 1898.