John R. Scales is a retired Special Forces brigadier general with more than three decades of service, including combat tours in Vietnam and Afghanistan. He also has a Ph.D. in engineering and worked in that field after retiring from the military. In addition to receiving two patents for inventions, General Scales has written two previous books: Sherman Invades Georgia (Naval Institute Press, 2006) and A Reluctant Hero’s Footsteps (Westbow Press, 2012). A past president of the Tennessee Valley Civil War Roundtable, he leads Civil War campaign tours in Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia.