An interview with Peter Grant

Now that BRINGS THE LIGHTNING is out in all four formats, hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook, and is available on Kindle Unlimited as well, it seems a propitious time to link to this excellent interview of author Peter Grant by Scott Cole of Castalia House. The level of knowledge that Grant has about the weapons of the period, and the amount of research he puts into his books, are truly astounding. – VD

Scott Cole: How did you decide to base your first Western novel on Walt’s demobilization, journey home, and quest to find a new life in a changed world?

Peter Grant: A lot of this was personal experience. I’ve been in military service, and experienced demobilization, a journey home, and having to start all over again. I knew that hundreds of thousands have had to do the same thing after almost every war in history. I researched the stories of both Union and Confederate veterans, and found they shared similar experiences. Also, the corruption, attacks on returning Confederates by both official and ‘unofficial’ enemies such as bushwhackers, etc. are all documented in books and narratives of the period. It was a logical step to make this the beginning of my novel.

Q. Is Walt’s character based on historical figures or is he your Western alter-ego?

Walt is entirely based on historical figures. Some were Southern veterans who became first guerrillas, then outlaws, such as the James gang. Others are based on veterans from both the North and the South who wrote about their experiences of coming home after the war, then heading west to make a fresh start. I have no alter ego in the book at all.

Q. You mentioned that you fired many of the weapons mentioned in the book. Were these updated versions of the original models or part of private collections that survived the years?

These were original weapons that had survived the wars in Southern Africa. I’ve fired original versions of Colt’s 1861 Army and 1873 revolvers, Winchester Model 1873 and 1886 rifles, and the Winchester Model 1887 lever-action shotgun. All were in private collections.

Q. Walt does a good job in explaining the advantages and disadvantages of various firearms in the book. Then again, he had a lot of them. If you had to choose only one pistol and one long rifle to equip yourself with in that time what would you choose and why? Would you make different choices if you were equipping yourself for the African bush?

Good question. If I were in Walt’s shoes, I’d have gone with the choices he made, for the same reasons: the Remington revolver and the Henry rifle. Both were suitable for the plains. I’d have liked a heavier rifle as well, to handle buffalo on the plains and bear, etc. in the mountains, but if I was limited to one rifle, the Henry would be it, because it would be so much more useful in combat to have its rapid rate of fire and large magazine capacity.

If I were to pick one of each for Africa, during the period when it was still wild and filled with very dangerous animals, the revolver would be the same, but the rifle would unquestionably have to be a much more powerful weapon. Don’t forget, African dangerous game is much larger and more powerful than those in North America. I’d pick a European big-caliber rifle, probably (in the days of blackpowder propellant) an eight-gauge or even a four-gauge muzzle-loading weapon. That would have obvious limitations in its speed of reloading, etc., but it would have the power to take down the largest African animals, unlike any American rifle of the period. If dangerous animals were less of a factor, I might consider a repeating rifle; but all of the cartridges during the period in which this novel is set (mid to late 1860’s) weren’t very efficient or powerful. If we were in the 1870’s, I’d take the Winchester 1876 rifle with its .45-75 cartridge, or, a bit later, the Winchester 1886 in .45-70. By the 1890’s I’d take a European bolt-action repeater with a smokeless round; the British Lee-Metford, the German Mauser, etc.

Q. Why were the cartridges so weak and inefficient in the mid to late 1860’s? Cost savings by manufacturers or just the technology at the time?

The cartridges were weak for two reasons.

The technology to produce metal cartridges was brand-new and in its infancy. Extruded brass was unknown; cartridges had to be formed from a sheet of the metal, with consequent weaknesses at the seams. This meant that if a powerful propellant load was used, it risked rupturing the case; so all early cartridges were relatively lightly loaded. For example, the Henry rifle (and its immediate successor, the Winchester Model of 1866) used a powder charge of only 25 to 28 grains, less than many handguns of the day. The Winchester 1873 used 40 grains – an improvement, but not greatly. It took until the 1870’s for more powerful cartridges such as the .50-70 and the later, more efficient .45-70 (and their larger, longer cousins) to be developed.

During the 1860’s, the centerfire primer had not yet been invented; all early cartridges were rimfire, like modern .22LR, or pinfire. This meant that ignition was less reliable. It also meant that the bases of the cartridges were less strong, as their rims had to be hollow to accommodate the priming compound and/or the pin. It took until the 1870’s for central primers to be developed (most notably the Berdan and Boxer priming systems). That, in turn, allowed for solid rims that were stronger.

Clinton calls for drone strikes in London

Then can’t remember having done so:

Hillary Clinton on Tuesday denied reports that she once suggested taking out WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with a drone strike.

“I don’t know anything about what [WikiLeaks] is talking about, and I don’t recall any joke,” the Democratic nominee told reporters Tuesday. “It would have been a joke if it had been said, but I don’t recall that.”

WikiLeaks tweeted a screen grab Sunday evening from a report alleging that Clinton once asked in 2010 during a State Department briefing, “Can’t we just drone this guy?” She supposedly asked this when she served as secretary of state.

I would think that a presidential candidate threatening lethal drone strikes in London, and against a foreign embassy, no less, would be concerning. But arguably even more concerning is the possibility that said presidential candidate genuinely can’t remember having done so because she has brain damage.

Brings the Lightning audiobook

Castalia House is very happy to be able to announce that BRINGS THE LIGHTNING, a Western by Peter Grant, is now available in audiobook. Narrated by Bob Allen, the audiobook is 7 hours and 56 minutes long.

When the Civil War ends, where can a former Confederate soldier go to escape the long memories of neighbors who supported the winning side? Where can Johnny Reb go when he can’t go home? He can go out west, where the land is hard, where there is danger on every side, and where no one cares for whom you fought – only how well you can do it. 


Walt Ames, a former cavalryman with the First Virginia, is headed west with little more than a rifle, a revolver, and a pocket full of looted Yankee gold. But in his way stand bushwhackers, bluecoats, con men, and the ever-restless Indians. And perhaps most dangerous of all, even more dangerous than the cruel and unforgiving land, is the temptation of the woman whose face he can’t forget.


When you can’t go home again – go west!

Ain’t equality grand?

On the plus side, no one calls them racists anymore:

The WHITE ghettos that blight South Africa: 20 years after the fall of apartheid, how it is now white people who live in squalid camps. There are 42,000 white South Africans living in poverty, a figure which has grown in last 20 years. Munsieville is a squatter camp west of Johannesburg which is home to 300 of them, many of them kids. Under apartheid white South Africans lorded it over blacks and ‘coloureds’ but now there is equality….

“I was mostly affected by the amount of children I saw, living in squalor. It saddens me to think they might never leave this level of poverty and will remain living in this situation for the rest of their lives. The children reminds me of any white kids I’ve met, even kids in affluent suburbs, playing outside spending their days in the sun. They don’t seem to understand they are poor, or are ignorant to what life is like outside Munsieville.”

Coming soon to an America near you.

Mailvox: why he must vote for Donald Trump

Someone with the propitious name of “Del Cid” sent me this today:

I am voting for Donald Trump this November 48, 2016.

Whether any of the innumerable slings and arrows directed at Trump’s person and politics recently have any basis in fact or not, in the end it matters quite little to me.  This election, I am not so much voting for the individual as I am voting for what he inherently represents.

As so many wrongly assume, just because I vote for Trump does not necessarily require that I admire every aspect of him personally.  Nor does it mean I condone every action he has committed, decision he has made, policy he has endorsed, or word he has spoken.  As common sense as this may sound to some, it has tripped up enough people I have spoken to lately that sadly I feel I must make this clarification.

So why am I voting for Donald Trump?

In part I am voting for Trump because the only viable alternative, Hillary Clinton, is far worse than Trump on almost every conceivable level. At the very least, I will vote strategically for Trump in order to deny Hillary the Presidency and to prevent the catastrophe that such a result would undoubtedly bring upon our nation and possibly even the rest of the world.

However, ultimately I will vote for Trump because no matter the specifics of what actions he may take or what stances he may adopt as President, the one thing he is guaranteed to do is shake the Establishment currently embedded in our nation’s government to its very core.  Given his track record so far as only just a Presidential nominee, one has to admit this to be true, just as one must equally admit that our government has fallen into a dangerous rut and must be shaken out of it.

Hillary could never do that, she is too much a part of said Establishment to bring any meaningful, productive change no matter how flowery and polished her scripts and talking points are.  Best case scenario, Hillary as President would only carry on the current status quo and our government, and nation, will continue to devolve into chaos and eventual self-destruction.

In contrast, Trump as President will likely result in one of two situations:

  1. He breaks the mold adhered to by almost every newly made President for the last several generations and actually acts on his campaign promises; thus making some much needed positive changes to our government and our national/international policies.  True, no one is perfect and he may and probably will make some bad decisions or changes to be sure.  But overall, his Presidency will be a net positive and with his help our nation will thrive and flourish and begin to find its way back to the right track. 
  2. He makes some truly terrible changes, declares himself God-Emperor of America, and drives us all to hell in a handcart.  If this is the path his presidency takes, then he will undoubtedly gather so much hatred and opposition from enough of us true blooded Americans that We the People will finally be galvanized into performing our full civic duty and actually do something ourselves to fix our nation and “Make America Great Again.”

Obviously possibility 1 is best case scenario, and 2 is worst case scenario.  Call me a flaming optimist, but I feel that possibility 1” is the most likely outcome.  As with all relatively sane individuals, I generally prefer orderly, intellectual revolutions to chaotic, violent ones.  However, history has repeatedly and unfailingly demonstrated that if the former is so continuously and brutally repressed, the latter will occur eventually.

Either way, change must happen.  Change will happen.  Real and fundamental change.

Which of our two candidates this election season are more suited to acting as a catalyst for positive change, short or long term?  The old bureaucrat so highly experienced in the game of political corruption that even her scandals have scandals?  The woman so inextricably tied to the rot at the core of our political machinery that she is the veritable posterchild (postergranny?) of all things wrong with our government today?  Or the loud, brash, polarizing man who drives the chattel of PC media elites, SJW thought police, cuckservatives, et all before him like so many helpless leaves before the hurricane?  The one candidate who has already begun the breaking of the Present World Order without even yet having stepped foot in the White House?

I look at it all like this:  It is a cold, hard fact that you will never in your life be given the choice of a Presidential candidate who will completely satisfy all of your moral and political standards.  Yet at the same time neither you nor your nation can afford for you to stand by, shun your civic duty, and remove yourself from the decision for the purpose of virtue signaling your moral superiority.  Other than arguably making you look good, what real good does this accomplish for the world?  You must choose the best you can out of what options you have been given, and make the most you can out of the reality with which you are faced.

I have studied my options carefully this election season.  Given the choices reality has set out before me, I can only conscientiously fulfill my civic duty as an American citizen by choosing Donald Trump for my next President.

Massive Russian civil defense drill

Russia is apparently taking the banging of the war drums seriously:

As relations between Russia and the US disintegrate as a result of the escalating proxy war in Syria, which today culminated with Putin halting a Plutonium cleanup effort with the US, shortly before the US State Department announced it would end negotiations with Russia over Syria, tomorrow an unprecedented 40 million Russian citizens, as well as 200,000 specialists from “emergency rescue divisions” and 50,000 units of equipment are set to take part in a four day-long civil defense, emergency evacuation and disaster preparedness drill, the Russian Ministry for Civil Defense reported on its website.

According to the ministry, an all-Russian civil defense drill involving federal and regional executive authorities and local governments dubbed “Organization of civil defense during large natural and man-caused disasters in the Russian Federation” will start tomorrow morning in all constituent territories of Russia and last until October 7. While the ministry does not specify what kind of “man-caused disaster” it envisions, it would have to be a substantial one for 40 million Russians to take part in the emergency preparedness drill. Furthermore, be reading the guidelines of the drill, we can get a rather good idea of just what it is that Russia is “preparing” for.

The website adds that “the main goal of the drill is to practice organization of management during civil defense events and emergency and fire management, to check preparedness of management bodies and forces of civil defense on all levels to respond to natural and man-made disasters and to take civil defense measures.” Oleg Manuilov, director of the Civil Defence Ministry explained that the exercise will be a test of how the population would respond to a “disaster” under an “emergency” situation.

Americans, meanwhile, are fretting over whether or not Kim Kardashian is going to need therapy or not after her recent trip to Paris.

This should go well.

The price of badthink

Scott Adams said that he used to be scheduled to do at least two speaking engagements per month. Since he’s been talking about Trump, he has not received one request. And one scheduled for next year, was canceled as “they are going in a different direction”.

It’s no wonder the Left has been winning the cultural war. The Left is very good about supporting its cultural leaders. Castalia readers aside – they have been reliably great in this regard – far too much of the Right would rather back a Left-approved winner than support any of its own. Of course, I’m guessing that very little of that speaking engagement money came from anyone who was spending his own money, and most of it came from SJWs who managed to put themselves in position to spend someone else’s.

If you were at the Big Fork meeting last night, please note that this is the right time to get involved and start supporting it. You’ve got the Paypal address already; we’ll get a button on the relevant page by Monday. We will continue to do it on a shoestring; we’re comfortable with that. But the more people who start using it, the more server resources we’ll require.

And for those ready to start making some noise next Monday, there is more than one way to do that. (These are not the OG shirts, they’re being prepared, so hold off on those as you’ll all be emailed about them. And it’s not the only Crypto-Fashion now available.

Interview with an economic hit man

John Perkins is interviewed by Sarah van Gelder:

Sarah van Gelder: What’s changed in our world since you wrote the first Confessions of an Economic Hit Man?

John Perkins: Things have just gotten so much worse in the last 12 years since the first Confessions was written. Economic hit men and jackals have expanded tremendously, including the United States and Europe.

Back in my day we were pretty much limited to what we called the third world, or economically developing countries, but now it’s everywhere.

And in fact, the cancer of the corporate empire has metastasized into what I would call a failed global death economy. This is an economy that’s based on destroying the very resources upon which it depends, and upon the military. It’s become totally global, and it’s a failure.

van Gelder: So how has this switched from us being the beneficiaries of this hit-man economy, perhaps in the past, to us now being more of the victims of it?

Perkins: It’s been interesting because, in the past, the economic hit man economy was being propagated in order to make America wealthier and presumably to make people here better off, but as this whole process has expanded in the U.S. and Europe, what we’ve seen is a tremendous growth in the very wealthy at the expense of everybody else.

On a global basis we now know that 62 individuals have as many assets as half the world’s population.

We of course in the U.S. have seen how our government is frozen, it’s just not working. It’s controlled by the big corporations and they’ve really taken over. They’ve understood that the new market, the new resource, is the U.S. and Europe, and the incredibly awful things that have happened to Greece and Ireland and Iceland, are now happening here in the U.S.

We’re seeing this situation where we can have what statistically shows economic growth, and at the same time increased foreclosures on homes and unemployment.

van Gelder: Is this the same kind of dynamic about debt that leads to emergency managers who then turn over the reins of the economy to private enterprises? The same thing that you are seeing in third-world countries?

Perkins: Yes, when I was an economic hit man, one of the things that we did, we raised these huge loans for these countries, but the money never actually went to the countries, it went to our own corporations to build infrastructure in those countries. And when the countries could not pay off their debt, we insisted that they privatize their water systems, their sewage systems, their electric systems.

Now we’re seeing that same thing happen in the United States. Flint, Michigan, is a very good example of that. This is not a U.S. empire, it’s a corporate empire protected and supported by the U.S. military and the CIA. But it is not an American empire, it’s not helping Americans. It’s exploiting us in the same way that we used to exploit all these other countries around the world.

It’s all about the debt. And debt that can’t be repaid has to be written off, somehow.

Nationalists continue to rise

  • THE French presidential race has been rocked after a opinion poll showed leader of the National Front party, Marine Le Pen, is by far the most popular political figure among right-wing supporters, and also gaining ground among left-wing circles. According to the poll carried out by Odoxa for French television station France 2, 74 per cent of those who consider themselves ‘conservative’ and who claim to support right-wing politics want the head of the country’s leading anti-immigrant party to play a more influential role in French politics, both now and in the future.
  • Hungary referendum: 98 per cent of voters say ‘no’ to EU migrant quotas. Hungary has voted emphatically against accepting EU migrant quotas, exit polls suggest, in a cry of defiance against Brussels that is likely to cement the country’s status as the leader of a “counter-revolution” against the bloc’s central powers.
Yes, the referendum was declared invalid because only 45 percent of the electorate voted, and the two major French parties will again conspire to try to keep the Front National out of power. But these are stopgap measures. They will fail, sooner rather than later.
The pendulum always swings back, no matter how much the powers-that-be want to keep it moving in the same direction. There is simply nothing the global elite has to offer the people of the West that is as important and valuable to them as reclaiming their nations and repatriating the invaders.