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They Came To Cordura
They Came To Cordura was Random House's Pulitzer Prize nominee for Fiction in 1958. The novel became a NY Times bestseller and was bought by Columbia Pictures. The studio quickly made this war novel into a major motion picture and released it in December, 1959. Cordura starred Gary Cooper in his next-to-last film, Rita Hayworth in one of her better, later roles, the always good Van Heflin, and young Tab Hunter in one of best performances. Cooper, however, had been diagnosed with cancer but neglected to tell the studio. Consequently his acting was stiffer, more wooden than usual, due to his declining health while filming and "Coop" died a few years later from his illness. The film wasn't the big hit Columbia was hoping for, but this novel has continued to sell well over the years in foreign editions and to the British Book Society Club.
They Came To Cordura was also the first novel to be set against the backdrop of 1916's American Army campaign into Mexico to capture or kill the bandit Pancho Villa, whose irregular troops crossed the border on the black night of March 8th at Columbus, New Mexico, and killed 8 civilians and 7 American soldiers posted there, wounding 7 more. America was outraged and President Woodrow Wilson forced to act, authorizing General John J. Pershing
to lead a punitive expedition of 4 regiments of Cavalry and support units after these Villistas. For 11 hot months they chased them all over northern Mexico by horse, truck, train, motorcar, and aeroplane, never catching Pancho, but fighting a number of largely forgotten engagements, including a battle at Ojos Azules (Blue Eyes), which was the last mounted charge against an enemy in the history of the U.S. Cavalry.
They Came To Cordura details the results of that last battle, as a disgraced Major (Gary Cooper) is ordered to take 5 soldiers who have distinguished themselves in the fight back to base at Cordura and write them up for Medals of Honor, which they'll be shipped home to the States to receive. An American woman prisoner, the ranch owner who aided the Villistas, is also being sent home for trial, and it is in their confrontations with the bandits and increasingly, each other, that this grim, historically-based adventure across a burning desert for six days is made of. While trying to keep his men alive so they can receive their medals for valor, harsh circumstances reveal all 5 "heroes" to be pathetic, corrupt, hypocritical, cowardly, and degenerate. Cordura describes with unsparing accuracy the conduct of the human spirit under stress. Its setting is a small corner of military history, but its concern is with war and the qualities that it unchangingly demands. It is a remarkable book for its creation of tension and its probing into the motives which make men behave courageously and selflessly on the battlefield.
This novel was published to rave reviews and later, in 1980, appeared on the Western Writers of America's initial list of the 30 Greatest Western novels ever written.
Reviews --
"A superb piece of storytelling...guaranteed to hold the reader absolutely absorbed from beginning to end." Saturday Review Syndicate
"Bloodcurdling excitement from start to finish....A timeless story of human behavior under stress. This distinctive novel is sure to bring its author recognition...Mr. Swarthout's people live and perform powerfully in these pages." the New York Times
"Tight as a saddle girth...a strong, harsh, haunting novel which will outlast most of the season's fiction...An ironic and revealing study of courage and cowardice." Chicago Tribune
"A vivid, bruising story....Its dramatic impact is immediate...it conveys a concept of heroism that is both profound and thought-provoking.
They Came To Cordura was also the first novel to be set against the backdrop of 1916's American Army campaign into Mexico to capture or kill the bandit Pancho Villa, whose irregular troops crossed the border on the black night of March 8th at Columbus, New Mexico, and killed 8 civilians and 7 American soldiers posted there, wounding 7 more. America was outraged and President Woodrow Wilson forced to act, authorizing General John J. Pershing
to lead a punitive expedition of 4 regiments of Cavalry and support units after these Villistas. For 11 hot months they chased them all over northern Mexico by horse, truck, train, motorcar, and aeroplane, never catching Pancho, but fighting a number of largely forgotten engagements, including a battle at Ojos Azules (Blue Eyes), which was the last mounted charge against an enemy in the history of the U.S. Cavalry.
They Came To Cordura details the results of that last battle, as a disgraced Major (Gary Cooper) is ordered to take 5 soldiers who have distinguished themselves in the fight back to base at Cordura and write them up for Medals of Honor, which they'll be shipped home to the States to receive. An American woman prisoner, the ranch owner who aided the Villistas, is also being sent home for trial, and it is in their confrontations with the bandits and increasingly, each other, that this grim, historically-based adventure across a burning desert for six days is made of. While trying to keep his men alive so they can receive their medals for valor, harsh circumstances reveal all 5 "heroes" to be pathetic, corrupt, hypocritical, cowardly, and degenerate. Cordura describes with unsparing accuracy the conduct of the human spirit under stress. Its setting is a small corner of military history, but its concern is with war and the qualities that it unchangingly demands. It is a remarkable book for its creation of tension and its probing into the motives which make men behave courageously and selflessly on the battlefield.
This novel was published to rave reviews and later, in 1980, appeared on the Western Writers of America's initial list of the 30 Greatest Western novels ever written.
Reviews --
"A superb piece of storytelling...guaranteed to hold the reader absolutely absorbed from beginning to end." Saturday Review Syndicate
"Bloodcurdling excitement from start to finish....A timeless story of human behavior under stress. This distinctive novel is sure to bring its author recognition...Mr. Swarthout's people live and perform powerfully in these pages." the New York Times
"Tight as a saddle girth...a strong, harsh, haunting novel which will outlast most of the season's fiction...An ironic and revealing study of courage and cowardice." Chicago Tribune
"A vivid, bruising story....Its dramatic impact is immediate...it conveys a concept of heroism that is both profound and thought-provoking.
244 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1958
6 people are currently reading
187 people want to read
About the author
Glendon Swarthout
52 books93 followersGlendon Fred Swarthout was an American writer. Some of his best known novels were made into films of the same title, Where the Boys Are, The Shootist and They Came To Cordura.
Also wrote under Glendon Fred Swarthout. Twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glendon_...
Also wrote under Glendon Fred Swarthout. Twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glendon_...
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
April 21, 2022
REREAD
“This immensely powerful novel is written in language that is stripped bare of emotion, as flat and as barren as the desert in which it is set. It has the same bleak majesty.” – (London) Evening Standard
******
In this novel, Swarthout’s second, and the first for which he gained recognition, he examined the nature of courage – not the question of what, but why.
Pick up any dictionary and you can learn the definition of courage. The one I picked up – or, more accurately, went to online – informed me that it is the mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty, and that it is the opposite of cowardice.
Swarthout of course knew what courage was before he began writing the book, but he wanted to know why some people have that “mental or moral strength” and others don’t. That question serves as the foundation that Swarthout’s novel rests on as his flawed protagonist struggles with the answer, wondering if courageous acts are planned, or occur accidentally, or could be the result of an aberration, or even just a matter of interpretation.
Furthermore, is courage transitory? Could a person be a hero on one occasion and a coward on another? On the other hand, could a person guilty of a cowardly act be able later to summon up the intestinal fortitude to overcome fear and commit an act of heroism? In fact, the story is not only an examination of courage, but also cowardice.
The backdrop of all this is the Punitive Mexican Expedition, under the command of General John J. Pershing, that was sent into Mexico in 1916 in an effort to capture the Mexican revolutionist, Pancho Villa.
This was in response to a raid on Columbus, New Mexico by Villa’s lieutenants. He wasn’t there personally, but there was no doubt that he planned and ordered it.
That is the backdrop, but it is not what drives the plot of the novel; that would be those questions about the nature of courage.
Glendon Swarthout had a personal interest in the subject, for while serving in the army during WWII, he was charged with the responsibility of gathering eyewitness statements for the possible awarding of posthumous Medals of Honor. Therefore, it is no accident that the protagonist in his book, Major Thorn, is charged with the same responsibility. No doubt it was a learning experience for the writer in Italy as it was for Major Thorn in the novel thirteen years later.
The ending of They Came to Cordura is grim and bleak and ends with these words; "... they came at last to Cordura,” but you’ll have to read the book to find out who and how they arrived.
The novel was the first of seven Swarthout stories to be adapted for film. Of course it is no surprise that Hollywood changed the ending to one that is less grim and bleak.
A final note:
Columbus, New Mexico is located about three miles from the Mexican border. At the time of the raid in 1916, the town had about seven hundred residents. Today the population is estimated to be a little over a thousand.
I’m fairly certain that the raid by Villa’s force was the most exciting event in Columbus’ history. The primary reason for my belief is because there is a state park located just south of the community – and its name is Pancho Villa State Park.
“This immensely powerful novel is written in language that is stripped bare of emotion, as flat and as barren as the desert in which it is set. It has the same bleak majesty.” – (London) Evening Standard
******
In this novel, Swarthout’s second, and the first for which he gained recognition, he examined the nature of courage – not the question of what, but why.
Pick up any dictionary and you can learn the definition of courage. The one I picked up – or, more accurately, went to online – informed me that it is the mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty, and that it is the opposite of cowardice.
Swarthout of course knew what courage was before he began writing the book, but he wanted to know why some people have that “mental or moral strength” and others don’t. That question serves as the foundation that Swarthout’s novel rests on as his flawed protagonist struggles with the answer, wondering if courageous acts are planned, or occur accidentally, or could be the result of an aberration, or even just a matter of interpretation.
Furthermore, is courage transitory? Could a person be a hero on one occasion and a coward on another? On the other hand, could a person guilty of a cowardly act be able later to summon up the intestinal fortitude to overcome fear and commit an act of heroism? In fact, the story is not only an examination of courage, but also cowardice.
The backdrop of all this is the Punitive Mexican Expedition, under the command of General John J. Pershing, that was sent into Mexico in 1916 in an effort to capture the Mexican revolutionist, Pancho Villa.
This was in response to a raid on Columbus, New Mexico by Villa’s lieutenants. He wasn’t there personally, but there was no doubt that he planned and ordered it.
That is the backdrop, but it is not what drives the plot of the novel; that would be those questions about the nature of courage.
Glendon Swarthout had a personal interest in the subject, for while serving in the army during WWII, he was charged with the responsibility of gathering eyewitness statements for the possible awarding of posthumous Medals of Honor. Therefore, it is no accident that the protagonist in his book, Major Thorn, is charged with the same responsibility. No doubt it was a learning experience for the writer in Italy as it was for Major Thorn in the novel thirteen years later.
The ending of They Came to Cordura is grim and bleak and ends with these words; "... they came at last to Cordura,” but you’ll have to read the book to find out who and how they arrived.
The novel was the first of seven Swarthout stories to be adapted for film. Of course it is no surprise that Hollywood changed the ending to one that is less grim and bleak.
A final note:
Columbus, New Mexico is located about three miles from the Mexican border. At the time of the raid in 1916, the town had about seven hundred residents. Today the population is estimated to be a little over a thousand.
I’m fairly certain that the raid by Villa’s force was the most exciting event in Columbus’ history. The primary reason for my belief is because there is a state park located just south of the community – and its name is Pancho Villa State Park.
June 10, 2010
The blurb on the back of the paperback describes the characters in this novel succinctly: "Major Thomas Thorn was supposed to be a coward. The five men under him were supposed to be heroes. The woman they were guarding was supposed to be a slut." This motley bunch make their way across the desert fighting Mexicans, disease, thirst, and each other.
Swarthout does an great job describing the relations between these people and examining the nature of heroism, courage, and survival instincts. This is a thoughtful and memorable novel, better than most of the current historical novels that are three or four times as long. Swarthout also wrote The Shootist, another good novel better remembered for the movie starring John Wayne.
Swarthout does an great job describing the relations between these people and examining the nature of heroism, courage, and survival instincts. This is a thoughtful and memorable novel, better than most of the current historical novels that are three or four times as long. Swarthout also wrote The Shootist, another good novel better remembered for the movie starring John Wayne.
June 19, 2014
Glendon Swarthout took 15 years before he was ready to publish his 2nd novel, a NY Times bestseller in 1958, which is now considered one of his masterpieces. Cordura (not one of Dupont's miracle nylons, although this is where the chemical company might have gotten the name from) is the first novel ever set against the backdrop of 1916's American Army campaign into Mexico to capture the bandit Pancho Villa, whose troops crossed the American border on March 8, 1916, at Columbus, New Mexico, and killed 8 civilians and 7 American soldiers posted there, wounding 7 more soldiers.
America was outraged and President Woodrow Wilson forced to act, authorizing General John J. Pershing to lead a punitive expedition of four regiments of Cavalry and support units after these Villistas. For eleven hot months they chased them all over northern Mexico by horse, truck, train, motorcar, and aeroplane, never catching Pancho, but fighting a number of largely forgotten engagements, including a battle at Ojos Azules, which was the last mounted charge against an enemy in the history of the United States Cavalry.
They Came To Cordura details the results of that last battle, as a disgraced Major Thorn is ordered to take 5 soldiers who have distinguished themselves in the fight back to base at Cordura and write them up for Medals of Honor, which they'll be shipped home to the States to receive. An American woman prisoner, the ranch owner who aided the Villistas, is also being sent home for trial, and it is in their confrontations with the bandits, and increasingly, each other, that this grim, historical adventure across a burning desert for six days is made of. While trying to keep his men alive so that they can receive their medals for valor, harsh circumstances reveal all 5 "heroes" to be pathetic, corrupt, hypocritical, cowardly, and degenerate. Cordura describes with unsparing accuracy the conduct of the human spirit under stress. Its setting is a small corner of military history, but its concern is with war and the qualities that it unchangingly demands. It is a remarkable novel for its creation of tension and its probing into the motives which make men behave courageously and selflessly on the battlefield.
They Came To Cordura was a top 10 NY Times bestseller and became a major motion picture starring Gary Cooper, Rita Hayworth, Van Helfin and Tab Hunter late the following year in 1959. The novel was published internationally to more rave reviews and was Random House's nominee for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for 1958. In 1980, Cordura made the Western Writers of America's initial list of the 30 Greatest Western Novels ever written. Interestingly, this older novel is currently on the reading list of the Commando Training School of the Australian Army.
More information about the writing Swarthouts and descriptions of all their adult novels and YA novellas, plus
movie trailers of the 9 films made from their stories as well as screenplays (originals and adaptations), are posted on their literary website -- www.glendonswarthout.com
A sampling of its Book Reviews --
"A superb piece of storytelling...guaranteed to hold the reader absolutely absorbed from beginning to end."
Saturday Review Syndicate
"Bloodcurdling excitement from start to finish."
the New York Times
"One of the most gripping novels I've ever read...Hemingway, Steinbeck, and Faulkner can move aside and make room for Swarthout."
Cleveland Plain Dealer
"Tight as a saddle girth...a strong, harsh, haunting novel which will outlast most of the season's fiction...An ironic and revealing study of courage and cowardice." Chicago Tribune
"A vivid, bruising story...Its dramatic impact is immediate...it conveys a concept of heroism that is both profound and thought-provoking." New York Herald Tribune Book Review
"...the reader feels that he has actually experienced the events described...Mr. Swarthout's people live and perform powerfully in these pages. Throughout the book, the narrative, the characterization and the descriptive writing are excellent. Although the episodes have and authentic and documentary flavor, the story is a timeless one of human behavior under great stress. It seems to this reviewer that this distinctive novel is sure to bring its author recognition as a promising original talent"
Lewis Nordyke, New York Times Book Review
"This novel is above all sheer storytelling...But Glendon Swarthout is a real writer, and his story is much more than a what-happens-next epic. He asks and seeks to answer a question: What is Courage? The central human situation he has invented is both intriguing and ironic...It is a pleasure to report that he winds up the book at the top of his form with a wonderful last paragraph that recaptures the heart of his story...We close the novel feeling that we have been given a sharp insight into the mystery of Courage."
Benjamin Appel, the Saturday Review of Literature
"This immensely powerful novel is written in language that is stripped bare of emotion, as flat and barren as the desert in which it is set. It has the same bleak majesty."
the London Evening Standard
America was outraged and President Woodrow Wilson forced to act, authorizing General John J. Pershing to lead a punitive expedition of four regiments of Cavalry and support units after these Villistas. For eleven hot months they chased them all over northern Mexico by horse, truck, train, motorcar, and aeroplane, never catching Pancho, but fighting a number of largely forgotten engagements, including a battle at Ojos Azules, which was the last mounted charge against an enemy in the history of the United States Cavalry.
They Came To Cordura details the results of that last battle, as a disgraced Major Thorn is ordered to take 5 soldiers who have distinguished themselves in the fight back to base at Cordura and write them up for Medals of Honor, which they'll be shipped home to the States to receive. An American woman prisoner, the ranch owner who aided the Villistas, is also being sent home for trial, and it is in their confrontations with the bandits, and increasingly, each other, that this grim, historical adventure across a burning desert for six days is made of. While trying to keep his men alive so that they can receive their medals for valor, harsh circumstances reveal all 5 "heroes" to be pathetic, corrupt, hypocritical, cowardly, and degenerate. Cordura describes with unsparing accuracy the conduct of the human spirit under stress. Its setting is a small corner of military history, but its concern is with war and the qualities that it unchangingly demands. It is a remarkable novel for its creation of tension and its probing into the motives which make men behave courageously and selflessly on the battlefield.
They Came To Cordura was a top 10 NY Times bestseller and became a major motion picture starring Gary Cooper, Rita Hayworth, Van Helfin and Tab Hunter late the following year in 1959. The novel was published internationally to more rave reviews and was Random House's nominee for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for 1958. In 1980, Cordura made the Western Writers of America's initial list of the 30 Greatest Western Novels ever written. Interestingly, this older novel is currently on the reading list of the Commando Training School of the Australian Army.
More information about the writing Swarthouts and descriptions of all their adult novels and YA novellas, plus
movie trailers of the 9 films made from their stories as well as screenplays (originals and adaptations), are posted on their literary website -- www.glendonswarthout.com
A sampling of its Book Reviews --
"A superb piece of storytelling...guaranteed to hold the reader absolutely absorbed from beginning to end."
Saturday Review Syndicate
"Bloodcurdling excitement from start to finish."
the New York Times
"One of the most gripping novels I've ever read...Hemingway, Steinbeck, and Faulkner can move aside and make room for Swarthout."
Cleveland Plain Dealer
"Tight as a saddle girth...a strong, harsh, haunting novel which will outlast most of the season's fiction...An ironic and revealing study of courage and cowardice." Chicago Tribune
"A vivid, bruising story...Its dramatic impact is immediate...it conveys a concept of heroism that is both profound and thought-provoking." New York Herald Tribune Book Review
"...the reader feels that he has actually experienced the events described...Mr. Swarthout's people live and perform powerfully in these pages. Throughout the book, the narrative, the characterization and the descriptive writing are excellent. Although the episodes have and authentic and documentary flavor, the story is a timeless one of human behavior under great stress. It seems to this reviewer that this distinctive novel is sure to bring its author recognition as a promising original talent"
Lewis Nordyke, New York Times Book Review
"This novel is above all sheer storytelling...But Glendon Swarthout is a real writer, and his story is much more than a what-happens-next epic. He asks and seeks to answer a question: What is Courage? The central human situation he has invented is both intriguing and ironic...It is a pleasure to report that he winds up the book at the top of his form with a wonderful last paragraph that recaptures the heart of his story...We close the novel feeling that we have been given a sharp insight into the mystery of Courage."
Benjamin Appel, the Saturday Review of Literature
"This immensely powerful novel is written in language that is stripped bare of emotion, as flat and barren as the desert in which it is set. It has the same bleak majesty."
the London Evening Standard
January 22, 2019
Rugged and absolutely 100% anti-Congressional Medal of Honor, Swarthout's masterful military western about a Mexican trek through Hell is so relentlessly painful, the reader feels like he/she needs a trip to Intensive Care. Swarthout's style is poetic and meticulously paced, and he is unsparing in his details of combat atrocities. Most of these come as a kind of stages of the Cross, as a troubled commander, his party of Cavalry and one woman are on a bleak mission with terrible odds. Of course, they become their own worst enemies on the path. No wonder John Wayne hated the film adaptation and Gary Cooper's participation in it. But then, the Duke hated a lot of westerns like this which shatter myths of bravery. It's ironic Wayne appeared in Swarthout's "The Shootist" adaptation, but he obviously recognized that Swarthout's panoramic characterizations and so much grit and dust and horror make for compelling adventure. By comparison, this book makes most westerns appear as boring as taking a tour of one's own bus stop. Also, the hypocrisy in military leadership is a major theme of almost every crisis, and there are loads of them. A great achievement in depicting how fear and spontaneous survival instincts can be misinterpreted. And what exactly constitutes valour, dying or not dying? A savage and philosophical western at the same time.
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November 25, 2023Impossible to rate. I both loved and hated it.
June 16, 2020
3.5 stars. Heroes, monsters, and the blurry line between them. Swarthout did really well with transitional periods of history: where technological advances overlapped with a more "primitive" past. Airplanes and horse-soldiers for instance. The Shootist was similar in this regard. I've always enjoyed stories that straddle these sort of cusps.
December 28, 2018
This is an engaging book. I was wondering would they make it? It has a sad twist at the end.
December 19, 2024
They Came to Cordura
Llegaron a cordura
Novela que cuenta una historia curiosa del conflicto entre México y Estados Unidos en la época de Pancho Villa.
Después de una incursión de Villa en el estado de Texas, el ejército norteamericano decidió hacer una incursión de castigo en México.
Fue lo que se llamó la "Expedición punitiva de Pershing" en 1916.
No se sabe bien lo que pretendía Villa atacando de esa manera. Lo que sucedió después tampoco tiene demasiado sentido.
El episodio que cuenta esta novela tampoco tiene mucho sentido. Una expedición de un mayor del ejército conduciendo a cinco soldados y una prisionera. En un principio una misión sencilla que se va complicando página a página hasta el final...
Una película se hizo en su momento con Gary Cooper y Rita Hayworth.
Llegaron a cordura
Novela que cuenta una historia curiosa del conflicto entre México y Estados Unidos en la época de Pancho Villa.
Después de una incursión de Villa en el estado de Texas, el ejército norteamericano decidió hacer una incursión de castigo en México.
Fue lo que se llamó la "Expedición punitiva de Pershing" en 1916.
No se sabe bien lo que pretendía Villa atacando de esa manera. Lo que sucedió después tampoco tiene demasiado sentido.
El episodio que cuenta esta novela tampoco tiene mucho sentido. Una expedición de un mayor del ejército conduciendo a cinco soldados y una prisionera. En un principio una misión sencilla que se va complicando página a página hasta el final...
Una película se hizo en su momento con Gary Cooper y Rita Hayworth.
May 13, 2021
Gritty story. US Army in Mexico, during punitive expedition against Villa, a few years before World War I. Officer leading group of men who emphatically don't want the medals this officer wants them to get.
December 30, 2021
Enjoyed it more than the movie with Gary Cooper.
Grittier, sadder. tougher.
Grittier, sadder. tougher.
March 17, 2017
This is one of Glendon Swarthout's earliest novels. You can tell he is working on what will become his signature style. It is maybe not as smoothly written as later novels, understandably, but is nonetheless really well written. It also focuses on a time in history that I was unaware of, the days of Pancho Villa. I sure love this author.
June 3, 2016
This one started a little slow, but it ended up being a powerful, smart masterpiece about war, duty, and courage. Swarthout was a truly great writer.
February 28, 2016
Interesting Western novel that explores the issues of bravery & heroism. Made into a movie that's also not bad.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews