American Scoundrel

by Thomas Keneally · 2002

Thomas Keneally’s *American Scoundrel* brings to life the larger‑than‑life saga of Daniel Edgar Sickles, a 19th‑century politician, soldier, and notorious womaniser. From his early diplomatic post in London to his flamboyant rise in New York politics, Sickles dazzles with charm and ambition, yet his career is punctuated by scandal. In 1859 he shot his wife’s lover in Lafayette Square, a crime that shocked the nation but ended in an acquittal thanks to presidential patronage. Undeterred, he raised a Union regiment, fought at Gettysburg where he lost a leg, and later displayed that very limb in a Washington museum. Keneally weaves these episodes into a vivid portrait of a man who could both seduce queens and command troops, while exposing the double standards that punished women and rewarded men in a nation on the brink of civil war.