2012 Patrick D. Smith Award

The book Hollow Victory: A Novel of the Second Seminole War by John and Mary Missall. ISBN: 978-1-886104-45-7

The year is 1835 and the Florida Territory is on the verge of a major war. President Andrew Jackson has ordered the Seminole Indians to abandon their homes and move to a reservation west of the Mississippi. Called into action is Col. William Wooster, a career officer who understands that removing the Seminoles will be a long and arduous task. Standing against the colonel is Kachi-Hadjo, a determined Seminole leader who wages a desperate seven-year conflict to remain on his native soil and protect his people’s way of life. Both men fight the merciless climate, growing frustrations, and each other, both hoping the next battle will yield something more than a hollow victory. 

Written by Seminole War historians with a deep understanding of this little known conflict, Hollow Victory takes the reader through one of the darkest chapters in American history, through a long and brutal war that left a lasting mark on Florida and has surprising similarities to the conflicts we wage today

Cover design by Jackson Walker Studio
Cover painting: “Here we make our stand” by Jackson Walker © 2010.

John and Mary Lou Missall are writers and historians who specialize in the Seminole Wars.  They are authors of The Seminole Wars: America’s Longest Indian Conflict, and editors of This Miserable Pride of a Soldier: The Letters and Journals of Col. William S. Foster in the Second Seminole War, and This Torn Land: Poetry of the Second Seminole War.  The couple lives in Fort Myers.