Life Crossing Borders, A : Memoir of a Mexican-American Confederate / Las memorias de un mexicanoamericano en la Confederación

In his memoir that he began in 1908, Santiago Tafolla recalls finding himself, along with his fellow Mexican Confederate soldiers, terrorized by white Confederates. When the ''americanos'' take up arms and threaten to eliminate all the ''greasers,'' Tafolla is forced to desert to Mexico in order to survive.

This fascinating autobiography recounts the life of a man born in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1837, long before Mexico lost control of the region following the Mexican-American War in 1848 and the state achieved U.S. statehood in 1912.