author
Frederic Richard Kilner
b. 1892
A World War I veteran's firsthand account gives this writer's work its clarity and force, turning military history into something immediate and human. Best known for a memoir of the 149th Field Artillery in France, he wrote from direct experience rather than distance.
1 Audiobook
Battery E in France: 149th Field Artillery, Rainbow (42nd) Division
by Frederic Richard Kilner
About the author
Born in 1892, Frederic Richard Kilner is chiefly remembered for Battery E in France: 149th Field Artillery, Rainbow (42nd) Division, an early-20th-century account of American artillery service in World War I. The book has been cataloged by libraries and archival sources as his principal work, and it stands out as a personal record of wartime service rather than a later retelling.
His writing is valued for its straightforward, on-the-ground perspective. Instead of treating the war only as strategy and dates, Kilner focused on the daily reality of soldiers in Battery E, giving readers a close view of service, movement, and combat in France.
Archival records also connect him with Kenilworth, First Fifty Years (1947), prepared for the Illinois village of Kenilworth, suggesting an interest in local history as well as military memory. Reliable biographical details beyond these published records are limited, so much of his lasting reputation rests on the vivid documentary quality of his World War I writing.