Rating: 
Summary: WILL BE MIS-READ, MISJUDGED AND BECOME A POLITICAL TOOL
Review: For as much real destruction ensued in the wake of the European incursions into the "New" World, by his own statistics and the causes of death, genocide WAS NOT perpetrated. Disease, NOT design receives the greatest responsibility for the demise of the vast majority of the death toll, from the Arawaks on;ex the plagues of 1545-46, 1575-6. the Europeans lacked the medical knowledge to cause or cure the same diseases among THEMSELVES. Any implication of wholesale "biological warfare" against large populations of indians is revisionism, and ignores/denigrates the suffering of Europeans who also died via contagion. The SAME diseases decimated huge populations of Europe regardless of "race", class, or gender "issues", from the middle ages through the colonial period, with the SAME socio-economic dislocations (destruction of food chains, etc), that disrupted the natives. Natives alone were not on the receiving end of plague. the Virginia Colony received at variant periods, on average the MOST immigrants..but maintained a startlingly low population..due to diseases that killed off huge numbers of settlers (ex., 1626, the white population of Virginia = 1232 since 1607; only reached as a result of 8000 settlers dying in the process). To banter the term "genocide" about like so many catch phrases, is to dull the bite it has as the heinous horror it is. Before the advent of this term, was there simply no genocide?! of course not, we simply had to look at the various causes of death for what they were;VARIOUS causes of death, and like disease, many non- discriminatory. I give the book two stars to counteract the rating bias that speaks more of the readers agenda than the books worth. I found the book itself wonderful, accurate, sans the rhetorical (in the worse sense), postmodern juggling of catch-phrases that mis-direct the facts.
Rating: 
Summary: Genocide sanctioned by our own government
Review: For years people told me the Holocaust of 6 million Jews was the worst case of genocide ever. Not even close. My college history professor gave me Stannard's book to read. Reading it allowed me to give a speech and write a research paper on genocide. ... As far as I'm concerned, we owe the Native Americans all the land found in the Western Hemispere. I also look at the history of the Europeans' "brave and valiant" exploring plus much of the history about our ""brave and valiant" forefathers and some of the leaders in the past as nothing more than historical propoganda. This nation was not founded on the blood of our forefathers. It was founded on the blood of more than 100 million Native Americans.
Rating:
Summary: In the wake of Columbus
Review: Graphic history of the genocidal consequences of the discovery of the New World, along with the catastrophic effects of spreading of new diseases. The latter are sometimes used to cover the former, and the picture portrayed by the author is altogether horrifying, and a challenge to the systematic amnesia constructed around the facts, which certainly outstrip the Nazi Holocaust by an order of magnitude.
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Summary: Everybody Should Read This
Review: I did not fully understand the atrocities the Europeans committed against the indigenous people of the Americas until I read this book. Stannard chronicles the slaughter and dispossesion of American Indians beginning with the earliest Spanish arrivals in the Caribbean, Mexico, and South America, moving to the English immigrants in the Northeast, and finally to the Anglo settlers in the South and West. He also mentions the campaigns against the indigenous Central Americans happening today. He also discusses the ideological connection between the the Spainish Inquisition, the American Indian Holocaust, and the Jewish Holocaust. The Europeans kept written and pictorial journals of their atrocities, and in some cases their acts are recorded in newspapers and Congressional records, so the author's assertions are well documented. Excerpts include: The Spanish bragging about feeding Indian infants to their flesh eating dogs; Anglo settlers in the West, after a particularly brutal massacre, using the entrails of Indian men as tobacco holders. I would argue that most Americans do not even know how this land was really acquired because the history has been so completely buried. Everybody needs to know what happened here and on whose graves our country was really built. Read this book!
Rating:
Summary: A devastating book on devastation
Review: I discovered David Stannard's American Holocaust soon after it was published. I had already begun my studies of what I was not taught in school, and Stannard's book was my big wake-up call. Fortunately, I bought the original hardback edition, because a paperback version of the book would have fallen apart long ago. American Holocaust was in some ways the center of gravity in my researches into the history of "settling" the Western Hemisphere by the white man. I had seen criticisms of his work, and I wanted to know the truth of the matters that he brought up. Several dozen books later, researching his sources among other material, American Holocaust holds up immensely well. As Hans Koning wrote, we should all "reflect on Stannard's merciless book." My only lament is that he has not published much else this field (Except, arguably, Before the Horror, which gives him the authority to write about pre-"discovery" population estimates of the New World.). Well, we have Ward Churchill, fortunately. My 1,000-page web site uses the work of Stannard and others like him extensively.
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Summary: I do not reccomend this book
Review: I found this book to not only be boring, but rather inaccurate in its information as well. Stannard writes a completely biased perspective of our history and presents misleading facts.
Rating:
Summary: A stunning revelation.
Review: I highly recommend this book for both its eloquence and its massively detailed research. If only it were required reading in our schools. I was taught in my youth to feel pride in my own family line that goes back to the earliest New England colonists, a brigade general who fought with George Washington in the French and Indian Wars and the American Revolution, and a long and 'distinguished' line of pioneer 'Indian fighters'. I also know that this family line also contains a long history of mental illness, schizoid personality disorder, and substance abuse and the family legends and personality are interlaced with PTSD and the trauma of war. After reading this book I can now put this family history into the context of New World genocide, which also damages the psyche of the perpetrators. I can also see how it is that the political leaders of our government to the present day have, as Stannard in part documents, phobically avoided responsibility for American genocide and for cultivating international efforts to prevent genocide. It also comes as no surprise then that the 'coalition' in the latest war against Iraq, itself one act in a century of Arab genocide, comprises the U.S., Australia, and Spain. These are three nations who have refused to confess or make any official apology for their histories of genocide and as a result continue to condone and perpetrator genocidal actions.
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Summary: The truth hurts, WE need to admit it!!!
Review: I suppose this is not a fair review because I haven't even read this book. But one needs to speak the truth when there are some reviews, not many, that are very sad to read. The Native peoples were definitely in the World's greatest genocide EVER. It seems to me everyone bases genocide on WWII with the Jewish Holocaust. It's true that that was so much more systematic and planned out but when a culture is wiped out from a stronger power it's still genocide. The Native peoples were considered "savages" and non-humans. This whole Revisionist talk is one of the biggest lies ever invented. The truh isn't politically LEFT or politically RIGHT. I'm amazed that people don't realize that the Forefathers of the USA wrote about many things. These are 100% documeneted and shows their views on various issues. And one is the removal of Native peoples by many means. You don't need gas chambers and concentration camps to call it a genocide, folks. We have a mythological view of our past and just because alot of us know its dark sides, doesn't mean you hate America. I mean, it happened and it was horrible but don't say it ever didn't happen when it did. The founding of America and up for a long time was for the benefit of wealthy white males. That was the power base and everything else was second class. But through struggle, we gained our freedoms and have tried to attempt to right wrongs if that's possible. No Forefathers gave us freedom but the common people fought the system through redress to gain what we have today.If one looks at the framers of the Constitution, many wanted to have a Monarchy and didn't sign it. So we're here today and those of us that know the truth should be applauded. Revisionism is a myth and a lie and what was truly done to the Native People's was genocide.
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Summary: thought provoking and challenging
Review: I teach history and have read many different textbooks. I have also tried to find books that tell the other side of history. Many years ago I had a very unique college course on the history of history. I believe this course has made me a truth seeker. Many traditionalists will try to discredit this and many other books that challenge the Pro- Euro/American view. Books like this are for open minds. I found this book to be a very good teaching tool in my current history classes. It also has kep students interested in learning history. For the years I have used these types of books in addition to the basic, boring textbooks my students have stated that history has been one of their favorite courses. I recommend this book, it has a great deal of information worthy of being read and later presented.
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Summary: This book has forever changed me. A must read!
Review: I thought I had a pretty good handle on the treatment and situation of Native Americans since the arrival of Columbus. After reading this book I was stunned. Though I will never truely understand what it is like to have my culture ripped away, I have a better perspective. Why isn't this book required reading. And yes, disease did kill more than guns, but the Europeans used it to their advantage. You can't ignore the statements of some of our most revered past leaders regarding the necessity of eliminating the Navtive Americans.
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