02145cam a2200169 4500 1142473139 TxAuBib 20240208120000.0 240208|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 9781098365004 1098365003 TxAuBib Pixler, Hugh. The Fourth Gun [PB]. Billy Forest and Harley Cobb grow up as neighbors and best friends on adjacent farms in 1850's Ohio. When the Civil War starts, Billy is apprenticing with a law firm in Columbus, looking forward to life as a trial attorney. Harley is working his family farm with his father and brothers. Billy and Harley join the 23rd Ohio Volunteers in 1861 and spend the next four years immersed in the horror, tedium and depredations of war. When they muster out in July 1865 they find that they are both changed in ways they don't understand. Besides each other, the only thing they can rely on is their guns. On the way home, they get into a gun battle in which a saddle partner is killed and Billy is seriously wounded. Billy blames himself for their friend's death because he couldn't get his Colt .44 out quickly enough to do his part. When he recovers he swears he will never let another friend down like that again. He becomes obsessed practicing with his guns. When they get home, Billy and Harley find out they don't fit in with their families anymore. They are experiencing a condition known then as "soldier's heart," now as PTSD. After Billy is forced into another shoot-out with railroad men who try to confiscate his family's farm, he decides he must go west to escape further trouble and to figure out what is wrong with him. Billy and Harley set out on a trail that ultimately takes them to the Colorado Territory. Along the way they winter in St. Louis. There, they meet Joab Baker, who befriends them and becomes Billy's mentor in the ways of the west. Billy learns that conflict in that untamed land can quickly become deadly, and hesitation fatal. Baker teaches him how to pull his gun out fast and shoot straight. 20240208.