Ambrose Bierce was a 19th-century American author and journalist known for his macabre tales and satirical work, The Devil’s Dictionary. He fought in the Civil War and later became a journalist, writing for the San Francisco Examiner. Bierce disappeared in Mexico in 1913 and is remembered for his realistic war stories and horror tales.
Ambrose Bierce was a 19th-century American author and journalist best known for his macabre tales and his satirical work, The Devil’s Dictionary, which provides cynical definitions such as “Love: A Temporary Madness Curable by Marriage.” Bierce is also remembered for his disappearance in Mexico in the last days of the 19th, an event as mysterious as many of his stories.
Ambrose Bierce was born on June 24, 1842 in Meigs County, Ohio, the tenth of 12 children. The family later moved to Elkhart, Indiana. Bierce fought in the Civil War, enlisting in 1861 as a member of the Union Army. He first worked as a surveying engineer for General William Babcock Hazen, creating battlefield maps, and later fought at the Battle of Shiloh. This last experience traumatized Bierce and became the subject of many of his stories.
After suffering a severe head wound in 1864, Bierce went on leave for a few months and was discharged in early 1865. The following year, he joined Hazen on a westward expedition to inspect military outposts and ended up in San Francisco. Bierce resigned from the military shortly thereafter and began his career as a journalist.
Bierce moved to England in 1872, but returned to San Francisco after three years. Beginning in 1887, he wrote regularly for the San Francisco Examiner, owned by William Randolph Hearst. Bierce moved to Washington, D.C. in 1899 but continued to write for Hearst until 1906.
In 1913, Bierce took a trip to visit his former battlefields and eventually entered revolutionary Mexico. He enlisted in Pancho Villa’s army as an observer and wrote his last letter from Chihuahua on December 26, 1913. That was the last time Bierce was heard from or seen, and no evidence ever surfaced regarding his disappearance.
For the most part, Bierce’s tales are about war or the supernatural. One of his most famous stories, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” was the subject of an award-winning film in 1962 that later aired on The Twilight Zone. Bierce’s war stories are realistic and brutal, and his oft-anthologized horror stories range from the delightfully macabre cruel earl to the downright creepy. His style is characterized by a sparse elegance and thoughtful choice of words, no doubt inspired by his experience as a journalist and editor. Bierce also wrote poetry and, of course, The Devil’s Dictionary, which originally appeared in serial form in a magazine.
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