Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Private History of a Campaign That Failed is a short, highly fictionalized memoir published in 1885 in which Mark Twain describes his two-week service with the pro-Confederate Missouri State Guard during the summer of 1861. The narrative centers on a group of inexperienced militiamen, the Marion Rangers, who kill a stranger in a panic. Twain acknowledged he saw no real military action during his service.
Mark Twain published The Private History of a Campaign That Failed in 1885. He had served with the Marion Rangers in the summer of 1861, but the sketch did not appear until roughly two decades after the events it describes.
The Marion Rangers were a group of inexperienced pro-Confederate militiamen operating in Marion County, Missouri, during the summer of 1861. Mark Twain was among them. He later quipped that during his two-week stint he spent more time retreating while being hunted than he ever spent fighting.
Yes. A made-for-television film adaptation was broadcast on PBS in 1981. The cast included Edward Herrmann, Pat Hingle, Joseph Adams, Harry Crosby, and Kelly Pease. The film also incorporated Twain's separate short story The War Prayer.
In 1887 Twain told Union veterans that he had been in one battle in which a stranger was killed in the summer of 1861. He also acknowledged that he saw no real action during his two-week service, and quipped that he spent more time retreating while being hunted than he did fighting.
The 1981 PBS television film combined The Private History of a Campaign That Failed with Twain's short story The War Prayer. Both works address Civil War themes, and the production wove them together into a single broadcast.