Civil wars Books

Book SynopsisIn the spring of 1862, the largest army ever assembled on the North American continent landed in Virginia, on the peninsula between the James and York Rivers, and proceeded to march toward Richmond. Between that army and the capital of the Confederate States of America, an outnumbered Confederate force did all in its feeble power to resist—but all it could do was slow, not stop, the juggernaut. To Southerners, the war, not yet a year old, looked lost. The Confederate government prepared to evacuate the city. The citizenry prepared for the worst. And then the war turned. During battle at a place called Seven Pines, an artillery shell wounded Confederate commander Gen. Joseph E. Johnston. His replacement, Gen. Robert E. Lee, stabilized the army, fended off the Federals, and then fortified the capital. “Richmond must not be given up!” he vowed, tears in his eyes. “It shall not be given up!” Federal commander Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, confident of success, found himself unexpectedly hammered by a newly aggressive, newly emboldened foe. For seven days, Lee planned ambitious attacks and launched them, one after another, hoping not just to drive Federals from the gates of Richmond but to obliterate them entirely. In Richmond Shall Not Be Given Up, historian Doug Crenshaw follows a battle so desperate that, ever-after, soldiers would remember that week simply as The Seven Days. McClellan reeled. The tide of war turned. The Army of Northern Virginia was born.

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Book SynopsisThe National Tribune was the premier Union veterans’ newspaper of the post-Civil War era. Launched in 1877 by a New York veteran to help his comrades and sway Congress to pass better pension laws, a short time later the National Tribune began publishing firsthand accounts penned by the veterans themselves, and did so for decades thereafter. This rich, overlooked, and underused source of primary material offers a gold mine of eyewitness accounts of battles, strategy, tactics, camp life, and much more. From generals to privates, the paper printed articles and long serials on everything from major battles such as Gettysburg and Antietam, to arguments about which battery fired the shot that killed General Leonidas Polk, whether Grant’s army was surprised at Shiloh, and just about every topic in between. Unbeknownst to many, a number of Confederate accounts were also published in the paper. Decades in the making, Dr. Rick Sauers’ unique multi-volume reference work The National Tribune Civil War Index: A Guide to the Weekly Newspaper Dedicated to Civil War Veterans, 1877-1943 lists every article (1877-1943). The first two volumes are organized by author, his unit, title, and page/column location. The third volume—the main index—includes a subject, author, and unit guide, as well as a “Unit as Sources” index that lists articles that mention specific commands but are written by soldiers who were not members of that unit. As an added bonus, this reference guide includes the contents of both the National Tribune Scrapbook and the National Tribune Repository, two short-lived publications that included articles by veterans, and a listing of the major libraries that have National Tribune holdings. Thanks to Dr. Sauers, Civil War researchers and writers worldwide now have easy access to the valuable contents of this primary source material.

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Book SynopsisThe National Tribune was the premier Union veterans’ newspaper of the post-Civil War era. Launched in 1877 by a New York veteran to help his comrades and sway Congress to pass better pension laws, a short time later the National Tribune began publishing firsthand accounts penned by the veterans themselves, and did so for decades thereafter. This rich, overlooked, and underused source of primary material offers a gold mine of eyewitness accounts of battles, strategy, tactics, camp life, and much more. From generals to privates, the paper printed articles and long serials on everything from major battles such as Gettysburg and Antietam, to arguments about which battery fired the shot that killed General Leonidas Polk, whether Grant’s army was surprised at Shiloh, and just about every topic in between. Unbeknownst to many, a number of Confederate accounts were also published in the paper. Decades in the making, Dr. Rick Sauers’ unique multi-volume reference work The National Tribune Civil War Index: A Guide to the Weekly Newspaper Dedicated to Civil War Veterans, 1877-1943 lists every article (1877-1943). The first two volumes are organized by author, his unit, title, and page/column location. The third volume—the main index—includes a subject, author, and unit guide, as well as a “Unit as Sources” index that lists articles that mention specific commands but are written by soldiers who were not members of that unit. As an added bonus, this reference guide includes the contents of both the National Tribune Scrapbook and the National Tribune Repository, two short-lived publications that included articles by veterans, and a listing of the major libraries that have National Tribune holdings. Thanks to Dr. Sauers, Civil War researchers and writers worldwide now have easy access to the valuable contents of this primary source material.

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Book Synopsis“Character is destiny” wrote Greek Philosopher Heraclitus more than twenty-five centuries ago. Douglas Southall Freeman, the Army of Northern Virginia’s preeminent historian, echoed that view when he wrote, “Further study . . . may prove both more profitable and more interesting when it deals with men and morale than where it merely described in new terms the familiar strategy and battles.” Better than any historian of his age, Freeman appreciated the impact character played on Gen. Robert E. Lee’s judgment and actions. Indeed, the foundation of his Pulitzer Prize-winning Lee biography is constructed around this theme. Most writers of military history stress strategy and tactics at the expense of the character of their subjects. Larry Tagg remedies that oversight with The Generals of Shiloh, a unique and invaluable study of the high-ranking combat officers whose conduct in April 1862 helped determine the success or failure of their respective armies, the fate of the war in the Western Theater and, in turn, the fate of the American union. Tagg’s new book, which is modeled after his bestselling The Generals of Gettysburg, presents detailed background information on each of his subjects, coupled with a thorough account of each man’s actions on the field of Shiloh and, if he survived that battle, his fate thereafter. Many of the great names tossed up by civil war are found here in this early battle, from U. S. Grant, William T. Sherman, and Don Carlos Buell, to Albert S. Johnston, Braxton Bragg, and P. G. T. Beauregard. Many more men, whose names crossed the stage of furious combat only to disappear in the smoke on the far side, also populate these pages. Every one acted in his own unique fashion and in a manner worthy of study. This marriage of character (“the features and attributes of a man”) with his war record, offers new insights into how and why a particular soldier acted a certain way, in a certain situation, at a certain time. Nineteenth century combat was an unforgiving cauldron. In that hot fire some grew timid and listless, others demonstrated a tendency toward rashness, and the balance rose to the occasion and did their duty as they understood it. Each of their stories are found within these pages. The Generals of Shiloh will be hailed as both a wonderful read and an outstanding reference work for the general student and scholar alike.

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Book SynopsisSeptember 17, 1862—one of the most consequential days in the history of the United States—was a moment in time when the future of the country could have veered in two starkly different directions. Confederates under General Robert E. Lee had embarked upon an invasion of Maryland, threatening to achieve a victory on Union soil that could potentially end the Civil War in Southern Independence. Lee’s opponent, Major General George McClellan, led the Army of the Potomac to stop Lee’s campaign. In Washington D.C., President Lincoln eagerly awaited news from the field, knowing that the future of freedom for millions was at stake. Lincoln had resolved that, should Union forces win in Maryland, he would issue his Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. All this hung in the balance on September 17: the day of the battle of Antietam. The fighting near Sharpsburg, Maryland, would change the course of American history, but in the process, it became the costliest day this nation has ever known, with more than 23,000 men falling as casualties. Join historian Daniel J. Vermilya to learn more about America’s bloodiest day, and how it changed the United States forever in That Field of Blood.

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Book SynopsisIn October 1863, the Union Army of the Cumberland was besieged in Chattanooga, all but surrounded by familiar opponents: The Confederate Army of Tennessee. The Federals were surviving by the narrowest of margins, thanks only to a trickle of supplies painstakingly hauled over the sketchiest of mountain roads. Soon even those quarter-rations would not suffice. Disaster was in the offing. Yet those Confederates, once jubilant at having routed the Federals at Chickamauga and driven them back into the apparent trap of Chattanooga’s trenches, found their own circumstances increasingly difficult to bear. In the immediate aftermath of their victory, the South rejoiced; the Confederacy’s own disasters of the previous summer—Vicksburg and Gettysburg—were seemingly reversed. Then came stalemate in front of those same trenches. The Confederates held the high ground, Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge, but they could not completely seal off Chattanooga from the north. The Union responded. Reinforcements were on the way. A new man arrived to take command: Ulysses S. Grant. Confederate General Braxton Bragg, unwilling to launch a frontal attack on Chattanooga’s defenses, sought victory elsewhere, diverting troops to East Tennessee. Battle above the Clouds by David Powell recounts the first half of the campaign to lift the siege of Chattanooga, including the opening of the “cracker line,” the unusual night battle of Wauhatchie, and one of the most dramatic battles of the entire war: Lookout Mountain.Trade ReviewWhat makes this book so good though, is the description of the Battle of Lookout Mountain…Now that is a very fine scenario for any ACW gamer! * Miniature Wargames - John Drewienkiewicz *

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Book SynopsisNow in paperback, Glory or the Grave: The Breakthrough, the Union Collapse, and the Defense of Horseshoe Ridge, September 20, 1863 is the second volume in The Chickamauga Campaign, David Powell’s magnificent three-volume study of this overlooked and often misunderstood campaign.Chickamauga (Cherokee for “River of Death”), lived up to its grim sobriquet in September 1863 when the Union Army of the Cumberland and Confederate Army of Tennessee waged a sprawling bloody combat along the banks of West Chickamauga Creek. This installment of Powell’s tour de force depicts the final day of battle, when the Confederate army attacked and broke through the Union lines. The massive rout that ensued was ameliorated somewhat by an incredible defensive stand atop Horseshoe Ridge, which Powell carefully dissects at the regimental level. No one understands Chickamauga like Powell, whose crisp prose and cogent analysis are based upon some 2,000 primary accounts. The result is a rich and deep portrait of the fighting and command relationships on a scale never before attempted, let alone accomplished.The third and final volume, Analysis of a Barren Victory, covers the confused retreat and pursuit into Chattanooga, insight into the fighting and its impact on the war as a whole, a detailed examination into the strengths and losses of the two armies, and an exhaustive bibliography.Powell’s magnum opus, complete with 37 original maps and 40 photos and illustrations is the culmination of more than a decade of research and study and a complete understanding of the battlefield’s complex terrain system. For any student of the Civil War in general, or the Western Theater in particular, Powell’s trilogy is a must-read.

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Book SynopsisGettysburg: Kids Who Did the Impossible! is a creative, visually-captivating experience for children, young historians, and Civil War enthusiasts alike. Gettysburg was one of the most important battles of the entire Civil War, and author Gregory Christianson brings it to life through breathtaking photographs, extraordinary watercolors, and exciting true-to-life stories. This is the perfect platform for “story guides” Liam and Jaden to celebrate Gettysburg’s young heroes—kids who defied age and inexperience to serve their town, country, and fellow human beings far beyond common valor. This remarkable and wholly unique presentation has something for everyone: single-page introductions for each day of the battle and lots of “have-to-know” facts, all wrapped in a photographic essay of the Gettysburg battlefield as you’ve never seen before.

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Book SynopsisThe stakes for George Gordon Meade could not have been higher. After his stunning victory at Gettysburg in July of 1863, the Union commander spent the following months trying to bring the Army of Northern Virginia to battle once more and finish the job. The Confederate army, robbed of much of its offensive strength, nevertheless parried Meade’s moves time after time. Although the armies remained in constant contact during those long months of cavalry clashes, quick maneuvers, and sudden skirmishes, Lee continued to frustrate Meade’s efforts. Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., Meade’s political enemies launched an all-out assault against his reputation and generalship. Even the very credibility of his victory at Gettysburg came under assault. Pressure mounted for the army commander to score a decisive victory and prove himself once more. Smaller victories, like those at Bristoe Station and Rappahannock Station, did little to quell the growing clamor—particularly because out west, in Chattanooga, another Union general, Ulysses S. Grant, was once again reversing Federal misfortunes. Meade needed a comparable victory in the east. And so, on Thanksgiving Day, 1863, the Army of the Potomac rumbled into motion once more, intent on trying again to bring about the great battle that would end the war. The Great Battle Never Fought: The Mine Run Campaign, November 26-December 2 1863 recounts the final chapter of the forgotten fall of 1863—when George Gordon Meade made one final attempt to save the Union and, in doing so, save himself.Trade ReviewThis is an excellent little book for the ACW wargamer ...Highly Recommended. * Miniature Wargames - John Drewienkiewicz *

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Book Synopsis“The present seems to be the most propitious time since the commencement of the war for the Confederate Army to enter Maryland,” wrote Robert E. Lee following his army’s stunning success at Second Manassas. Confederate armies advanced across a thousand mile front in the summer of 1862. The world watched anxiously—could the Confederacy achieve its independence? Reacting to the Army of Northern Virginia’s trek across the Potomac River, George B. McClellan gathered the broken and scattered remnants of several Federal armies within Washington, D. C. to repel the invasion and expel the Confederates from Maryland. “Everything seems to indicate that they intend to hazard all upon the issue of the coming battle,” he said of the invading force. Historians Robert Orrison and Kevin Pawlak trace the routes both armies traveled during the Maryland Campaign, ultimately coming to a climactic blow on the banks of Antietam Creek. That clash on September 17, 1862, to this day remains the bloodiest single day in American history. To Hazard All: A Guide to the Maryland Campaign, 1862 offers several day trip tours and visits many out-of-the-way sites related to the Maryland Campaign. Chapters include: Confederates Enter Maryland The Federals Respond The Investment of Harpers Ferry The Battle of South Mountain The Battle of Antietam Return to Virginia

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Book SynopsisOn June 25, 1876, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer led the 7th U.S. Cavalry into the valley of the Little Bighorn. By sunset, Custer and five of his companies lay dead—killed in battle against Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. Through the passage of time, Custer’s last fight has come to overshadow the rest of his military career, which had its brilliant beginning in the American Civil War. Plucked from obscurity by Maj. Gen. George McClellan, Custer served as a staff officer through the early stages of the war. His star began to rise in late June, 1863, when he catapulted several grades to brigadier general and was given brigade command. Shortly thereafter, at Gettysburg and Buckland Mills, he led his men—the Wolverines—in some of the heaviest cavalry fighting of the Eastern Theater. At Yellow Tavern, Custer’s assault broke the enemy line, and one of his troopers mortally wounded the legendary Confederate cavalryman, J.E.B. Stuart. At Trevilian Station, his brigade was nearly destroyed. At Third Winchester, he participated in an epic cavalry charge. Elevated to lead the Third Cavalry Division, Custer played a major role at Tom’s Brook and, later, at Appomattox, which ultimately led to the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. Historian Daniel T. Davis, a long-time student of George Custer, has spent countless hours walking and studying the battlefields where Custer fought in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. In The Most Desperate Acts of Gallantry, he chronicles the Civil War experiences of one of the most recognized individuals to emerge from that tragic chapter in American history.

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Book SynopsisTo many of the Federal soldiers watching the Stars and Stripes unfurl atop Lookout Mountain on the morning of November 25, 1863, it seemed that the battle to relieve Chattanooga was complete. The Union Army of the Cumberland was no longer trapped in the city, subsisting on short rations and awaiting rescue; instead, they were again on the attack. Ulysses S. Grant did not share their certainty. For Grant, the job he had been sent to accomplish was only half-finished. Braxton Bragg’s Confederate Army of Tennessee still held Missionary Ridge, with other Rebels under James Longstreet threatening more Federals in Knoxville, Tennessee. Grant’s greatest fear was that the Rebels would slip away before he could deliver the final blows necessary to crush Bragg completely. That blow landed on the afternoon of November 25. Each of Grant’s assembled forces—troops led by Union Generals William T. Sherman, George H. Thomas, and Joseph Hooker—all moved to the attack. Stubbornly, Bragg refused to retreat, and instead accepted battle. That decision would cost him dearly. But everything did not go Grant’s way. Despite what Grant’s many admirers would later insist was his most successful, most carefully planned battle, Grant’s strategy failed him—as did his most trusted commander, Sherman. Victory instead charged straight up the seemingly impregnable slopes of Missionary Ridge’s western face, as the men of the much-maligned Army of the Cumberland swarmed up and over Bragg’s defenses in an irresistible blue tide. Caught flat-footed by this impetuous charge, Grant could only watch nervously as the men started up . . . All Hell Can’t Stop Them: The Battles for Chattanooga—Missionary Ridge and Ringgold, November 24-27, 1863—sequel to Battle Above the Clouds—details the dramatic final actions of the battles for Chattanooga: Missionary Ridge and the final Confederate rearguard action at Ringgold, where Patrick Cleburne held Grant’s Federals at bay and saved the Army of Tennessee from further disaster.

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Book SynopsisIn 2014, Eric J. Wittenberg published “The Devil’s to Pay”: John Buford at Gettysburg. A History and Walking Tour, an award-winning study of Union cavalry delaying actions at Gettysburg. Fast-forward four years to 2018 and Wittenberg’s latest release, a companion Western Theater study entitled Holding the Line on the River of Death: Union Mounted Forces at Chickamauga, September 18, 1863. This volume focuses on the two important delaying actions conducted by mounted Union soldiers at Reed’s and Alexander’s bridges on the first day of Chickamauga. A cavalry brigade under Col. Robert H. G. Minty and Col. John T. Wilder’s legendary “Lightning Brigade” of mounted infantry made stout stands at a pair of chokepoints crossing Chickamauga Creek. Minty’s small cavalry brigade held off nearly ten times its number on September 18 by designing and implementing a textbook example of a delaying action. Their dramatic and outstanding efforts threw Confederate Gen. Braxton Bragg’s entire battle plan off its timetable by delaying his army’s advance for an entire day. That delay cost Bragg’s army the initiative at Chickamauga. Wittenberg brings his expertise with Civil War cavalry operations to bear with vivid and insightful descriptions of the fighting and places the actions in their full and proper historic context. This thoroughly researched and well-written book includes three appendices—two orders of battle and a discussion of the historic context of some of the tactics employed by the Union mounted force on September 18, and an epilogue on how the War Department and National Park Service have remembered these events. It also includes a detailed walking and driving tour complete with the GPS coordinates, a trademark of Wittenberg’s recent works. Complete with more than 60 photos and 15 maps by master cartographer Mark Anderson Moore, Holding the Line on the River of Death: Union Mounted Forces at Chickamauga, September 18, 1863 will be a welcome addition to the burgeoning Chickamauga historiography.

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Book SynopsisThe Battle of New Market in the Shenandoah Valley suffers from no lack of drama, interest, or importance. The ramifications of the May 1864 engagement, which involved only 10,000 troops, were substantial. Previous studies, however, focused on the Confederate side of the story. David Powell’s, Union Command Failure in the Shenandoah: Major General Franz Sigel and the War in the Valley of Virginia, May 1864, provides the balance that has so long been needed. Union General Ulysses S. Grant regarded a spring campaign in the Valley of Virginia as integral to his overall strategy designed to turn Robert E. Lee’s strategic western flank, deny his Army of Northern Virginia much needed supplies, and prevent other Confederates from reinforcing Lee. It fell to Union general and German transplant Franz Sigel to execute Grant’s strategy in the northern reaches of the Shenandoah while Maj. Gen. George Crook struck elsewhere in southwestern Virginia. Sigel’s record in the field was checkered at best, and he was not Grant’s first choice to lead the effort, but a combination of politics and other factors left the German in command. Sigel met Confederate Maj. Gen. John C. Breckinridge and his small army on May 15 just outside the crossroads town of New Market. The hard-fought affair hung in the balance until finally the Union lines broke, and Sigel’s Yankees fled the field. Breckinridge’s command included some 300 young men from the Virginia Military Institute’s Corps of Cadets. VMI’s presence and dramatic role in the fighting ensured that New Market would never be forgotten, but pushed other aspects of this interesting and important campaign into the back seat of history. Award-winning author David Powell’s years of archival and other research provides an outstanding foundation for this outstanding study. Previous works have focused on the Confederate side of the battle, using Sigel’s incompetence as sufficient excuse to explain why the Federals were defeated. This methodology, however, neglects the other important factors that contributed to the ruin of Grant’s scheme in the Valley. Union Command Failure in the Shenandoah delves into all the issues, analyzing the campaign from an operational standpoint. Complete with original maps, photos, and the skillful writing readers have come to expect from the pen of David Powell, Union Command Failure in the Shenandoah will satisfy the most demanding students of Civil War history.

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Book SynopsisThe 12th Virginia has an amazing history. John Wilkes Booth stood in the ranks of one of its future companies at John Brown’s hanging. The regiment refused to have Stonewall Jackson appointed its first colonel. Its men first saw combat in naval battles, including Hampton Roads and First Drewry’s Bluff, before embarrassing themselves at Seven Pines—their first land battle—just outside Richmond. Thereafter, the 12th’s record is one of hard-fighting from the Seven Days’ Battles all the way to Appomattox. Its remarkable story is told here in full for the first time in John Horn’s The Petersburg Regiment in the Civil War: A History of the 12th Virginia Infantry from John Brown’s Hanging to Appomattox, 1859-1865. The Virginians of the 12th found themselves in some of the most pivotal battles of the war under Generals William Mahone and later, David Weisiger. After distinguishing themselves at Second Manassas, they were hit hard at Crampton’s Gap in the South Mountain fighting and were only able to field 25 men three days later at Sharpsburg. Good service at Chancellorsville followed. Its Gettysburg performance, however, tied to General Mahone’s mysterious behavior there, remains controversial. The Virginians played a key role in Longstreet’s flank attack at the Wilderness as well as in his near-fatal wounding, launched a bayonet charge at Spotsylvania, and captured their first enemy flag. The regiment truly came into its own during the nine-month siege of Petersburg, where it fought in a host of bloody battles including the Crater, Jerusalem Plank Road, Globe Tavern, Second Reams Station, Burgess Mill, and Hatcher’s Run. Two days before the surrender at Appomattox the regiment fought in the rear guard action at Cumberland Church—General Lee’s final victory of the war. Horn’s definitive history is grounded in decades of archival research that uncovered scores of previously unused accounts. The result is a lively, driving, up-tempo regimental history that not only describes the unit’s marches and battles, but includes personal glimpses into the lives of the Virginians who made up the 12th regiment. Tables compare the 12th’s fighting prowess with friend and foe, and an appendix resolves the lingering controversy over the fate of the regiment’s last battle flag. With thirty-two original maps, numerous photos, diagrams, tables, and appendices, a glossary, and many explanatory footnotes, The Petersburg Regiment in the Civil War will long be hailed as one of the finest regimental histories ever penned.Trade ReviewExcellent value and highly recommended for collectors of Civil War regimental histories and for wargamers who wish to recreate any of the battles in which the 12th Virginia served. * Miniature Wargames - Arthur Harman *

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Book SynopsisIn early August 1862, Confederate Maj. Gen. Stonewall Jackson took to the field with his Army of the Valley for one last fight—one that would also turn out to be his last independent command.Near the base of Cedar Mountain, in the midst of a blistering heat wave, outnumbered Federal Infantry under Maj. Gen. Nathanial Banks attacked Jackson’s army as it marched toward Culpeper Court House. A violent three-hour battle erupted, yielding more than 3,600 casualties. “The carnage was fearful,” one observer wrote.The unexpected Federal aggressiveness nearly won the day. Jackson, attempting to rally his men, drew his sword—only to find it so rusted that it would not come unsheathed. “Jackson is with you!” he cried, brandishing the sword still in its scabbard.The tide of battle turned—and the resulting victory added to the Stonewall mystique.Civil War history typically breezes by the battle of Cedar Mountain, moving quickly from the Seven Days’ Battles into the Second Bull Run Campaign, but the stand-alone battle had major implications. It saw the emergence of the Federal cavalry as an effective intelligence collector and screening force. It also provided Confederate Maj. Gen. A.P. Hill’s first opportunity to save the day—and his first opportunity to raise Jackson’s ire. Within the Federal army, the aftermath of the battle escalated the in-fighting among generals, led to recriminations and finger-pointing over why the battle was even fought.Some called it out-right murder.Most importantly, the defeat at Cedar Mountain halted a Federal advance into central Virginia and provided the commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, Gen. Robert E. Lee, an opportunity to take the fight away from Richmond and toward Washington.

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Book SynopsisJeffrey Hunt’s Meade and Lee After Gettysburg: The Forgotten Final Stage of the Gettysburg Campaign, from Falling Waters to Culpeper Court House, July 14-31, 1863 exposes for Civil War readers what has been hiding in plain sight for 150 years: The Gettysburg Campaign did not end at the banks of the Potomac on July 14, but deep in central Virginia two weeks later along the line of the Rappahannock. Contrary to popular belief, once Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia slipped across the swollen Potomac back to Virginia the Lincoln administration pressed George Meade to cross quickly in pursuit—and he did. Rather than follow in Lee’s wake, however, Meade moved south on the east side of the Blue Ridge Mountains in a cat-and-mouse game to outthink his enemy and capture the strategic gaps penetrating the high wooded terrain. Doing so would trap Lee in the northern reaches of the Shenandoah Valley and potentially bring about the decisive victory that had eluded Union arms north of the Potomac. The two weeks that followed was a grand chess match with everything at stake—high drama filled with hard marching, cavalry charges, heavy skirmishing, and set-piece fighting that threatened to escalate into a major engagement with the potential to end the war in the Eastern Theater. Throughout, one thing remains clear: Union soldiers from private to general continued to fear the lethality of Lee’s army. Meade and Lee After Gettysburg, the first of three volumes on the campaigns waged between the two adversaries from July 14 through the end of 1863, relies on Official Records, regimental histories, letters, newspapers, and other sources to provide a day-by-day account of this fascinating highstakes affair. The vivid prose, coupled with original maps and outstanding photographs, offers a significant contribution to Civil War literature. Thanks to Hunt these important two weeks—until now overshadowed by the battle of Gettysburg and almost completely ignored by writers of Civil War history—have finally gotten the attention they have long deserved. Readers will never view the Gettysburg Campaign the same way.

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Book SynopsisDespite the thousands of books published on the American Civil War, one aspect that has never received the in-depth attention it deserves is the use of landmines and their effect on the war and beyond. Kenneth R. Rutherford rectifies this oversight with America’s Buried History: Landmines in the Civil War, the first book devoted to a comprehensive analysis and history of the fascinating and important topic of landmines. Modern mechanically fused high explosive and victim-activated landmines were used for the first time in the world’s history on a widespread basis in the American Civil War. The first American to die from a victim-activated landmine was on the Virginia peninsula in early 1862 during the siege of Yorktown. The controversial weapon, which was concealed on or beneath the ground, was built for one purpose: to kill or maim enemy troops. The weapon was the brainchild of Confederate General Gabriel J. Rains, who had experimented with explosive booby traps in Florida two decades earlier during the Seminole Wars. By the end of the war in 1865, some 2,000 “Rains mines” had been built and deployed in the field around Richmond. Simultaneously, other Confederate officers and soldiers also developed a sundry of landmine varieties, including command controlled and victim activated, across the Confederacy. The Confederacy abandoned common practices in favor of innovative approaches that would help them overcome the significant deficits in materiel and manpower. The South’s reliance on these weapons pushed the limits of nineteenth century technology against a backdrop of a deteriorating military situation, setting off explosive debates inside the Confederate government and within the ranks of the army over the ethics of using “weapons that wait.” As the Confederacy’s fortune dissipated, its military leaders sought creative ways to fight, including leveraging low-cost weapons with minimal material inputs. This became an important factor in the increased support and attention landmines received from Confederate leaders. As the Civil War progressed, Southern military men continued to develop landmines with technological ingenuity adapted to local circumstances. Confederate soldiers manufactured landmines and also configured spur-of-the-moment landmines in a relatively ad hoc manner, often recycling unexploded Union ammunition. These debates over the ethics of mine warfare did not end in 1865. Dr. Rutherford, who is known worldwide for his decades of work in the landmine discipline, brings together primary and other research from archives, museums, and battlefields to demonstrate that the Civil War was the first military conflict in world history to see the widespread use of such weapons. His study contributes to the literature on one of the most fundamental, contentious, and significant modern conventional weapons. According to careful estimates, by the early 1990s, landmines were responsible for more than 26,000 deaths each year worldwide. America’s Buried History traces the development of landmines from their first use before the Civil War, to the early use of naval mines, through the establishment of the Confederacy’s Army Torpedo Bureau, the world’s first institution devoted to developing, producing, and fielding mines in warfare. As Dr. Rutherford demonstrates, landmines transitioned from “tools of cowards” and “offenses against democracy and civilized warfare” to an accepted form of warfare.

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Book SynopsisOn a rainy evening during the Civil War’s second May, President Abraham Lincoln and two of his cabinet secretaries boarded a treasury department ship to sail to Union-held Fort Monroe in Hampton Roads, Virginia. The trip resulted in the first and only time in the country’s history that a sitting president took direct control of military forces, both army and navy, to wage a campaign with wide-ranging consequences. This little-known slice of the war and its effect on the president is the subject of Steve Norder’s Lincoln Takes Command: The Campaign to Seize Norfolk and the Destruction of the CSS Virginia. For five days that May, Lincoln studied maps, suggested military actions and—in his quiet, respectful way—issued direct orders to subordinate commanders. Helped by movements farther up the Virginia peninsula, the president’s decisions resulted in a host of military actions and successes, including: a naval bombardment of a Confederate fort, the sailing of Union ships up the James River closer to the enemy capital, an amphibious landing of Union soldiers, the capture of Norfolk and the vital Portsmouth and Gosport navy yards, and the destruction of the Rebel ironclad CSS Virginia. Salmon P. Chase, Lincoln’s treasury secretary, described the actions as a “brilliant week’s campaign.” The president returned to Washington in triumph, hailed as a military and civilian leader. Indeed, some urged him to take direct command of the nation’s field armies. Norder’s years-long investigation draws upon a host of primary sources, including letters, diaries, official reports, and memoirs. This rich blending of material allows for a fresh perspective and interesting insights. Untold numbers of books have been penned about Abraham Lincoln, his presidency, and his struggles during the Civil War, but the fascinating week within the covers of Lincoln Takes Command—which helped shape him as a war president—has never has been told in such full detail. The successes that crowned his short time in Hampton Roads changed the nation’s commander in chief by giving him more of an understanding and confidence in his ability to see what needed to be accomplished, insight that sustained him through the rest of the war.Trade ReviewRecommended for its wargaming potential. * Miniature Wargames - Arthur Harman *

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Book SynopsisCountless books have examined the battle of Gettysburg, but the retreat of the armies to the Potomac River and beyond has not been as thoroughly covered. “Lee is Trapped, and Must be Taken”: Eleven Fateful Days after Gettysburg: July 4 to July 14, 1863, by Thomas J. Ryan and Richard R. Schaus goes a long way toward rectifying this oversight. This comprehensive study focuses on the immediate aftermath of the battle and addresses how Maj. Gen. George G. Meade organized and motivated his Army of the Potomac in response to President Abraham Lincoln’s mandate to bring about the “literal or substantial destruction” of Gen. Robert E. Lee’s retreating Army of Northern Virginia. As far as the president was concerned, if Meade aggressively pursued and confronted Lee before he could escape across the flooded Potomac River, “the rebellion would be over.” The long and bloody three-day battle exhausted both armies. Their respective commanders faced difficult tasks, including the rallying of their troops for more marching and fighting. Lee had to keep his army organized and motivated enough to conduct an orderly withdrawal away from the field. Meade faced the same organizational and motivational challenges, while assessing the condition of his victorious but heavily damaged army, to determine if it had sufficient strength to pursue and crush a still-dangerous enemy. Central to the respective commanders’ decisions was the information they received from their intelligence-gathering resources about the movements, intentions, and capability of the enemy. The eleven-day period after Gettysburg was a battle of wits to determine which commander better understood the information he received, and directed the movements of his army accordingly. Prepare for some surprising revelations. Woven into this account is the fate of thousands of Union prisoners who envisioned rescue to avoid incarceration in wretched Confederate prisons, and a characterization of how the Union and Confederate media portrayed the ongoing conflict for consumption on the home front. The authors utilized a host of primary sources to craft their study, including letters, memoirs, diaries, official reports, newspapers, and telegrams, and have threaded these intelligence gems in an exciting and fast-paced narrative that includes a significant amount of new information. “Lee is Trapped, and Must be Taken” is a sequel to Thomas Ryan’s Spies, Scouts, and Secrets in the Gettysburg Campaign, the recipient of the Bachelder-Coddington Literary Award and Gettysburg Civil War Round Table Distinguished Book Award.

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Book SynopsisThe Maps of the Cavalry at Gettysburg: An Atlas of Mounted Operations from Brandy Station Through Falling Waters, June 9 - July 14, 1863 continues Bradley M. Gottfried’s efforts to study and illustrate the major campaigns of the Civil War’s Eastern Theater. This is his seventh book in the ongoing Savas Beatie Military Atlas Series.The Maps of Gettysburg, Gottfried’s inaugural and groundbreaking atlas published in 2007, covered only a small portion of the cavalry’s actions during the seminal campaign. This book addresses that topic in-depth in a way that no other study has ever achieved. Gottfried covers the opening battle of the campaign at Brandy Station in detail, followed by the actions at Aldie, Middleburg, and Upperville, where Jeb Stuart’s cavalry successfully halted Alfred Pleasonton’s probes toward the Blue Mountain passes in an effort to determine the location of Robert E. Lee’s army. The movements toward Gettysburg are covered in a series of maps, including the actions at Westminister, Hanover, and Hunterstown. The five major actions on July 2-3 at Gettysburg take up a considerable portion of the book and include the fight at Brinkerhoff Ridge, and four more on July 3 (Stuart against David Gregg northeast of the town, Wesley Merritt’s fight along Emmitsburg Road, Judson Kilpatrick’s actions near the base of Big Round Top, and Grumble Jones’s near-destruction of the 6th U.S. Cavalry near Fairfield).The cavalry also played a vital role during Lee’s retreat to the Potomac River. The numerous fights at Monterrey Pass, Smithfield, Boonsboro, Funkstown, and Hagerstown were of critical importance to both sides and are covered in detail. The book concludes with the fight at Falling Waters and ends with an epilogue recounting events occurring in Virginia through the end of July.The Maps of the Cavalry at Gettysburg plows new ground by breaking down the entire campaign into sixteen map sets or “action sections,” enriched with 82 detailed full-page color maps. These cartographic originals bore down to the regimental and battery level, and include the march to and from the battlefield and virtually every significant event in between. At least two—and as many as ten—maps accompany each map set. Keyed to each piece of cartography is a full-facing page of detailed text describing the units, personalities, movements, and combat (including quotes from eyewitnesses) depicted on the accompanying map, all of which make the cavalry actions come alive.This presentation allows readers to easily and quickly find a map and text on virtually any portion of the campaign. Serious students will appreciate the extensive and authoritative endnotes and complete order of battle, and take it with them on trips to the battlefields. A final bonus is that the maps unlock every other book or article written on any aspect of the cavalry’s actions during this important campaign.Perfect for the easy chair or for stomping the hallowed grounds, The Maps of the Cavalry at Gettysburg is a seminal work that belongs on the bookshelf of every serious and casual student of the battle.Trade ReviewA seminal work of meticulous, detailed, and exhaustive scholarship… * Midwest Book Review *This is a beautiful book and a wargames scenario writer’s delight. […] It is very strongly recommended for all readers. * Miniature Wargames *

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Book SynopsisLong called by some the “Andersonville of the North,” the prisoner of war camp in Elmira, New York, is remembered as the most notorious of all Union-run POW camps. It existed for only a year—from the summer of 1864 to July 1865—but in that time, and for long after, it became darkly emblematic of man’s inhumanity to man. Confederate prisoners called it “Hellmira.” Hastily constructed, poorly planned, and overcrowded, prisoner of war camps North and South were dumping grounds for the refuse of war. An unfortunate necessity, both sides regarded the camps as temporary inconveniences—and distractions from the important task of winning the war. There was no need, they believed, to construct expensive shelters or provide better rations. They needed only to sustain life long enough for the war to be won. Victory would deliver prisoners from their conditions. As a result, conditions in the prisoner of war camps amounted to a great humanitarian crisis, the extent of which could hardly be understood even after the blood stopped flowing on the battlefields. In the years after the war, as Reconstruction became increasingly bitter, the North pointed to Camp Sumter—better known as the Andersonville POW camp in Americus, Georgia—as evidence of the cruelty and barbarity of the Confederacy. The South, in turn, cited the camp in Elmira as a place where Union authorities withheld adequate food and shelter and purposefully caused thousands to suffer in the bitter cold. This finger-pointing by both sides would go on for over a century. And as it did, the legend of Hellmira grew. In Hellmira: The Union’s Most Infamous POW Camp of the Civil War, Derek Maxfield contextualizes the rise of prison camps during the Civil War, explores the failed exchange of prisoners, and tells the tale of the creation and evolution of the prison camp in Elmira. In the end, Maxfield suggests that it is time to move on from the blame game and see prisoner of war camps—North and South—as a great humanitarian failure.

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Book Synopsis“On To Richmond!” cried editors for the New York Tribune in the spring of 1861. Thereafter, that call became the rallying cry for the North’s eastern armies as they marched, maneuvered, and fought their way toward the capital of the Confederacy.Just 100 miles from Washington, DC, Richmond served as a symbol of the rebellion itself.Richmond was home to the Confederate Congress, cabinet, president, and military leadership. And it housed not only the Confederate government but also some of the Confederacy’s most important industry and infrastructure. The city was filled with prisons, hospitals, factories, training camps, and government offices.Through four years of war, armies battled at its doorsteps—and even penetrated its defenses.Civilians felt the impact of war in many ways: food shortages, rising inflation, a bread riot, industrial accidents, and eventually, military occupation. To this day, the war’s legacy remains deeply written into the city and its history.On to Richmond!: Richmond During the Civil War by historians Doug Crenshaw and Robert M. Dunkerly tells the story of the Confederate capital before, during, and after the Civil War. This guidebook includes a comprehensive list of places to visit: the battlefields around the city, museums, historic sites, monuments, cemeteries, historical preservation groups, and more.

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Book SynopsisDouglas S. Freeman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning four-volume study on Robert E. Lee remains the most thorough history of the man. After spending so many years with his subject, Freeman claimed he knew where Lee was every day of his life, from West Point until his death. In fact, there are many gaps in Freeman’s Lee, and hundreds of sources have been discovered in the decades since that have changed many of the accepted “facts” about the general. In From Arlington to Appomattox: Robert E. Lee’s Civil War, Day by Day, 1861-1865 author Charles Knight does for Lee and students of the war what E. B. Long’s Civil War Day by Day did for our ability to understand the conflict as a whole. This is not another Lee biography, but it is every bit as valuable as one, and perhaps more so. Lost in all of the military histories of the war, and even in most of the Lee biographies, is what the general was doing when he was out of history’s “public” eye. We know Lee rode out to meet the survivors of Pickett’s Charge and accept blame for the defeat, that he tried to lead the Texas Brigade in a counterattack to save the day at the Wilderness, and took a tearful ride from Wilmer McLean’s house at Appomattox. But what of the other days? Where was Lee and what was he doing when the spotlight of history failed to illuminate him? Focusing on where he was, who he was with, and what he was doing day by day offers an entirely different appreciation for Lee. Readers will come away with a fresh sense of his struggles, both personal and professional, and discover many things about Lee for the first time using his own correspondence and papers from his family, his staff, his lieutenants, and the men of his army. General Lee intended to write a history of the Army of Northern Virginia but died before he could complete his work. Based on hundreds of first-person accounts, From Arlington to Appomattox recreates, as far as such a thing is now possible, a Lee-centric study of what the man experienced on a daily basis. It is a tremendous contribution to the literature of the Civil War.

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Book SynopsisIn the popular memory, the end of the Civil War arrived at Appomattox with handshakes and amicable banter between Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant - an honorable ceremony amongst noble warriors. And so it has been remembered to this day. But the war was not over. A larger and arguably more important surrender had yet to take place in North Carolina. This story occupies but little space in the vast annals of Civil War literature. As author Ernest A. Dollar Jr. ably explains in Hearts Torn Asunder: Trauma in the Civil War’s Final Campaign in North Carolina, the lens of modern science may reveal why. This war’s final campaign in North Carolina began on April 10, 1865, a day after Appomattox. More than 120,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were still in the field bringing war with them as they moved across North Carolina’s heartland. Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman was still out to destroy the South’s ability and moral stamina to make war. His unstoppable Union troops faced Maj. Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s demoralized but still dangerous Confederate Army of Tennessee. Thousands of paroled Rebels, desperate, distraught, and destitute, added to the chaos by streaming into the state from Virginia. Grief-stricken civilians struggling to survive in a collapsing world were caught in the middle. The collision of these groups formed a perfect storm long ignored by those wielding pens. Hearts Torn Asunder explores the psychological experience of these soldiers and civilians during the chaotic closing weeks of the war. Their letters, diaries, and accounts reveal just how deeply the killing, suffering, and loss had hurt and impacted these people by the spring of 1865. The author deftly recounts the experience of men, women, and children who endured intense emotional, physical, and moral stress during the war’s dramatic climax. Their emotional, irrational, and often uncontrollable reactions mirror symptoms associated with trauma victims today, all of which combined to shape memory of the war’s end. Once the armies left North Carolina after the surrender, their stories faded with each passing decade, neither side looked back and believed there was much that was honorable to celebrate. Hearts Torn Asunder recounts at a very personal level what happened during those closing days that made a memory so painful that few wanted to celebrate, but none could forget.

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Book SynopsisThe Civil War was a long and bloody affair that claimed the life of some 750,000 men. When it ended, former opponents worked to rebuild their common country - America - and move into the future together. Most modern Americans might find that hard to believe, especially in an era witnessing the tearing down or movement of Confederate monuments and desecration of cemeteries. In the unique and timely Patriots Twice: Former Confederates and the Building of America after the Civil War, award-winning author Stephen M. Hood identifies more than 200 former Confederate soldiers, sailors, and government officials who reintegrated into American society and attained positions of authority and influence in the Federal government, United States military, academia, science, commerce, and industry. Their contributions had a long-lasting and positive influence on the country we have today. Many of the facts and stories in Patriots Twice will come as a surprise to modern Americans. For example, ten postwar presidents appointed former Confederates to serve the reunited nation as Supreme Court justices, secretaries of the US Navy, attorneys general, and a secretary of the interior. Dozens of former Southern soldiers were named US ambassadors and consuls. Eight were appointed generals who commanded US Army troops during the Spanish-American War. Former Confederates were elected mayors of such unlikely cities as Los Angeles, CA, Minneapolis, MN, Ogden, UT, and Santa Fe, NM, and served as governors of the non-Confederate states and territories of Colorado, West Virginia, Missouri, Utah, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Alaska, and the Panama Canal Zone. Former Confederates became presidents of national professional societies, including the American Bar Association, the American Medical Association, the American Gynecological and Obstetrical Society, the American Neurological Association, the American Surgical Association, and the American Public Health Association. In science and engineering, former Confederates led the American Society of Civil Engineers, the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Geological Society of America. One former Confederate co-founded the environmental and preservation advocacy group Sierra Club, and another intellectual and scholar was president of the Society for Classical Studies (at that time named the American Philological Association). Many former Confederates founded or co-founded many our nation’s colleges and universities, some exclusively for women and newly freed African-Americans. Other former rebels served as presidents of prominent institutions including the University of California, Berkeley. Others taught at universities, not just in the American South but at Harvard, Yale, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Johns Hopkins, the University of San Francisco, and Amherst College. Many others served on the governing boards of the United States Military Academy at West Point and the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland. Today’s United States benefitted greatly from the post-Civil War reconciliation that accepted the contributions of former Confederates. The men who fought the South forgave them and moved on together. It’s an important lesson everyone today should learn.Trade Reviewa timely and timeless contribution to the current and on-going national discussion about the legacy and aftermath of the American Civil War in terms of the Confederacy and how it is to be interpreted in our current state of dramatic and divisive political polarization. * Midwest Book Review *

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Book SynopsisFew Civil War generals attracted as much debate and controversy as Pierre Gustav Toutant Beauregard. He combined brilliance and charisma with arrogance and histrionics. He was a Catholic Creole in a society dominated by white Protestants, which made him appear exotic next to the likes of Albert Sidney Johnston and Robert E. Lee.He was reviled by Jefferson Davis and often mocked by Mary Chesnut in her diary. Yet, he was popular with his soldiers and subordinates. Outside of Lee, he was the South’s most consistently successful commander, winning at Bull Run, defending Charleston in 1864, and defeating Benjamin Butler at Bermuda Hundred and Ulysses Grant and George Meade at Petersburg. Yet, he lived his life in the shadow of his one major defeat: Shiloh.Beauregard’s career before and after the war was no less tumultuous than his Civil War record. He was born among the Creole elite of Louisiana, but rejected the life of a planter in favor of the military, inspired by tales of Napoléon. He was considered a shining light of the antebellum army and performed superbly in the Mexican-American War. Yet, he complained about a lack of promotion and made a frustrating stab at being mayor of New Orleans in 1858.After the war, he was a successful railroad executive and took a stand against racism, violence, and corruption during Reconstruction. Yet, he was ousted from both railroads he oversaw and his foray into Reconstruction politics came to naught. Although he provided for his family and left them a hefty sum after his death, the money was mostly gained by working for the corrupt Louisiana Lottery.In Dreams of Victory: General P. G. T. Beauregard in the Civil War, Sean Michael Chick explores a life of contradictions and dreams unrealized—the first real hero of the Confederacy who sometimes proved to be his own worst enemy.

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Book SynopsisThe Boy Generals: George Custer, Wesley Merritt, and the Cavalry of the Army of the Potomac is the first installment in a remarkable trilogy to examine the strategy, tactics, and relationships of the leading Union army’s mounted arm and their influence on the course of the Civil War in the Eastern Theater. George Armstrong Custer’s career has attracted its fair share of coverage, but most Custer-related studies focus on his decision-making and actions to the exclusion of other important factors, including his relationships with his fellow officers. Custer developed his tactical philosophy within the politically ridden atmosphere of the Army of the Potomac’s Cavalry Corps. His relationship with his immediate superior, Wesley Merritt, was so acrimonious that even Custer’s wife Libbie described him as her husband’s “enemy.” The Boy Generals examines in detail the steadily deteriorating relationship of two cavalrymen with opposing tactical philosophies, and how this relationship affected events in the field. Custer was a hussar - a firm believer in the shock power of the mounted saber charge - while Merritt was a dragoon, his tactics rooted in the belief that the purpose of the horse was to transport the trooper to the battlefield, where he could fight dismounted with his carbine. With these diametrically opposed belief systems, it was inevitable that these officers would clash. What has often been described as a spirited rivalry was in fact something much darker, an association that moved from initial distaste to acrimony, and finally, outright insubordination on Custer’s part. Author Adolfo Ovies mined deeply Official Reports, regimental histories, and contemporary newspaper accounts, together with unpublished and little used primary sources of men who fought in their commands. This rich and satisfying study exposes the depths of one of the most dysfunctional and influential relationships in the Army of the Potomac and how it affected cavalry operations in the Eastern Theater. The Boy Generals will change the way Civil War readers think of the premier Union army’s mounted arm, as well as George Custer’s legacy.

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Book SynopsisColonel Elmer Ellsworth was the first Union officer killed in the American Civil War. When it happened, on May 24, 1861, the entire North was aghast. Ellsworth was a celebrity and had just finished traveling with his famed and entertaining U. S. Zouave Cadets drill team. They had performed at West Point, in New York City, and for President Buchanan before returning home to Chicago. Ellsworth then joined his friend and law mentor Abraham Lincoln in his quest for the presidency. When Lincoln put out the call for troops after Fort Sumter was fired upon, Ellsworth responded. Within days he was able to organize over a thousand New York firefighters into a regiment of volunteers. Was it youthful enthusiasm or a lack of formal training that resulted in his death? There is evidence on both sides. What is definite is that the Lincolns rushed to the Navy Yard to view the body of the young man they had loved as a son. Mary Lincoln insisted that he lie in state in the East Room of their home. The elite of New York brought flowers to the Astor House en memoriam. Six members of the 11th New York accompanied their commander’s coffin. When the young colonel’s remains were finally interred in the Hudson View Cemetery, the skies opened up. A late May afternoon thunderstorm broke out in the middle of the procession, referred to as “tears from God himself.” Only eight weeks later, the results of the battle of First Bull Run knocked Ellsworth out of the headlines. The trickle of blood had now become a torrent, not to end for four more years of war. Groeling’s well-written biography is grounded in years of examining archival resources, diaries, personal letters, newspapers, and other accounts. In the sixty intervening years since the last portrait of Ellsworth was written, new information has arisen that gives readers and historians a better understanding of the Ellsworth phenomenon. The author’s interwoven accounts of John Hay, George Nicolay, Abraham Lincoln, and the Lincoln family put Ellsworth clearly at the forefront of the excitement that led up to the election of a president. First Fallen: The Life of Colonel Elmer Ellsworth, the North’s First Civil War Hero examines every facet of Ellsworth’s complex, fascinating life. It is the story of many young men who fought and died for the Union. Elmer, however, was the first and - according to those who remember him - perhaps the best.

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Book SynopsisContrary to popular belief, the Eastern Theater during the late summer and fall of 1863 was anything but inconsequential. Generals George Meade and Robert E. Lee continued where they had left off, boldly maneuvering the chess pieces of war to gain a decisive strategic and tactical advantage. Cavalry actions and pitched battles made it clear to anyone paying attention that the war in Virginia was a long way from having been decided at Gettysburg. This period of the war was the first and only time Meade exercised control of the Army of the Potomac on his own terms, but historians and students alike have all but ignored it. Jeffrey Wm Hunt brilliantly rectifies this oversight in Meade and Lee at Rappahannock Station: The Army of the Potomac’s First Post-Gettysburg Offensive, from Kelly’s Ford to the Rapidan, October 21 to November 20, 1863. It was a fascinating time in north-central Virginia. After recovering from the carnage of Gettysburg, the Richmond War Department sent James Longstreet and two divisions from Lee’s army to reinforce Braxton Bragg’s Army of Tennessee, where they helped win the Battle of Chickamauga. Washington followed suit soon thereafter by sending two of Meade’s corps (the XI and XII) to reinforce William Rosecrans’ Army of the Cumberland. Despite his weakened state, Lee took advantage of the opportunity and launched a daring offensive that drove Meade back on Washington but ended in a bloody defeat at Bristoe Station on October 14. What happened next is the subject of Meade and Lee at Rappahannock Station, a fast-paced and dynamic account of Lee’s bold strategy to hold the Rappahannock River line as the Army of the Potomac retraced its steps south. Pressured by Washington to fight but denied strategic flexibility, Meade launched a risky offensive to carry Lee’s Rappahannock defenses and bring on a decisive battle. The dramatic fighting included a stunning Federal triumph at Rappahannock Station—which destroyed two entire Confederate brigades—that gave Meade the upper hand and the initiative in his deadly duel with Lee, who retreated south to a new position behind the Rapidan River. It seemed as though Lee’s vaunted Army of Northern Virginia had lost its magic after its defeat in Pennsylvania. Hunt’s third installment in his award-winning Meade and Lee series is grounded upon official reports, regimental histories, letters, newspapers, and other archival sources. Together, they provide a day-by-day, and sometimes minute-by-minute, account of the Union army’s first post-Gettysburg offensive action and Lee’s efforts to repel it. In addition to politics, strategy, and tactics, Hunt’s pen ably examines the intricate command relationships, Lee’s questionable decision-making, and the courageous spirit of the fighting men. Complete with original maps and outstanding photographs, Meade and Lee at Rappahannock Station is a significant contribution to Civil War literature.

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Book Synopsis“Johnsonville” doesn’t mean much to most students of the Civil War. Its contribution to Union victory in the Western Theater, however, is difficult to overstate, and its history is complex, fascinating, and heretofore mostly untold. Johnsonville: Union Supply Operations on the Tennessee River and the Battle of Johnsonville, November 4-5, 1864, by Jerry T. Wooten, Ph.D., now available in paperback, remedies that oversight with the first full-length treatment of this subject.Wooten, a former Park Manager at Johnsonville State Historic Park, unearthed a wealth of new material that sheds light on the creation and strategic role of the Union supply depot, the use of railroads and logistics, and the depot’s defense. His study covers the emergence of a civilian town around the depot, and the role all of this played in making possible the Union victories with which we are all familiar.This sterling monograph also includes the best and most detailed account of the Battle of Johnsonville. The fighting took place on the heels of one of the most audacious campaigns of the war, when Confederate Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest led his cavalry through western Tennessee and Kentucky on a 25-day campaign. On November 4-5, 1864, Forrest’s troops attacked the depot and shelled the town, destroying tons of valuable supplies. The complex land-water operation nearly wiped out the Johnsonville supply depot, severely disrupted Gen. George Thomas’s army in Nashville, and impeded his operations against John Bell Hood’s Confederate army.Prior works on Johnsonville focus on Forrest’s operations, but Wooten’s deep original archival research peels back the decades to reveal significantly more on that battle, as well as what life was like in and around the area for both military men and civilians. Civil War students thirst for original deeply researched studies on fresh topics, and that is exactly what Johnsonville: Union Supply Operations on the Tennessee River and the Battle of Johnsonville, November 4-5, 1864 provides them.

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Book SynopsisAlthough it was the Civil War’s second-largest battle, few books have been written about Chickamauga, and nothing like the thousands penned about the war’s largest and bloodiest battle at Gettysburg. You can count on two hands the number of authors who have tackled Chickamauga in any depth, and most of their works cover the entire battle. Left unmined and mostly forgotten are the experiences of specific brigades or regiments or state-affiliated troops. Scott Mingus’s and Joe Owen’s Unceasing Fury: Texans at the Battle of Chickamauga, September 18-20, 1863, is the first full-length book to examine in detail the role of troops from the Lone Star State.Texas troops fought in almost every major sector of the sprawling Chickamauga battlefield - from the first attacks on September 18 on the bridges spanning the creek to the final attack on Snodgrass Hill on September 20, the third day of fighting. In between, Texas regiments launched attack after attack against Union lines at the Viniard farm, Poe Field, Kelly Field, and North Dyer Field. More than 4,400 Texans participated on foot and on horseback; one out of four fell there. Fortunately, many of the survivors left vivid descriptions of battle action, the anguish of losing friends, the pain and loneliness of being so far away from home, and their often-colorful opinions of their generals.The authors of this richly detailed study base their work on scores of personal accounts, memoirs, postwar newspaper articles, diaries, and other primary sources. Their meticulous work, which includes original maps, photos, and other illustrations, provides the first full exploration of the critical role Texas enlisted men and officers played in the three days of fighting near West Chickamauga Creek in September 1863. Unceasing Fury provides the Lone Star State soldiers with the recognition they have so long deserved.

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Book SynopsisStudents of the Civil War tend to think the story of Robert E. Lee’s 1862 Maryland Campaign is complete, and that any new study of the subject must by necessity rely on interpretations long-since accepted and understood. But what if this is not the case? What if the histories previously written about the first major Confederate operation north of the Potomac River missed key sources, proceeded from mistaken readings of the evidence, or were influenced by Lost Cause ideology? Alexander B. Rossino, the author of Six Days in September, demonstrates that distortions like these continue to shape modern understanding of the campaign in Their Maryland: The Army of Northern Virginia From the Potomac Crossing to Sharpsburg in September 1862. Rossino reassesses the history of the Confederate operation in seven comprehensive chapters, each of which tackles a specific major issue: - Did Robert E. Lee Intend to Foment Rebellion in Maryland in September 1862? - The Army of Northern Virginia Crosses the Potomac to Liberate Maryland - Confederate Encampments Near Frederick City and the Implications for the Lost Orders Debate - Maryland Civilians and Confederate Failure in the State - Rebels Photographed in Frederick, Maryland: The Case for September 1862 - A Critical Re-Assessment of Robert E. Lee’s Defensive Strategy at Sharpsburg - Robert E. Lee on the Field at Sharpsburg Did supply problems in Virginia force Lee north to press the advantage he had won after the Battle of Second Manassas? What did Rebel troops believe about the strength of secessionist sentiment in Maryland, and why? Did the entire Army of Northern Virginia really camp at Best’s Farm near Frederick, Maryland? Did D. H. Hill lose Special Orders No. 191, or is there more to the story? How did Maryland civilians respond to the Rebel army in their midst, and what part did women play? Finally, why did Robert E. Lee choose to fight at Sharpsburg, and how personally was he involved in directing the fighting? Rossino makes extensive use of primary sources to explore these and other important questions, and in doing so reveals that many long-held assumptions about the Confederate experience in Maryland do not hold up under close scrutiny. The result is a well-documented reassessment that sheds new light on old subjects.

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Book SynopsisGettysburg, the largest land battle on the North American continent, has maintained an unshakable grip on the American imagination. Building on momentum from a string of victories that stretched back into the summer of 1862, Robert E. Lee launched his Confederate Army of Northern Virginia on an invasion of the North meant to shake Union resolve and fundamentally shift the dynamic of the war. His counterpart with the Federal Army of the Potomac, George Meade, elevated to command just days before the fighting, found himself defending his home state in a high-stakes battle that could have put Confederates at the very gates of the nation's capital. The public historians writing for the popular Emerging Civil War blog, speaking on its podcast, or delivering talks at the annual Emerging Civil War Symposium at Stevenson Ridge in Virginia always present their work in ways that engage and animate audiences. Their efforts entertain, challenge, and sometimes provoke readers with fresh perspectives and insights born from years of working at battlefields, guiding tours, presenting talks, and writing for the wider Civil War community. The Summer of '63: Gettysburg: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War is a compilation of some of their favorites, anthologized, revised, and updated, together with several original pieces. Each entry includes original and helpful illustrations. This important study, when read with its companion volume The Summer of '63: Vicksburg and Tullahoma, contextualizes the major 1863 campaigns in what arguably was Civil War's turning-point summer.Trade Review...ideal for dipping into to read one or more short pieces at a time. It would probably be best appreciated by those interested in the American Civil War who are already familiar with the campaign and battle of Gettysburg. * Miniature Wargames - Arthur Harman *

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Book SynopsisThe fall of Vicksburg in July 1863 fundamentally changed the strategic picture of the American Civil War, though its outcome had been anything but certain. Union general Ulysses S. Grant tried for months to capture the Confederate Mississippi River bastion, to no avail. A bold running of the river batteries, followed by a daring river crossing and audacious overland campaign, finally allowed Grant to pen the Southern army inside the entrenched city. The long and gritty siege that followed led to the fall of the city, the opening of the Mississippi to Union traffic, and a severance of Confederacy in two. In middle Tennessee, meanwhile, the Union Army of the Cumberland brilliantly recaptured thousands of square miles of territory while sustaining fewer than 600 casualties. Commander William S. Rosecrans worried the North would "overlook so great an event because it is not written in letters of blood"—and history proved him right. The Tullahoma Campaign has stood nearly forgotten compared to events along the Mississippi and in south-central Pennsylvania, yet all three major Union armies scored significant victories that helped bring the war closer to an end. The public historians writing for the popular Emerging Civil War blog, speaking on its podcast, or delivering talks at its annual Emerging Civil War Symposium at Stevenson Ridge in Virginia always present their work in ways that engage and animate audiences. Their efforts entertain, challenge, and sometimes provoke readers with fresh perspectives and insights born from years of working at battlefields, guiding tours, presenting talks, and writing for the wider Civil War community. The Summer of '63: Vicksburg and Tullahoma: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War is a compilation of some of their favorites, anthologized, revised, and updated, together with several original pieces. Each entry includes helpful illustrations. This important study, when read with its companion volume The Summer of '63: Gettysburg, contextualizes the major 1863 campaigns in what arguably was Civil War's turning-point summer.

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Book Synopsis"What If... ?" Every Civil War armchair general asks the question. Possibilities unfold. Disappointments vanish. Imaginations soar. More questions arise. Asking "What if..." is often more than an exercise in wishful fantasy. A serious inquiry sparks rigorous exploration, demands critical thinking, and unlocks important insights.The Great "What Ifs" of the American Civil War: Historians Tackle the Conflict’s Most Intriguing Possibilities is a collection of thirteen essays by the historians at Emerging Civil War, including a foreword by acclaimed alternate history writer Peter G. Tsouras.Each entry focuses on one of the most important events of the war and unpacks the options of the moment. To understand what happened, we must look at what could have happened, with the full multitude of choices before us and a clear and objective eye. "What if" is a tool for illumination.This is not a collection of alternate histories or counterfactual scenarios. Rather, it is an invitation to ask, to learn, and to wonder, "What if... ?"Table of ContentsForeword: "Paths Not Taken: Thoughts of an Alternate Historian" by Peter G. Tsouras Introduction by Chris Mackowski Chapter One: "‘Persistently Misunderstood’: The What-Ifs of Shiloh" by Timothy B. Smith Chapter Two: "The What Ifs of Antietam" by Kevin Pawlak Chapter Three: "What If Great Britain Had Intervened in the American Civil War?" by Dwight Hughes Chapter Four: "What If Someone Else Had Been Offered Command of the Army of the Potomac?" by Frank Jastrzembski Chapter Five: "What if Stonewall Jackson Had Not Been Shot?" by Kristopher D. White Chapter Six: "To Go Around to the Right? Longstreet at Gettysburg" by Dan Welch Chapter Seven: "What if Jefferson Davis Hadn't Been So Loyal to Braxton Bragg?" by Cecily Nelson Zander Chapter Eight: "What if Robert E. Lee Had Struck a Blow at the North Anna River?" by Chris Mackowski Chapter Nine: "‘Rally the loyal men of Missouri’: What If the 1864 Missouri Expedition Had Been Successful?" by Kristen Trout Chapter Ten: "Why Didn’t General Robert E. Lee Wage a Guerrilla War with his Army of Northern Virginia in April 1865?" by Barton A. Myers Chapter Eleven: "‘What if Lincoln Lived? The Civil War’s Perennial Counterfactual Question" by Brian Matthew Jordan and Evan C. Rothera Contributor Notes

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Book SynopsisJoseph Eggleston Johnston was one of the original five full generals of the Confederacy. He graduated West Point in the same 1829 class as Robert E. Lee and served in the War with Mexico, the Seminole Wars in Florida, and in Texas and Kansas. By 1860 he was widely looked upon as one of America's finest military officers. Yet, Johnston remains an enigma.Richard McMurry's masterful The Civil Wars of Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston: Volume 1: Virginia to Mississippi, 1861-1863 unlocks Johnston the general and represents a lifetime of study and thinking about the officer, his military career, and his simultaneous battles with the government in Richmond in general, and with President Jefferson Davis in particular. This first installment opens with secession and the beginning of the war and continues through his appointment as full general, his role at Manassas, his literary duel with Davis, and stewardship at the helm of the Confederacy's primary army in Virginia. After Johnston is forced back to the gates of Richmond and wounded at Fair Oaks/Seven Pines, McMurry carries his subject through recovery and into the Western Theater, where Johnston tries and fails to rescue the trapped Confederate garrison at Vicksburg, Mississippi. This installment ends on the eve of Johnston's command with the Army of Tennessee in North Georgia.Dr. McMurry weaves hundreds of primary sources, many previously unused, into an elegant prose that captures Johnston in a way that has never been accomplished. In elegant fashion, McMurry also sheds fresh light on old controversies and examines Johnston's relationships and their impact on the course of the war. Here, finally, is the definitive biography of Joe Johnston.

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Book SynopsisFort Sumter. Charleston. April 1861. The bombardment and surrender of Sumter were only the beginning of the story.Both sides understood the military significance of the fort and the busy seaport, which played host to one of the longest and most complicated and fascinating campaigns of the entire Civil War. Richard Hatcher's Thunder in the Harbor: Fort Sumter and the Civil War is the first modern monograph to document the role of both the fort and the city throughout the entire Civil War.After it was captured, Southern troops immediately occupied and improved Sumter's defenses. The U.S. blockaded Charleston Harbor and for two years the fort, with its 50 heavy guns and 500-man garrison, remained mostly untested. That changed in April 1863, when a powerful combined operation set its sights on the fort, Charleston, and its outer defenses. The result was 22-month land and sea siege, the longest of the Civil War. The widespread effort included ironclad attacks, land assaults, raiding parties, and siege operations. Some of the war's most famous events unfolded there under the direction of a host of colorful personalities, including the assault of African American troops against Battery Wagner (depicted in the movie Glory), the shelling of the city by the "Swamp Angel," and the beginning of submarine warfare when the H. L. Hunley sank the USS Housatonic and was herself lost at sea.The destruction of Fort Sumter remained a key Federal objective throughout the siege. Despite repeated concentrated bombardments of the fort and the city, however, it never fell. The defiant fort, Charleston, and its meandering defensive line were evacuated in February 1865 once word arrived that Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman had taken Columbia, South Carolina and was about to cut off the coastal city.Hatcher, the former historian at Fort Sumter, mined a host of primary sources to produce an in-depth and fascinating account of the intricacies, complexities, and importance of this campaign to the overall war effort.Nearly 18 months of shelling had rendered Fort Sumter almost unrecognizable, but the significance of its location remained. During the eight decades that followed, the United States invested millions of dollars and thousands of hours rebuilding and rearming the fort to face potential foreign threats in three different wars. By the end of World War II, sea and air power had been made Sumter obsolete, and the fort was transferred to the National Park Service. Thunder in the Harbor fills a large gap in the historiography of the war and underscores that there is still much to learn about our endlessly fascinating Civil War.

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Book SynopsisBy the spring of 1864, the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia had become battle-hardened, battle-weary foes locked in an ongoing stalemate. With the presidential election looming in the fall, President Abraham Lincoln needed to break the deadlock and so brought to the east the unassuming "dust-covered man" who had strung together victory after victory in the west: Ulysses S. Grant."Well," said soldiers in the Army of the Potomac with a grudging respect for their Southern adversary, "Grant has never met Bobby Lee yet."Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant would come to symbolize the armies they led as the spring campaign got underway, and the clash that began in the Virginia Wilderness on May 5, 1864, turned into a long, desperate death-match that inexorably led to Appomattox Court House eleven months later.The war would come to an end, but at what cost along the way?Grant vs. Lee: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War recounts some of the most famous episodes and most compelling human dramas from the marquee match-up of the Civil War - not just the two most successful commanders produced by either side but the two largest and most fabled armies of the war.

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Book SynopsisOften relegated to a backseat by action in the Eastern Theater, the Western Theater is actually where the Federal armies won the Civil War.In the West, General Ulysses S. Grant strung together a series of victories that ultimately led him to oversee Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox Court House and, eventually, two terms in the White House. In the West, the fall of Atlanta secured Lincoln's reelection for his own second term. In the West, Federal armies split the Confederacy in two - and then split it in two again.In the West, Federal armies inexorably advanced, gobbling up huge swaths of territory in the face of ineffective Confederate opposition. By war's end, General William T. Sherman had marched the "Western Theater" all the way into central North Carolina.In the Eastern Theater, the principal armies fought largely within a 100-mile corridor between the capitals of Washington, D.C., and Richmond, Virginia, with a few ill-fated Confederate invasions north of the Mason-Dixon Line. The Western Theater, in contrast, included the entire area between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River, from Kentucky in the north to the Gulf of Mexico in the south - a vast geographic expanse that, even today, can be challenging to understand.The Western Theater of War: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War revisits some of the Civil War's most legendary battlefields: Shiloh, Chickamauga, Franklin, the March to the Sea, and more.

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Book SynopsisThe first shot of the American Civil War was not fired on April 12, 1861, in Charleston, South Carolina, but instead came on October 16, 1859, in Harpers Ferry, Virginia - or so claimed former slave turned abolitionist Frederick Douglass.The shot came like a meteor in the dark.John Brown, the infamous fighter on the Kansas plains and detester of slavery, led a band of nineteen men on a desperate nighttime raid that targeted the Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry. There, they planned to begin a war to end slavery in the United States.But after 36 tumultuous hours, John Brown's Raid failed, and Brown himself became a prisoner of the state of Virginia.Brown's subsequent trial further divided north and south on the issue of slavery as Brown justified his violent actions to a national audience forced to choose sides. Ultimately, Southerners cheered Brown's death at the gallows while Northerners observed it with reverence. The nation's dividing line had been drawn.Herman Melville and Walt Whitman extolled Brown as a "meteor" of the war. Roughly one year after Brown and his men attacked slavery in Virginia, the nation split apart, fueled by Brown's fiery actions.John Brown's Raid tells the story of the first shots that led to disunion. Richly filled with maps and images, it includes a driving and walking tour of sites related to Brown's Raid so visitors today can walk in the footsteps of America's meteor.

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Book SynopsisHe has been accused of "studied and ingenious cruelty." By turns he has been called a savior and a barbarian, a hero and a villain, a genius and a madman. But whatever you call William Tecumseh Sherman, you must admit he is utterly fascinating.Sherman spent a lifetime in search of who he was, striving to find a place and a calling. Informally adopted by the Ewing family of Lancaster, Ohio, when his own father died when he was just nine, the young redhead lived in a spacious mansion just up the hill from his mother. Later, as a young man he would marry his adopted sister, Ellen.After attending West Point, the intrepid Ohioan found that being a soldier suited him. Yet he always seemed to miss his opportunity. The second Seminole War was in its closing days before he saw action. When the Mexican-American War broke out, he anticipated the opportunity to earn military glory only to be posted to Pittsburgh on recruiting duty. Transferred to California, he arrived too late after surviving two shipwrecks, then ended up on administrative duties.Hounded by his family to leave the military, Sherman tried banking and practicing law. Finally, he became superintendent of a new military academy in Louisiana and thought he had found his place - until civil war intervened.But after leading his troops at the battle of Bull Run, the anxious brigadier general was sent West to Kentucky. Apprehensive over the situation in the Blue Grass State, suffering from stress, insomnia and anxiety Sherman begged to be relieved. Sent home to recover, the newspapers announced he was insane. Colleagues concluded he was "gone in the head."Instead, like a phoenix, he rose from the ashes to become a hero of the republic. Forging an identity in the fire of war, the unconventional general kindled a friendship with Ulysses S. Grant and proved to everyone at Shiloh, Vicksburg, Chattanooga, Georgia, and in the Carolinas that while he was unorthodox, he was also brilliant and creative. More than that, he was eminently successful and played an important role in Union victory.Man of Fire: William Tecumseh Sherman in the Civil War tells the story of a man who found himself in war - and that, in turn, secured him a place in history. Condemned for his barbarousness or hailed for his heroics, the life of this peculiar general is nonetheless compelling - and thoroughly American.

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Book SynopsisThe small, curiously named village of Secessionville, just outside of Charleston, South Carolina was the site of an early war skirmish, the consequences of which might have been enormous had the outcome been different. It quickly would be forgotten, however, as the Seven Days battles, fought shortly afterward and far to the north, attracted the attention of Americans on both sides of the conflict.The battle at Secessionville was as bloody and hard fought as any similar sized encounter during the war. But it was poorly planned and poorly led by the Union commanders whose behavior did not do justice to the courage of their men. That courage was acknowledged by Confederate Lt. Iredell Jones who wrote, "let us never again disparage our enemy and call them cowards, for nothing was ever more glorious than their three charges in the face of a raking fire of grape and canister."For the Federals, the campaign on James Island was a joint Army-Navy operation which suffered from inter-service rivalries and no small amount of mutual contempt. Brig. Gen. David Hunter, the overall Union commander, lost interest in the campaign and turned effective control over to his subordinate Brig. Gen. Henry Benham whose ego and abrasive personality was a significant problem for the officers who served directly under him. On the Confederate side were men like John C. Pemberton, oddly enough a West Point classmate of Benham, who never gained the respect of his subordinates either. The civilian authorities diligently worked behind his back to have him relieved and replaced. He did, however, oversee the construction of a formidable line of defensive works which proved strong enough in the end to save Charleston for much of the war.In Six Miles from Charleston, Five Minutes to Hell, historian Jim Morgan examines the lead up to the James Island campaign as well as the skirmish itself on June 16, 1862 and its aftermath. By including several original sources not previously explored, he takes a fresh look at this small, but potentially game-changing fight, and shows that it was of much more than merely local interest at the time.

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Book SynopsisMost studies of the Mississippi River focus on Union campaigns to open and control it, overlooking Southern attempts to stop them. Now in paperback, Neil Chatelain's Defending the Arteries of Rebellion: Confederate Naval Operations in the Mississippi River Valley, 1861-1865 is the other side of the story - the first modern full-length treatment of inland naval operations from the Confederate perspective.Confederate President Jefferson Davis realized the value of the Mississippi River and its entire valley, which he described as the "great artery of the Confederacy." This key internal highway controlled the fledgling nation's transportation network. Davis and Stephen Mallory, his secretary of the navy, knew these vital logistical paths had to be held, and that they offered potential highways of invasion for Union warships and armies to stab their way deep into the heart of the Confederacy.To protect these arteries of rebellion, Southern strategy called for crafting a ring of powerful fortifications supported by naval forces. Different military branches, however, including the Navy, Marine Corps, Army, and Revenue Service, as well as civilian privateers and even state naval forces, competed for scarce resources to operate their own vessels. A lack of industrial capacity, coupled with a dearth of skilled labor, further complicated Confederate efforts and guaranteed the South's grand vision of deploying dozens of river gunboats and powerful ironclads would never be fully realized.Despite these limitations, the Southern war machine introduced numerous innovations and alternate defenses including the Confederacy's first operational ironclad, the first successful use of underwater torpedoes, widespread use of Army-Navy joint operations, and the employment of extensive river obstructions. When the Mississippi came under complete Union control in 1863, Confederate efforts shifted to its many tributaries, where a bitter and deadly struggle ensued to control these internal lifelines. Despite a lack of ships, material, personnel, funding, and unified organization, the Confederacy fought desperately and scored many localized tactical victories - often won at great cost - but failed at the strategic level.Chatelain, a former Navy Surface Warfare Officer, grounds his study in extensive archival and firsthand accounts, official records, and a keen understanding of terrain and geography. The result is a fast-paced, well-crafted, and endlessly fascinating account that is sure to please the most discriminating student of the Civil War.

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Book SynopsisThe second installment of Al Ovies’ The Boy Generals trilogy, George Custer, Wesley Merritt and the Cavalry of the Army of the Potomac, from the Gettysburg Retreat through the Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1864, encompasses a period jammed with tumultuous events for the cavalry on and off the battlefield and a significant change of command at the top.Once below the Potomac River, the Union troopers raced down the east side of the Blue Ridge Mountains but were unable to prevent General Lee’s wounded Army of Northern Virginia from reaching Culpeper. The balance of the 1863 was a series of maneuvers, raids, and fighting that witnessed the near-destruction of the Michigan Cavalry Brigade at Buckland Mills and the indecisive and frustrating efforts of the Bristoe Station and Mine Run campaigns. Alfred Pleasonton’s controversial command of the mounted arm ended abruptly, only to be replaced by the more controversial Philip H. Sheridan, whose combustible personality intensified the animosity burning between George Custer and Wesley Merritt.Victory and glory followed the Cavalry Corps during the early days of Overland campaign, particularly at Yellow Tavern, where Rebel cavalier Jeb Stuart was mortally wounded. The “spirited rivalry” between Custer and Merritt, in turn, took a turn for the worse. At Trevilian Station, the bitterness and rancor permeating their relationship broke into the open to include harsh official reports critical of the other’s actions. Merritt’s elevation to temporary command of the 1st Cavalry Division cemented their rancor.Just as their relationship worsened, so too did the tenor of the war darken as the sieges of Richmond and Petersburg ground on, and Confederate partisan Col. John S. Mosby intensified guerrilla operations that disrupted Union logistics in the Shenandoah Valley. When Gen. Ulysses Grant demanded that Sheridan escalate retribution, the cavalry commander delivered his infamous edict to “eat out Virginia clear and clean as far as they go, so that crows flying over it for the balance of the season will have to carry their provender with them.” Much of the gritty task fell on the shoulders of the boy generals.Adolfo Ovies’ well-researched and meticulously detailed account of the increasingly dysfunctional relationship between Custer and Merritt follows the same entertaining style in the first installment. The Boy Generals changes the way Civil War enthusiasts will understand and judge the actions of the Union’s bold riders.

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Book SynopsisThe Johnson-Gilmor Raid represents one of three attempts to free prisoners of war during the American Civil War. Like the other two, it was destined to fail for a variety of reasons, mostly because the timetable for the operation was a schedule impossible to meet. The mounted raid was a fascinating act of increasing desperation by the Confederate high command in the summer of 1864, and award-winning cavalry historian Eric J. Wittenberg presents the gripping story in detail for the first time in Destined to Fail: The Johnson-Gilmor Cavalry Raid around Baltimore, July 10-13, 1864.The thundering high-stakes operation was intended to ease the suffering of 15,000 Confederate prisoners held at Point Lookout, Maryland, a peninsula at the confluence of the Potomac River and the Chesapeake Bay. The story includes a motley cast of characters on both sides and fast-paced drama in a deeply researched study that draws upon published and unpublished primary sources, including contemporary newspapers.Part of Wittenberg’s cogent analysis compares and contrasts this raid to a pair of other unsuccessful attempts to free Union prisoners of war – the Kilpatrick-Dahlgren Raid of February-March 1864, and the Stoneman Raid on Macon, Georgia of July 1864 – as well as Gen. George S. Patton’s attempt to free his son-in-law and other American prisoners in March of 1945. This book will be welcomed by anyone with an interest in the Civil War, high-stakes cavalry operations, or the politics of Civil War high command.

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Book SynopsisWilliam Royston Geise was a young Ph.D. candidate at the University of Texas at Austin in the early 1970s when he researched and wrote The Confederate Military Forces in the Trans-Mississippi West, 1861-1865: A Study in Command in 1974. Although it remained unpublished, it was not wholly unknown. Deep-diving researchers were aware of Dr. Geise’s work and lamented the fact that it had never been published. In many respects, studies of the Trans-Mississippi Theater are only now catching up with Geise.This intriguing study traces the evolution of Confederate command and how it affected the shifting strategic situation and general course of the war. Dr. Geise accomplishes his task by coming at the question in a unique fashion. Military field operations are discussed as needed, but his emphasis is on the functioning of headquarters and staff – the central nervous system of any military command. This was especially so for the Trans-Mississippi.After July 1863, the only viable Confederate agency west of the great river was the headquarters at Shreveport. That hub of activity became the sole location to which all isolated players, civilians and military alike, could look for immediate overall leadership and a sense of Confederate solidarity. By filling these needs, the Trans-Mississippi Department assumed a unique and vital role among Confederate military departments and provided a focus for continued Confederate resistance west of the Mississippi River.The author’s work mining primary archival sources and published firsthand accounts, coupled with a smooth and clear writing style, helps explain why this remote department (referred to as “Kirby Smithdom” after Gen. Kirby Smith) failed to function efficiently, and how and why the war unfolded there as it did.Trans-Mississippi Theater historian and Ph.D. candidate Michael J. Forsyth (Col., U.S. Army, Ret.) has resurrected Dr. Geise’s smoothly written and deeply researched manuscript from its undeserved obscurity. This edition, with its original annotations and Forsyth’s updated citations and observations, is bolstered with original maps, photographs, and images. Students of the war in general, and the Trans-Mississippi Theater in particular, will delight in its long overdue publication.

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Book SynopsisAll of middle Tennessee held its breath when the new year dawned in 1863.On the previous day, December 31 – the last day of 1862 – just outside Murfreesboro along Stones River, the Confederate Army of Tennessee had launched a morning attack that nearly bent the Federal Army of the Cumberland back upon itself.The two armies, nearly equal in size, had prepared identical attack plans, but the Confederates had struck first. Fighting throughout the day, amid the rocky outcroppings and cedar groves, proved desperate. Federals managed to hold on until dark, but as the last hours of the old year slipped away, the Army of the Cumberland faced possible annihilation.The armies rang in the New Year to the sounds of suffering on the battlefield, although the armies themselves remained largely still.Meanwhile, hundreds of miles to the east, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. He needed battlefield victories to bolster its authority, but thus far, those victories had eluded him. The stakes for the Army of the Cumberland, in the wake of other Federal failures were enormous.But the fighting along Stones River was not over. On January 2, Confederates launched another massive assault.In Force of a Cyclone: The Battle of Stones River, December 31, 1862-January 2, 1863, authors Caroline Davis and Bert Dunkerly explore a significant turning point of the Civil War – a battle that had the highest percentage of casualties on both sides. Lincoln himself often looked back on that fragile New Year’s Day and all that was at stake. “I can never forget whilst I remember anything,” he told Federal commander Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans, “that about the end of last year and the beginning of this, you gave us a hard-earned victory, which, had there been a defeat instead the nation could scarcely have lived over.”

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