TOCWOC – A Civil War Blog

If you're new To TOCWOC - A Civil War Blog, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed or go check out the Best of TOCWOC - A Civil War Blog. Thanks for visiting!

Those that can’t write, Review!

September 2010

James W. Durney

***********************************************************

In my mailbox or on the shelves

I want to recommend this book again.  I am enjoying the one-page Bios Part of the New Jersey Civil War Sesquicentennial is New Jersey Goes to War edited by Joseph G. Bilby containing 150 biographies of New Jersey citizens that lived during the war.  This book can be read either as a series of short bios or as a book.  Either way, it is informative and enjoyable.  Only available from www.njcivilwar150.org 100% of the purchase price goes to support the New Jersey Civil War Sesquicentennial.  All those involved contributed their time and contributions paid for printing.

I had this listed for October but find it is available now.  I expect Nathan Bedford Forrest’s Redemption by Shane Kastler to cause some comments.  The author covers Forrest’s Christian conversion and renunciation of his racist views, which are largely overlooked, and is specifically devoted to the spiritual aspect of Forrest’s life. This book is an excellent mini-biography and a story of conversion concentrating on the years after the war.

The full-color hardcover edition of The Maps of Gettysburg by Bradley M. Gottfried is a huge improvement over the original edition.  This reprint brings the book on par with the rest of the series.  For those that own the black-and-white version of The Maps of Gettysburg: An Atlas of the Gettysburg Campaign, June 3 – July 13, 1863 by Bradley M. Gottfried, Savas Beatie’s coupon code MAPSCOLOR will give you $10.00 off the new edition and free shipping. Email sales@savasbeatie.com with the coupon code.  Orders placed through PayPal with the coupon code MAPSCOLOR will be issued a refund by the company.

Volume I of the audio supplement to The Complete Gettysburg Guide: Walking and Driving Tours of the Battlefield, Town, Cemeteries, Field Hospital Sites, and other Topics of Historical Interest by J. David Petruzzi covers the main battlefield.  See Augusts’ New Releases for volume II.

Confederate Minds The Struggle for Intellectual Independence in the Civil War South by Michael T. Bernath looks at the fight to prove the distinctiveness of the Southern people and to legitimatize their desire for a separate national existence through the creation of a uniquely Southern literature and culture.

A German Hurrah!: Civil War Letters of Friedrich Bertsch and William Stängel, 9th Ohio Infantry by Joseph R. Reinhartwas published in July.  This is the newest book of German letters the author has translated.  The others are: August Willich’s Gallant Dutchmen: Civil War Letters from the 32nd Indiana Infantry and Two Germans In The Civil War: The Diary Of John Daeuble And The Letters of Gottfried Rentschler.

Yes, it is alternate history and the first one was great fun.  A Rainbow of Blood: The Union in Peril An Alternate History by Peter G. Tsouras, continues the story started in Britannia’s Fist: From Civil War to World War: —An Alternate History.

In William Marvel’s The Great Task Remaining: The Third Year of Lincoln’s War the first line inside the dust jacket states “Revisionist history at its’ best”.  At lest you have been warned.

*****************************************************

New Releases

September 2010

Failure in the Saddle: Nathan Bedford Forrest, Joe Wheeler, and the Confederate Cavalry in the Chickamauga Campaign by Dave Powell.  Draws upon a massive array of primary accounts, many previously unpublished, to offer a detailed examination of the Southern cavalry’s role in this fascinating campaign. The result is a richly detailed and elegantly written study full of insightful tactical commentary, new perspectives on the strategic role of the Rebel horsemen, and fresh insights on every engagement, large and small, waged during the bloody North Georgia campaign.

Stoneman’s Raid, 1865 by Chris J. Hartley is due.  This excellent book looks at one of the largest cavalry raids of the war.  For two months, Stoneman’s cavalry rode across six Southern states, fighting fierce skirmishes and destroying supplies and facilities.  Well written, easy to read with an abundance of maps this is worth reading.

Into the Crater: The Mine Attack at Petersburg by Earl J. Hess is a moment-by-moment examination of the Battle of the Crater and its immediate aftermath, this is the clearest picture yet of how a Federal mine was built underneath the Confederate lines at Petersburg, how the assault against those lines was planned and executed, and why it ultimately failed.

The Rashness of that Hour: Politics, Gettysburg, and the Downfall of Confederate Brigadier General Alfred Iverson by Robert Wynstra.  During the early afternoon of July 1, 1863, much of Iverson’s brigade is killed, wounded, or captured on Oak Ridge.  Iverson loses his command less than a week after the battle.  This book looks at this blunder, the feuds and politics involved in this incident and the aftermath.

Year of Meteors: Stephen Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, and the Election that Brought on the Civil War by Douglas R. Egerton covers the election of 1860 recreating the cascade of unforeseen events that confounded political bosses, set North and South on the road to disunion, and put not Stephen Douglas, but his greatest rival, in the White House.

The New York City Draft Riots: Their Significance for American Society and Politics in the Age of the Civil War by Iver Bernstein is due in Paperback.

This is a reprint of the 1990 book that looked at “Civil War society and politics, patterns of race, ethnic and class relations, the rise of organized labor, styles of leadership, philanthropy and reform, strains of individualism, and the rise of machine politics in Boss Tweed’s Tammany regime.”

The New York Times The Complete Civil War 1861-1865 edited by Harold Holzer and Craig Symonds.  Whatever doubts I have about this is over ridden by the editors.  The book is listed as 480 pages from Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers.

After the War: The Lives and Reputations of Great Civil War Figures After the Shooting Stopped by David Hardin is a 256-page book with a promising title.  I consider this a “buyer beware”.

If you held off buying War Like the Thunderbolt: The Battle and Burning of Atlanta by Russell S. Bonds, start looking for the paperback edition.

October 2010

Railroads of the Civil War: An Illustrated History by Michael Leavy,  uses “compelling period photographs and drawings and a rich narrative to reevaluate and illuminate the role of railroads in the Civil War. In addition to identifying details about the various trains and ancillary equipment and buildings in the illustrations, the author explains how trains influenced the outcome of battles and the war in general.”

An Example for All the Land: Emancipation and the Struggle over Equality in Washington, D.C. by Kate Masur, looks at Washington during Reconstruction “as a unique battleground in the American struggle over equality.”

The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery by Eric Foner, is due the fourth.  The product description says, “In this landmark work of deep scholarship and insight, Eric Foner gives us the definitive history of Lincoln and the end of slavery in America.”

At the Precipice Americans North and South during the Secession Crisis (Littlefield History of the Civil War Era) by Shearer Davis Bowman.  Focuses on the different ways in which Americans, North and South, black and white, understood their interests, rights, and honor during the late antebellum years.  The press release says the author will take the reader ‘inti the mind” of a number of famous people.

Abraham Lincoln and the Structure of Reason by David A. Hirsch & Dan Van Haften.  Authors Hirsch and Van Haften argue that it was Lincoln’s in-depth study of geometry that gave our sixteenth president his verbal structure.

Extraordinary Circumstances: The Seven Days Battles by Brian K. Burton in paperback.  This is one of the best histories of The Seven Days Battles.

The award winning Lincoln and His Admirals by Craig Symonds in paperback.

November 2010

Manifest Destinies: America’s Westward Expansion and the Road to the Civil War by Steven E. Woodworth paints a vivid and panoramic portrait of 1840’s America at its most vibrant and expansive: the annexations of Texas, California, and the states of the Pacific Northwest; prospectors heading west in search of gold; the founding of the Church of Latter-Day Saints and the eventual migration of the Mormons; railroads and telegraph lines connecting populations as never before; William Henry Harrison waging the first modern populist campaign for president, focusing on entertaining voters rather than discussing issues.  Throughout these events, Woodworth traces the path of what had been the “local” issue of slavery as it grew into a central national issue that divided religions, political parties, and, ultimately, the nation itself.

The Day Dixie Died: The Battle of Atlanta by Gary Ecelbarger is a description of the battle fought on July 22, 1864. The press release says “This riveting narrative from Civil War historian and battlefield guide Gary Ecelbarger chronicles the day that struck a death knell for the Southern war effort.”

Colonization after Emancipation: Lincoln and the Movement for Black Resettlement by Phillip W. Magness & Sebastian N. Page is a detailed look at this “solution” to slavery.

Border War: Fighting over Slavery before the Civil War by Stanley Harrold looks at the years leading up to the war on the border between “Free” and “Slave”.  The author takes the position that this constant conflict pushed the South into secession.

Creating a Confederate Kentucky The Lost Cause and Civil War Memory in a Border State by Anne Elizabeth Marshall looks at the development of a Confederate identity between 1865 and 1925.  Having read and enjoyed My Old Confederate Home A Respectable Place for Civil War Veterans by Rusty Williams, I am looking forward for more information on “Confederate” Kentucky.

Notre Dame in the Civil War: Marching Onward to Victory by James M. Schmidt will be the first book to incorporate the Notre Dame Civil War story into a comprehensive and unified narrative.

The Notorious “Bull” Nelson: Murdered Civil War General by Donald A. Clark an examination of this irascible officer, his numerous accomplishments, and his grim fate.

The Long Pursuit: Abraham Lincoln’s Thirty-Year Struggle with Stephen Douglas for the Heart and Soul of America by Roy Morris Jr.

Lincoln for President: An Unlikely Candidate, An Audacious Strategy, and the Victory No One Saw Coming by Bruce Chadwick is being released in paperback.

December 2010

Bloody Times: The Funeral of Abraham Lincoln and the Manhunt for Jefferson Davis by James L. Swanson is another book on this subject from the author of Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer.

January 2011

The Civil War: The First Year of The Conflict Told by Those Who Lived It edited by Brooks Simpson, Stephen Sears and Sheehan-Dean Aaron.

The Great Heart of the Republic: St. Louis and the Cultural Civil War by Adam Arenson looks at this city during the years surrounding the war.

Publication in 2011

In April, look for Jeffry Wert’s A Glorious Army: Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia from the Seven Days to Gettysburg.

The Maryland Campaign of September 1862, Volume 2: Antietam edited by Thomas G. Clemens is the second part of the Ezra Carman manuscript, covering the battle is expected in the summer of 2011.

At 1,680 pages, Hearts Touched by Fire: The Best of Battles and Leaders of the Civil War might require some heavy lifting.  The book is adapted from the series by James M. McPherson, James L. Robertson Jr., Stephen W. Sears, Craig L. Symonds and Harold Holzer.

Scott C. Patchan’s Second Manassas: Longstreet’s Attack and the Struggle for Chinn Ridge is scheduled for the end of April.

Unavailable Dates

Eric Wittenberg is working on a project is for The History Press entitled The Battle of Yellow Tavern: Jeb Stuart’s Last Battle. This will be a study of Phil Sheridan’s May 1864 raid on Richmond, with particular focus on the May 11, 1864 Battle of Yellow Tavern, where Jeb Stuart received his mortal wound.

Thunder Across the Swamps, the second book in the Louisiana Quadrille series, covering the war for the lower Mississippi from February to May 1863.  The first book in the series won the Laney Prize.

We can look forward to a complete history of the Iron Brigade from Lance J. Herdegen.  Those Damned Black Hats!, the Iron Brigade during the Gettysburg Campaign won The Army Historical Foundation Distinguished Writing Award for Operational Battle History.

Joseph R. Reinhart expects German Hurrah!: Civil War Letters of Friedrich Bertsch and William Stängel, 9th Ohio Infantry. The book contains 110 translated letters written by two fiery, highly opinionated German-born officers who fought in the Ninth Ohio Infantry Regiment during the American Civil War. Published in two German-American newspapers, the letters helped connect German Americans in the Ohio Valley to their native landsmen at the battlefront.

Gettysburg Glimpses 2: More True Stories from the Gettysburg Campaign by Scott L. Mingus Sr. This is the fourth in a series of very popular books about human interest stories from Gettysburg, this installment offers more than 200 of the best anecdotes, amusing incidents, and funny stories from the Gettysburg Campaign.

Human Interest Stories from the Civil War by Scott L. Mingus Jr. and Dr. Thomas M. Mingus.  Similar in style and variety as the Gettysburg series by Scott L. Mingus Sr., this inaugural work by two professionally trained historians/educators contains some of the very best stories from the Civil War. Many have not been retold since the 19th century. Balanced between Union and Confederate accounts, this upcoming new book covers the gamut of the war from 1861 through 1865 with many very amusing true tales.

Savas Beatie has a two-volume set on The Petersburg Campaign, taken from a series of unpublished battle studies written by Ed Bearss, edited by Bryce Suderow in the works.  This has no publication date.

Eric Wittenberg announced a contract with The History Press for a history of Averell’s August 1863 Law Book Raid, which led to the August 26-27, 1863 Battle of White Sulphur Springs. Averell’s West Virginia and western Pennsylvania cavalry fought the infantry brigade of Col. George S. Patton in White Sulphur Springs, a couple of miles from The Greenbrier. This has never had any sort of a book-length study.  Terry Lowry, who has done some good work on the Civil War in West Virginia, has agreed to show Eric the battlefield, and lots of people will help him with this project.

In the Fall of 2011, look for Campaign Chattanooga edited by Steven Woodworth the next book in the excellent Civil War Campaigns in the Heartland series

*****************************************************

The Grand Design: Strategy and the U.S. Civil War
by Donald Stoker

Product Details

• Hardcover: 512 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (July 15, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195373057
• ISBN-13: 978-0195373059

Nations often stumble into war.  Miscalculations, expectations and preconceptions work together to blind one or both parties to reality.  The result is a war that neither side particularly wanted but was unable or unwilling to avoid.  Once started war requires planning.  Each sides needs to determine its’ objectives and a course of action that will attain them.  Ideally, each campaign helps obtain the objective.  In the Civil War, the objective of each side is very straightforward: The South wanted to become an independent nation and the North wanted to preserve the Union.  Since the two objectives are mutually exclusive, victory in an exhausting war is the result.

Donald Stoker takes a long and detailed look at how each side worked to accomplish their objective.  This is a detailed look at conducting one of the most important wars in America’s history.  This is a combination of history, theory, observation and “might have been”.  The mix results in an absorbing and thought provoking read.  This is not a basic history!  This is an advanced intermediate level book.  A background in the issues, coupled with an understanding of “Battles and Leaders”, the major and some minor political figures and the campaigns is required.  Without these, this is going to be a long long long book!  With them, it is a lively read that can pull together several ideas giving “the reason why” to any number of questions.

I alternated between enlightenment, enjoyment, agreement and disagreement.  His handling of Halleck is excellent.  I feel he is to hard on Meade.  At times, he is inconsistent on J. E. Johnston.  Overall, the author’s position is mainstream current history.  Each reader will find something to disagree with but will agree on most items.

The book opens with a discussion of strategy, as we understand it and as understood 150 years ago.  In this section, the author defines terms and outlines his argument.   The book proceeds from 1861 to 1865, covering the planning or lack of planning and direction of the war.  Much of the history is of political control and political problems with generals.  We watch Lincoln grow into his role as commander, even as we see Davis mired in details.  Each campaign season, produces a new set of opportunities and dangers. Political considerations, for Lincoln East Tennessee, influence campaigns while producing problems with generals.  The South constantly is trying to balance limited resources, reward success and retrieve lost areas.  The author maintains a firm grip on the major areas of the war, outlining how they contribute or fail in each year.  Neither President has an easy time with his generals nor have generals an easy time with their President.  The development of the path to victory is a complex story that the author tells well.

This is a book every student of the war will want to read.  This is an understandable explanation of why the war came to be fought as it was.  It is an intelligently written book full of good ideas that will challenge you, while increasing your understanding of the war.

Henry Morton Stanley is best remembered for his role as an African explorer.

His 1874-77 journey, charting the Congo river, started the Scramble for Africa. Before Stanley, the white man had been largely content to nibble at the edges, staking little more than ports such as Freetown, Cape Town and Mombasa. After Stanley, the white man went inland.

His planned statue in his home town of Denbigh, Wales, has come under fire for supposedly glorifying imperialism.

Stanley had an earlier career as a Confederate soldier, signing up with the Dixie Grays, part of the Sixth Arkansas, and fighting at Shiloh, where he was captured.

I became so absorbed with some blue figures in front of me,” he wrote, “that I did not pay sufficient attention to my companion Greys. I assumed that the Greys were keeping their position, and never once thought of retreat, but to my speechless amazement, I found myself a solitary grey in a line of blue skirmishers. My companions had retreated! The next I heard was, ‘Down with that gun, Secesh, or I’ll drill a hole through you! Drop it quick.’

The whole fascinating story of Stanley’s Confederate history, capture, imprisonment at Camp Douglas and release by taking oath and enlisting in the Union army is covered in an article in Military History Online.

Commanding Lincoln’s Navy: Union Naval Leadership During the Civil War
by Stephen R. Taaffe

Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Naval Institute Press (May 4, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591148553
• ISBN-13: 978-1591148555

The author brings his considerable talents to the US Navy during the Civil War, their mission and their management.  As with Commanding the Army of the Potomac, we look less at battles than management.  This produces a non-standard history that can be a challenge to read.  The author understands we do not know the Admirals as well we know the Generals.  He takes the time and writes a series of mini biographies of the main characters by way of an introduction.

In doing so, he shows us the difference between the pre-war Navy and Army, underscoring how these differences affect the war.  One major difference is no VIP tries to get command of a ship.  Another is the Navy Department is under stable political control throughout the war.  While strengths, these two items created their own set of problems.  Seniority was everything in the Navy.  Until death or retirement, no one moved up.  Since there was no real retirement officers served well past their physical abilities and often the intellectual abilities as well.

This is not a tale of Washington politics and influence peddling, although there is a good deal of that.  This is a story of building a Navy, selecting men for major commands and their actions.  Battles and blockades command much of the narration.  While there are few naval battles, attacks on forts and the problems of the blockade take center stage.  While not always a “page turner”, this is a book of solid information on an ignored subject.  This is either an excellent introduction to or a short history of the Navy’s activities in the Civil War.  Either way, it is well worth reading and a book that should be in your Civil War library.

Earlier I did a couple of posts on Tom Dooley and his defense counsel Zeb Vance. Now Dooley has come to the stage here in Burnsville, NC, in a locally-produced musical, Tom Dooley.

The Kingston Trio gave this tale national, if not global, visibility, but the story of Tom Dooley is based on historical events in Wilkes County. The facts are few, the legends many, and Asheville resident Brenda Lunsford Lilly has taken yet another tack in writing the book for this new musical production.

Here’s what we know: Tom Dula (aka Dooley) was a young Confederate soldier just back from the war. He was romantically involved with at least two women in his home community, one of whom was later found stabbed to death. Tom was tried for murder, and although his defense attorney was none other than famed Civil War-era governor Zeb Vance, Dooley was convicted and hanged.

But there are many skeptics who believe that others were involved in the death of Laura Foster. And the creative team that produced “The Ballad of Tom Dooley” brings in new dramatic elements to thicken the brew.

The Wall Street Journal has a review of a book about Confederate general Jo Shelby, his flight into Mexico to avoid surrender, and his postbellum career.

At war’s end, Shelby led an embittered expedition of perhaps a thousand men to Mexico. Their number included about 200 of his former troopers, soldiers from other Confederate commands and what must have seemed like half the Confederate government, including the governors of Missouri, Louisiana, Tennessee and Texas.

Shelby and the others didn’t enter Mexico with military action in mind; they were simply determined to make a new start far from the hated Yankees. But the ex- Confederates rode into the middle of another civil war. As Mr. Arthur relates, Shelby’s ragtag group ran a gantlet of bandits, Apaches and Mexican rebel forces-including those at Matehuala-as it headed to Mexico City to offer the emperor military assistance. Maximilian received Shelby cordially but astutely judged that aligning himself with former Confederates would only inflame the U.S., which already resented France’s incursion in Mexico.

Georgia archeologists have located the remains of Camp Lawton, a POW camp that functioned briefly in 1864 and still holds a lot of interesting artifacts.

About 1/4 mile away, on adjacent land owned by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, they used a metal detector to find something else: a pre-Civil War penny about the size of a half-dollar. They were surprised nobody had beaten them to it.

“We thought, holy cow, in order for us to find an artifact like this, this site has to be undisturbed,” Chapman said. “To find a Civil War site that hasn’t been looted is extremely rare.”

Other artifacts soon followed. The tourniquet buckle was stamped with the name of a New York company that manufactured surgical equipment in the 1860s. The clay pipe bore the name of its maker in Glasgow, Scotland.

There was a literal half-penny – a coin cut in half to buy things costing less than 1 cent – and three other coins including a German-made game token stamped with George Washington’s profile.

And finally, a group of market analysts take a look at the Confederate prospects for victory as seen by European investors (PDF).

Using a unique dataset of Confederate gold bonds in Amsterdam, we apply this methodology to estimate the probability of a Southern victory from the summer of 1863 until the end of the war. Our results suggest that European investors gave the Confederacy approximately a 42 percent chance of  victory prior to the battle of Gettysburg/Vicksburg. News of the severity of the two rebel defeats led to a sell-off in Confederate bonds. By the end of 1863, the probability of a Southern victory fell to about 15  percent.

Fredrick Engels is best known for his political partnership with Karl Marx, especially his editorship of Das Capital after the latter’s death. However, Engels was one of the few political radicals of his time with some actual military field experience, having served in the Prussian army and having taken part in the abortive revolution of 1848, where one of his cohorts was future Union general August Willich.

Engels also wrote prolifically about military matters and unlike his partner Marx actually knew what he was talking about (he ghosted a lot of Marx’s military commentary). Here are a series of articles on rifled artillery he did for the New York Tribune on the eve of the Civil War in 1860. Engels knew something about the subject, having served as an artilleryman himself. Here he gives a good period view of the various guns.

[Read more →]

Couple of interesting CW period guns. One is the Norwich rapid fire cannon, which was to compete with Gatling’s gun.

This prototype Norwich rapid fire “Gatling type” cannon was made in Greenville, Connecticut by James D. Mowry’s company which became the Norwich Arms Company.  It was made in about 1862 as a prototype for competition in providing a rapid fire rifle/cannon.  The company had a contract with the war department to produce 30,000 Springfield muskets at his Greenville factory. This unique piece is marked S. Mowry who is believed to be his brother and worked with James D. Mowry.  In 1861, in the Norwich City directory, there is listed a John S. Mowry of Greenville and James D. Mowry is also listed in the same directory.  In the 1868 Norwich City directory is listed Samuel Mowry (Mowry’s Machine Works, Greenville).

It is apparently the only one ever made.

The other is a beautiful Thomas Turner Snider Enfield. Turner was a custom gunsmith who catered to the sporting/volunteer market and hand built custom and expensive rifles. This is a later variation on the venerable P1853 Enfield in .577 caliber. Not the best photos but later in the 1860s the British Army settled on an updated breech-loading version of the Enfield that took a metallic cartridge. The Snider conversion featured a swing-up gate that allowed the weapon to be loaded from the breech, allowing the army to update its rifles at minimal cost. This sufficed until the introduction of the Martini-Henry, the first purpose build military breech loader.

Across the pond much the same thing was going on in America, with the US Army adopting the Allin conversion (commonly called the “trapdoor”) to the Springfield musket in 1866, first in .50-70 and later in .45-70.