analysis of the latest and most s scholarship. Contact email: BookR
The River Was Dyed With Blood: Nathan Bedford Forrest and Fort Pillow. By Brian Steel Wills. Illustrated, appendix, notes, bibliography, 288 pp. University of Oklahoma Press,
Brian Steel Wills does a super job of charting the background of Nathan Bedford Forrest and how the culture that shaped him manifested itself later in the coura caution, and the untiring energy characterizing his military caree
Additionally, Forrest exhibited the ability to produce dramatic moments in critical situations while simultaneously employing tactics to turn adverse condition to his benefit. These traits had served him well before the Civil War in building a fortune and would guide him throughout his Confederate service. To fully understand the contro versy surrounding Fort Pillow, one must grasp the retribution, retaliation, and reprisal culture characteristic of West Tennessee as early as the fall of 1862. The men under Forrest’s command had experienced widespread local brutality by Union forces directed against Confederate sympathizers and their families, been exposed to Union atrocities including murder, and seen their property confiscated leavin
ur readers with timely cant Civil War research and
families destitute. Animosity was inherent in the minds of individual soldiers. Likewise, the presence of Negro soldiers stoked the passions of men raised in a strat ified society that relegated slav to the bottom rung. The combination of individual anger, antipathy, and societal strictures led to an explosiv situation once the walls of Fort Pillow were breached. The deaths of soldiers, particularly black s diers, as well as Unionist civilians housed in the fort, resulted from “unloosening of the dogs of war.” General Forrest did not lead the assault on the fort and only entered after its surrender. The majority of the killing that was later so vilified as a massacre took place below the bluffs a escaping soldiers fled to the riv Contemporaneous accounts confirm that Forrest was not present when the “massacre” occurred and stopped any excesses upon his arrival. Yet, being in overal command, he was forever labeled with the sobriquet “That Devil Forrest.” Brian Steel Wills presents a well-balanced, unbiased, and thoroughly researched account
of both the assault on Fort Pillo and its aftermath. He explores how the Union press and politicians used the slogan “Remember Fort Pillow” to defeat Democrats and scapegoat Forrest for their political purposes. Yet, he leave the interpretation of conflicting facts to the reader who is willin to examine the evidence in light of contemporary biases and leave the ultimate conclusions for further research. This book is well written, concise, and superbly ed ited. It should be on every stude of the Civil War’s bookshelf.
Wayne L. Wolf is Professor Emeritus at South Suburban College and the author of numerous Civil War books including Heroes and Rogues of the Civil War and The Last Confederate Scout.
Lincoln’s Multiple Personal Trage Terrible Carnage of the Civil War
The Black Heavens: Abraham Lincoln and Death. By Brian R. Dirck. Notes, Bibliography, and
Professor Dirck has written a narrative on death and mourning by Abraham Lincoln. The United States president knew death throughout his life, but nothing prepared him for how the country lost so many soldiers during the Civil War, destroyed so much property, and produced such a significant debt to the nation pa for by an extraordinary amount of taxation. While the fighting caused so many widows, he was able to lead the country toward a “new birth of freedom,” with a future liberation from human bondage. His hope for a better future was littered with graves. This excellent writer makes the argument that death can be looked at with emancipation and preserving the Union as one of
the central realities of Lincoln’ life. He failed to mention how he dealt with death throughout his lifetime but points to it in some his wartime speeches and letters. Much conjecture and researched deduction is found throughout this outstanding narrative of how Lincoln handled the death of his parents, children, alleged love o his life, and the loss of so many this important time in our histor Unlike many individuals from this time, the author asserts tha Lincoln was far more rational than superstitious; rarely spoke of ghosts or other displays of th spirit world. He provides many fascinating examples of how this man confronted the problems of death and dying with the same realism that directed other important characteristics of his fiftyyears on this planet.
The Black Heavens insightfully tackles how Lincoln gradually turned to the almighty and faith
during four years of war and conflict. It is fascinating to see th the President learned to accept th casualties of conflict in order to pay for Union fight and freedom for millions. While he mourned close friends early in the contest such as Elmer Ellsworth and Edward Baker, he chose to deal
with death in a private way. Dirck makes excellent observations in detailing that for the president t lose himself in the war’s casualties, would have risked his rationality, his judgment, and ability to govern. The author allows us to gain an understanding of this great man’s character and ability to withstand the rigors of his presidency. Dr. Dirck writes about Lincoln dealing with a good death, the ideas of death, ghosts, battlefiel and death, duty, control, and the death of his sons Eddie and Willie as well as his close friends; Elme Ellsworth and Edward Baker. He shows interesting examples in his study of death creating an honest passing with a sense of resolution and a reason that systematically provided people with hope for a better future. The most compelling chapters are the three dealing with the deaths of Eddie and Willie Lincoln and Elmer Ellsworth and how Abraham Lincoln and his wife, Mary, dealt with their deaths, their lives, hi four years in office, and the Civi War. This academic has brought to light that the president’s lega background and political nature trained him that death was also an entity that could be sensibly examined, defined, and handled in a
more disconnected way. In the end, the strength of Dirck’s tome is analyzing and finding how Abraham Lincoln searched for a deeper meaning
concerning death and its purpose for himself during his life. The President’s Second Inaugural
Address clearly states his belief as he told people on March 4, 1865, “as G-d gives us the right, …let us finish the work we are in.” He knew that the afterlife was black but did not necessarily understand why.
Brian Dirck has written a fascinating volume on Abraham
Lincoln and death that presents a very different perspective on the Sixteenth President. The author has succeeded in the first booklength treatment of Lincoln’s connection with death that scholars and enthusiasts will learn from and enjoy. The Anderson University professor offers a fresh, innovative, and quite readable account of Abraham Lincoln. The author’s use of thir teen images is very effective and helpful to the reader. Thus, this tle is highly recommended.
David Marshall is a high school American history teacher in the Miami-Dade School district for the past thirty-three years. A li long Civil War enthusiast, David is president of the Miami Civil War Round Table Book Club. In addition to numerous reviews in tions, he has given presentations to Civil War Round Tables on Joshua Chamberlain, Ulysses S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, the Battl of Gettysburg, and the Common Soldier.
Endurance: The George Spangler Farm Hospitals and the Battle of Gettysburg. By Ronald D. Kirkwood. Illustrated appendices, bibliography, index
George and Elizabeth Spangle and their four children operate a successful, growing, and prof itable farm in Gettysburg, Penn By community standards, they were doing well and giving back
to their community. Then the XI Corps, Army of the Potomac, seized their home, barn, and su mer kitchen for a field hospita leaving them crowded in one bedroom for the next six weeks as nearly 2,000 wounded and dying Union and Confederate soldiers were treated on their pro erty and the adjacent Granite Schoolhouse.
Both armies used their prope ty as a staging area for the ba
and fouling the land with human and animal waste. Spangler’s Farm was chosen because it was
Union’s front line extending fr Cemetery Ridge to Culp’s Hill. It also provided sufficient spa and shelter for thousands of ex pected wounded. Ron Kirkwood has masterfully woven together the troop movements during the Battle of Gettysburg with the subsequent horrors of treatment at t
Spangler Hospitals. His persona accounts through soldier letter diaries, and medical files illu minate what the Spangler family lived through, a nightmare o blood, amputated limbs, agony,
death, and nauseating smells. Individual chapter vignettes hig light personal stories that make the reader realize Gettysburg is story of thousands of individual stories. As examples, the death of George Nixon III, great grandfather of a future president, or the sacrifices of Civil War nurs Rebecca Lane Pennypacker Price are highlighted. The heroic deat of Confederate General Lewis A. Armistead and the struggles of Private Reuben F. Ruch of the 153rd Pennsylvania show that death and dying did not discriminate by rank. These stories are multiplied by those of countless individual soldiers, doctors, nu es, and volunteers who contribut ed to alleviating the trauma of hospital stay These stories also illuminat the medical care available in 1863, the contributions of local residents, unscrupulous profitee in embalming tents, tomb raiders for souvenirs, and the tortu of family members seeking their loved ones. Medical providers, like Dr. Bleeker Hovey and his wife Marilla, who worked side by side to alleviate suffering left lasting impression on their phys ical as well as mental health. W
was truly hell in these hospital and no one associated with them ever forgot their experiences. The author’s research is extensive and contains six appendices that include biographies of surgeons who worked at the Spangler Hospitals, a detailed list of over 1,400 wounded and deceased soldiers, and an organi zational chart of the Army of th
Potomac. These inclusions make this a volume that should be on
available after the months of re search Ron Kirkwood obviously did with a passion for accuracy
the Lincoln-Davis Civil War Roundtable. He has written numerous books and articles on the Civil War and enjoys researching the life of the common soldier.
Wilbur George Kurtz: A Most Remarkable Life, A Pictorial Biography. By E. Joseph Seguin. Photos, index, notes and timelin no bibliography, acknowledgments, foreword, introduction. 202 pp., 2019. Stone Mountain, GA: K & S Books.
You might say he was the founding father of Atlanta History. Wilbur Kurtz’ disciples included the renowned local historian, Franklin Garrett; Civil collectors and scholars, Beverly Dubose Sr. and his son, Beverly Dubose Jr., (and later, Beverly III); Colonel James G. Bogle, an Margaret Mitchell. This group was not only essential to establishing the Atlanta Historical Society, but the Atlanta Civil War Roundtable, which continues to flourish today with nearl 700 meetings since its inception just prior to the Centennial in 1960s. Ironically, it would be Kurtz native of Illinois and a graduat of the Chicago Art Institute, an
Garrett, another Midwesterner, from Wisconsin by way of Chicago, who would be responsible for preserving much of Atlanta’s history. (Full disclos as a native Chicagoan, I bring n pre-conditioned views to this re view). Southerners DuBose and Bogle balanced the team. He is almost singlehandedly responsible for the nearly 350
historical markers in and around Atlanta. According to the book’s
exact placement of each one. He got heavily involved with produc tion of the movie Gone with the
to send him detailed measurements of an antebellum lamppost still extant in front of the Uni Daughters of the Confederacy on Juniper and Sixth Street in Atlanta. Henry was evidently as avid as the old man. Climbing to the top of the lamppost, he drew unwanted attention from the lo-
cal constabulary and was held until he was able to explain his behavior to the satisfaction of authorities. Kurtz was also involved with the Atlanta Cyclorama in the ear ly 1930’s under FDR’s Works
Projects Administration (WPA). The program was designed to stimulate the economy putting all types of labor back to work. It helped various groups of artists and artisans to work during the depression. Several importan artists benefited from the progr including the likes of Jackson Pollack, Willem de Kooning, John Steuart Curry, Berenice Abbott, and Jacob Lawrence. Kurtz landed the job of creating the diorama which remains with the restored painting at th Atlanta History Center. He kept a meticulous record of his work on the large painting including early attempts to conserve it. H Notebook 23, Cyclorama was presented by Wilbur Kurtz III, t the History Center in 2018 and i an important contribution to doc umenting the painting and to our understanding of its intriguing history. The early 1940s found Kurtz in Hollywood working on Song of the South, and in the early 1950’s on the Great Locomotive Chase in which his father-in-law Captain William A. Fuller, had
participated. Kurtz was “the acknowledged expert on the subject.” He and Bogle collaborated on the film parlaying the latter reputation as “a recognized rail road historian…and the foremost authority about the Andrews Raid of 1862. Bogle had lectured and written extensively on the topic including “The General and the Texas” co-authored with Stan
Cohen, and supervised the restoration of the locomotive Texas a
continued through the Atlanta Civil War Round Table. This paperbound book is pre-
search work. As a fellow writer, that is of some interest whi
s may find it a hindrance to low of the story. In the end is an extensive picture book extremely detailed captions r than a traditional biograKurtz’ life is a fascinating at the first half of the 20t ry in the Midwest and the alized City of Atlanta.
Source: Bogle Obituary, August 1 The Atlanta Journal-Cons
tore Cilella was the Preside EO of the Atlanta History
ton’s Regulars, A History of 21st New York Volunteers e Civil War, (University of s Press, 2009), editor of orrespondence of General Upton, 2 Vols., (University nnessee Press, 2017), and r of Till Death Do Us Part; orrespondence of Emory mily Upton, (University of oma Press, 2020).
Vol. 46, No. 1 Remembrance Day, 2019, Ge The world will
– Abraham Linc by Joe Bordonaro President Lincoln was wro about the first part, but v correct about the second pa
this famous phrase from his nificent “Gettysburg Addres On Nov. 23, 2019, reenactor members of the general publ gathered in Gettysburg, Pen to remember the actions of soldiers and the President
Remembrance Day 2019. Stafford County Science Teacher Don Mullen, portray President Lincoln.
Members of the 14th Brooklyn years ago. The Sons of Union Veterans held their 62nd ann parade, featuring numerous C War reenactors. Members of r enacting groups commemorated
the actions of various indiv and units by conducting marc es and visiting monuments. A “Remembrance Illumination” o Gettysburg National Cemetery graves occurs each year, as Although the numbers of reen
tors are down from its 2000 when Wikipedia estimated the were about 50,000 Civil War enactors; a still impressive ber showed up this year and the traditions alive. The ac
activities that took place. Joe Bordonaro is a USAF vete
Why the Civil War Remains Unresolv Not Even Past: The Stories We Keep Telling About the Civil War. By Cody Marrs. Photos, notes, index, 240 pp., 2020. Johns Hopkins University
In 1958 Wesleyan University published a series of lectures delivered by Bruce Catton that spring on campus. Catton, in the introduction to that volume, America Goes to War, meditated on the Civil War’s place in American history. After lambasting those who romanticized it too much, Catton concluded “the Civil War is not a closed chapter in our dusty past.” That statement rings as true today as it did sixty-two years ago. As a republic we still grapple with the Civil War’s legacies. More than 150 years after fighting on the battle fields ceased, the Civil War still stirs deep emotions, sparks bitter rancor, and triggers controversy. The question remains as to why that is the case. This volume lends significant insight into why individuals believe what they do about the Civil War and why our nation’s most tumultuous moment remains unresolved. Cody Marrs, an English professor at the University of Georgia, through prodigious research and careful analysis of film, art, nov els, and poetry, has produced a carefully-crafted, impeccably
New 392 page, full-color bo Civil War Artillery Projectil The Half Shell Book. For more information and ho to order visit the website ww
written, and thought-provoking volume. It simultaneously informs and calls for an honest reckoning with the past. Organized into four main chapters, the book’s first, examines the notion that the Civil War was merely a “family squabble,” a contest of brother against brother. Beginning with the publication of Walt Whitman’s Drum Taps in 1865, Marrs traces how various individuals such as Constance Mayer, whose painting Recognition: North and South, which depicted a Confederate soldier mourning over the body of a slain Union soldier, his brother, in the aftermath of battle, mythologized the conflict as a temporary falling out among family members. Marrs convincingly argues that this myth, eith as a result of Whitman’s writings, the musings of Robert Penn Warren during the Civil War centennial, or screen writers such a Tony Kushner, endures because it is much more comfortable to imagine the war as “a domestic quarrel… that ultimately brought everyone back together.” In the next chapter the author’s attention turns to how var ious individuals including Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, Emily Dickinson, and Ken Burns cast the Civil War as a “dark and cruel war” where the shared sufferings of soldiers on the battlefie meaning white combatants, essentially erases national allegiance. The “dark and cruel war,” just like the “family squabble,” skirts around slavery’s centrality to the conflict and the Africa American experience. While the first two perspectiv Marrs examines side-step slavery, the book’s third chapter provides solid exploration of how the Civi War’s most persistent, and arguably most destructive mythology, the Lost Cause, infests society with the idea that not only d slavery have nothing to do with the war, but that enslavers prove genial and kind. While the author does revisit some familiar ground here, explored by other scholars
of the Lost Cause in examining the influence of individuals such as Edward Pollard, D.W. Griffith, and Margaret Mitchell, Marrs’s examination of the ways in which alternative history such as Harry Turtledove’s The Guns of the South continues to foment the Lost Cause is an important contribution to the study of Civil W memory. Marrs’s final chapter offers i sight into how African Americans such as Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. DuBois, Edmonia Lewis, and Meta Vaus Warrick Fuller, attempted to challenge the perspectives examined in the volume’s first three chapters. While each chapter is strong, this fina one is arguably the most powerful. It not only posits the manners in which various African Americans attempted to place slavery’s destruction at the cent of Civil War remembrance, but compellingly shows how African Americans viewed figures, many in white society, both North and South, since the Civil War’s end. Through careful analysis of speeches and writings of individuals such as W.E.B. DuBois, Marrs suggests that criticisms levied against Robert E. Lee and other Confederate figures in recent years, particularly in the wake of the 2015 tragic murders in Charleston, S.C., are not necessarily a case of revisionist hi tory, but merely resurrecting the ideas promulgated by African Americans since the Civil War’s end. Engagingly written and solidly argued, Marrs’s volume should have wide appeal to those interested in the complexities of Civi War memory and individuals seeking an understanding of how the past influences the present.
Jonathan A. Noyalas is director of Shenandoah University’s McCormick Civil War Institute in Winchester, Virginia, a professor in Civil War Era Studies at Shenandoah University, and founding editor of Journal of the Shenandoah Valley During the Civil War Era. He is the author or editor of thirteen books including Civil War Legacy in the
Shenandoah: Remembrance, Reunion, and Reconciliation.
Voices from the Past Remembering the Civil War: The Conflict as Told by Those Who Lived It. Edted by Michael Barton and Charles Kupfer. Introduction, pictures, photos, 470 pp., 2020, Lyons Press
This text is published as an troductory volume of Civil War memoirs “for general readers.” All the entries are in the publ domain and many are available online at places such as Projec Gutenberg (under the heading “US Civil War (Bookshelf”). The volume is broken into sections for each year of the war, with readings on battles i chronological order, interspers with sections such as “Prologue to War,” ”Everyday Life in Camp and Field,” “Everyday Life in the Hospital,” “The Variety of Warriors,” “The Variety of Civi War Experience,” and “Reflectin on the War.” Each reading is introduced by the editors with comments on the background of the author an their place and purpose in the War. At the end is bibliographic information about the item. The memoirs range from commanding generals (Lee, Grant, Longstreet) to common soldiers (Sam Watkins, William Fletcher) to well-known personalities (Herman Melville, Louisa May
Whitman, Frederick Douglas) and a host of others. The authors attempt to present a well-rounded view North and South, general and common soldier, soldier and civilian, and generally do so. I would have liked to see more readings from the TransMississippi and from the navies. The editors’ biggest failing is t year 1865. There are only four readings (all other years have over twice that) covering the Appomattox Campaign, Lee’s surrender, and Lincoln’s assassination. There should have been some readings from the Army of Tennessee or its Union counterparts, something about Jo Shelby and the Confederate Iron Brigade crossing the Rio Grande and going to Mexico, or Juneteenth in Texas. If nothing else, they should have included Nathan Bedford Forrest’s farewell to his troops (“I have never on the fiel of battle sent you where I was un willing to go myself, nor would I now advise you to a course which I felt myself unwilling to pursue You have been good soldiers. You can be good citizens. Obey the laws, preserve your honor, and the government to which you have surrendered can afford to be and will be magnanimous.) Granted Forrest is controversial in some quarters, but his words are perfect for a volume such as this. Remembering the Civil War is not for the well-read Civil War enthusiast or specialist. It is i tended for those with very little background in the Civil War who want to learn more. It would make a great gift to someone just starting out or someone who has expressed an interest and, for whatever reason, hasn’t pursued it. It is recommended with that understanding.
CAPT Joe Derie is a longtime Civi War buff with a special interest in Civil War naval history and th Civil War in the West. He is a re tired USCG officer and a licensed officer of the Merchant Marine, currently self-employed as a marine surveyor and marine accident
Philip Tucker’s new book, Custer at Gettysburg, focuses on the cavalry showdown on East Cavalry Field between Union General George Custer and Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart. Philip Tucker concentrates on the tactical performanc es of both men during this climat ic day of the battle. This is one the first surveys of George Custe that concentrates on his contribution on a single day during the Civil War and does not emphasize his life before July 3, 1863 or his post war fighting in the Western United States. The author makes an argument that the fighting that took place away from Pickett’s Charge was much more important than the accepted climatic moment of the three day’s at Gettysburg that
520 Folly Road, Suite 25 PM Charleston, SC 29412
helped denigrate Custer’s importance to the battle. Tucker pain a portrait of the need for empha sizing the clash at East Cavalry Field rather than appearing as an insignificant moment during the final day of fighting. This historian succeeds in bringing to light the unexpected portrayal of a cavalry commander as a forceful, prepared, clever, and careful battlefield leader of bo cavalry and horse artillery. In end, Philip Thomas Tucker writes an interpretation of the battle Gettysburg that illuminates a new history of Custer’s success and leadership in out-thinking and out-dueling Stuart and his horsemen. Unfortunately, this title is marred by a forty-three-page introduction and a great deal of repetition throughout the narrative including numerous times in the same paragraph and page. Assistance in editing would have greatly helped the flow of this four hundred and eighty-page volume. Much is made of other soldiers who are viewed as if there is a competition to elevat this “boy general.” Tucker emphasizes throughout this tome that anything Custer does or achieves is much better than most everyone else who fought and helped the Army of the Potomac gain an important victory at Gettysburg. Additionally, would have been helpful to have more maps as well as a bibliography. Perhaps the most troublin aspect of the volume is that the author makes related statements several times throughout this tapestry that “a number of nonprofessional Civil War authors— rather than PhD’s—and nonacademic publishers have made a cottage industry on behalf of th false propositions and based on outdated books.” On a positive note, he quotes many well-known and leading scholars who support
many of his assertions throughout this magnum opus. Despite these limitations, the book provides some important information, including a previously unpublished account of the battle written on July 4, 1863, and published by a correspondent under the heading “From the Michigan Cavalry.” This study covers two important individuals who helped determine which side won the battle of Gettysburg. Overall, this book gives an interesting and thought-provoking look into George Armstrong Custer and J.E.B Stuart’s strengths and weaknesses in the combat’s critical cavalry charges. This history is significant and the write has written a probing reconsideration of the performance of these two important figures. This is a lucid, readable summary of the critical East Cavalry Field fight ing that brings two key personalities to life. Tucker’s engagin prose ably examines the topic and makes the story accessible to anyone seeking to understand these individuals and their contr butions to this important moment during the Civil War. There have been many titles published dealing with one of the most important Civil War battles, but Tucker has succeeded in researching and analyzing the vital fighting at East Cavalry Field in a full book-length treatment that scholars and enthusiasts will dis cuss and argue over. The author provides fresh insight that helps us understand Custer and Stuart’s motivation, strategies, tensions, controversies, and triumphs that characterized their careers and lives prior to Gettysburg and during the battle. He does not shy away from placing fault with anyone, especially how it relates to Custer. The general and his Michigan Wolverines’ success on July 3, 1863, was Custer’s finest hour.
David Marshall is a high school American history teacher in the Miami-Dade School district for the past thirty-three years. A li
long Civil War enthusiast, David is president of the Miami Civil War Round Table Book Club. In addition to numerous reviews in tions, he has given presentations to Civil War Round Tables on Joshua Chamberlain, Ulysses S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, the Battl of Gettysburg, and the Common Soldier.
Psychiatry and the Lost Cause Administrations of Lunacy: Racism and the Haunting of American Psychiatry at the Milledgeville Asylum. By Mab Segrest. Illustrated, notes, The
Using a series of biographical sketches of inmates, Mab Segrest traces the history of th Georgia State Lunatic, Idiot, an Epileptic Asylum from its founding in 1842 to its court-ordered demise in 2010. The book’s central thesis is that modern psych atric practice was forged in the cauldron of slavery, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the era of Jim Crow. The Georgia State Asylum became the laboratory for reconstructing psychiatri history within the United States particularly as an integral part Southern history. Patient narratives, hospital cords, newspapers, and oral histories were combed to place each historical period in perspective explain the changing context of psychiatric care for both white and black patients. Varying psychiatric theories from heredity predisposition to germ theory, bodily humors, behavioral causation, and post-traumatic stress are placed in the histori
time period when they dominated admissions to the asylum. The author, however, goes be-
related to the number and diagnosis of each patient to an over riding view that indicts Souther society as a preserver of racism manifested even in the Georgia Asylum. Antebellum racism was held to not only shape American psychiatry but to inculcate in i the seeds of white supremacy tha would, and still does, character
America. Many contentions put forward by the author to support her omnipresent racism are flawed. Her contention that more Southerners died in the Civil War than Union troops because more battles were fought in the South neglects numerical, industrial, and technological superiority of the North. Frequent use of phraseology such as, “We can imagine, he seemed a bat[sic bit] narcissistic, or, course, we cannot know for sure,” allow the author to conclude that white supremacy ideology was the root cause of not only psychi atric admissions but later dispro portionate prison sentences and labor gang membership. Opinion becomes diagnosis; conjecture becomes the answer to statistical fact finding, and reconstruction of events, e.g. contending the 1897 fire at the asylum was the outcome of a century of segregation, are used to color psychiatr practices with racism and white privilege. The imperative of reasserting white control after the Civil War subverted scientific advances and is labeled as the overriding socio-political theory of America. If the author would have removed her own stated biases and let readers interpret the data fo themselves, they may reach similar conclusions or may realize that it was the global understand ing of mental illness at the time that was reflected in the adminis tration of asylums in America. The data and personal stories in this text are well documented, enlightening, and historically re evant as one piece in the puzzle of the evolution of psychiatry in America. Except for a series of typographical errors, the researc is solid and comprehensive. For historians interested in the role psychiatry in society, this book recommended but should be read with an understanding of the inherent biases.
Wayne L. Wolf is Professor Emeritus at South Suburban College and the author of numerous books and articles on the Civil War. He is past president of the Lincoln-Davis Civil War Roundtable.
A Confederate Army Surgeon in War and Peace Christopher H. Tebault, Surgeon to the Confederacy. By Alan I. West. Bibliography, illustrations, photographs, tabl index. 207 pp., 2020, MacFarland
Christopher H. Tebault, a New Orleans native, was commissioned an Assistant Surgeon in the Confederate Army Medical Corps in early 1862, shortly aft graduating from medical school in New Orleans. He was originally assigned to the 21st Louisian Infantry and served in the Corin Campaign. Later he was assigned to the 10th South Carolin Infantry as an Acting Surgeon, taking part in Bragg’s invasion of Kentucky, the Battle of Stone’s River, and the Tullahoma Campaign. Probably because of his excel lent medical qualifications, he then assigned to the Confederate Hospital at Quintard, Ga., in Ju 1863. He served continuously at Confederate Army Hospitals in Georgia until being paroled from the Confederate Army Hospital in Macon in May 1865. Following the war, he returne to New Orleans where he began a long career as a medical practitioner, medical educator, public health doctor, Southern patr ot, “Lost Cause” proponent, and concerned citizen. He was the Surgeon General of the United Confederate Veterans from 1896 until his death in 1914. The genesis for this book cam when the author, a collector of medical antiquities, purchased a walnut medical chest with many original medicine bottles from
chest had a Stars and Bars on it and a small plaque engraved:
C. H. Tebault, M.D. - Surgeon 10th S.C. INF. REGT. C.S.A.
the chest other than that he had purchased it from a Connecticut estate. As the author stated, thi began a 22-year quest to find out more about Dr. Tebault. There is nothing in Dr. Tebault’s records about the loss of his chest; auth speculates that he lost it in one of his campaigns with the Army of Tennessee. This is possible of course, but it could just as well have been looted at the end of th war when he was paroled. Dr. Tebault left no memoirs but did leave some writings (several of them are in an appendix to the book). The book is thus mostly a history of what was going on at the time, followed by a few paragraphs on what Dr. Tebault was doing based on records and other documents. He was obviously an accomplished doctor, did much for public health in New Orleans, and was well thought of by his contemporaries, both doctors and lay persons, but due to lack of material we don’t find out much about the person. Christopher H. Tebaul Surgeon to the Confederacy, has been ably researched by the autho and, with a few minors errors (th 21st Louisiana Infantry did not have 7,000 at Island Number 10 and Dr. Tebault was never on the staff of every Confederate commander in chief), there is much of interest here. It is highly re ommended to those with special interests in the Confederate Army Medical Corps and its services in the Army of Tennessee’s area, reconstruction in New Orleans, the September 1874 Battle of Liberty Place in the Crescent City, publi health issues, medical education in New Orleans following the war, and the United Confederate Veterans.
CAPT Joe Derie is a longtime Civi War buff with a special interest in Civil War naval history and th Civil War in the West. He is a re tired USCG officer and a licensed officer of the Merchant Marine, currently self-employed as a marine surveyor and marine accident investigator in Portland, OR.
In 1929, British military historian and theorist B.H. Liddell Hart published Sherman: Soldier, Realist, American. This groundbreaking work would be his only exploration of the American Civil War. Hart, who would ultimately be knighted for his 26 books on military history, had seen firsthand the futility of frontal assaults in the First World War, an he saw in General Sherman one of the earliest proponents of indirect warfare. Sherman was the master of directing large armies to feint in one direction and fla the Confederates in the opposite direction. Hart went on to argue an even larger point that, by hav ing the foresight to aggressively destroy the Southern means of economic production, Sherman
destroyed the resolve of the Southern people, and ultimately the Southern nation itself. Now, nearly a century later, an other respected British military historian, Brian Holden Reid,
has written The Scourge of War: The Life of William Tecumseh
Civil War. He is closely associat ed with the British armed forces, having spent ten years as residen
historian at the Department of War Studies to the Staff College, Camberley. Reid was awarded the Samuel Eliot Morison Prize by the Society for Military
eneral Sherman History in 2019 for his contributions to the field. Much like Liddell Hart, Brian Reid has strong opinions and insights about General Sherman and nineteenth century warfare in general. Certainly, William T. Sherman shares the stage with Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant as the three principal architects of Northern victory in the Civil War. General Sherman served from First Bull Run to the end of the war and the author rec ognizes Sherman’s maturation as a military leader and strategist. Professor Reid points out that as early as 1861, Sherman was telling all who would listen that the “Real War” would be fought for control of the Mississippi basin. Reid believes that, as Military Commander of the Memphis District in the summer of 1862, Sherman reached the conclusion that the South could not be reconciled, and that to win the war, the North must conduct “a harsher, more punitive style of milita campaigning.” Writing his brother, Senator John Sherman, in the spring of 1863, the general declared, “We are forced to invade – we must keep the War South till they are not only ruined, exhaust ed, but humbled in pride and spirit.” This would be Sherman’s guiding philosophy as his responsibilities in the Union command structure rose with each promotion. The Southern people, in his mind, had brought this “Scourge of War” down upon themselves. Reid’s new biography follows Sherman from his 1820 birth in Ohio, until his 1891 death in New York City. “Cump’s” formative years were driven by the early death of his father, Charle Sherman, and his subsequent
adoption by Thomas and Maria Ewing. A powerful U.S. Senator from Ohio, Ewing secured Sherman’s appointment to West Point in 1836. Popular with his fellow cadets for his flashes of
wit and loquacious personality, Sherman also dressed careless-
be checkered after his 1853 resignation from the army, Reid believes that the articulate Sherma
was “the best-read ex-officer in civil life,” with a sophisticated taste for theater as well as Brit history and literature. Brian Reid notes Sherman’s
personal bravery at Shiloh, but also acknowledges that on a tactical level—the actual fighting of battles—the general did not excel. His frontal assaults at First Bull Run, Chickasaw Bayou, Tunnel Hill, and Kennesaw Mountain were all repulsed. Reid believes that the unexpected death of his son, Willy, contribut ed to a despondent Sherman not doing the painstaking reconnaissance at Chattanooga for which he was renowned. Reid also faults Sherman for missing an opportunity on the second day of the Battle of Jonesboro to destroy and capture William Hardee’s Corps. Where Professor Reid sees exceptional brilliance in Sherman is at both the operational and strate gic level. The general’s superb lo gistical understanding and preparation allowed him, in the 90-day Atlanta Campaign, to “consistently outthink and outmaneuver Joseph Johnston.” After capturing Atlanta and ensuring the re-election of Presiden Lincoln, Sherman boldly set out for Savannah in his famous March to the Sea. Both Liddell Hart and Brian Reid praise Sherman for paring his army back to his 62,000 fittest soldier creating a mobile fighting force that lived primarily off the country. Reid also puts a spotlight on Sherman’s expert use of pontoon trains to ensure that his columns were never held up by large rivers in Georgia or the Carolinas. From a strategic perspective, Reid notes that Sherman understood, more than any other military leader, the psychological destruction he was inflicting on the South’s international prestige and internal self-respect. Foreign
governments could never recognize a Southern nation while a Northern army was moving rapidly and unchecked through its hinterland. This point leads naturally to Reid’s most controversial
assertion that Sherman’s wanton plunder and burning of civil and
vation set in after the departure Federal troops. Sherman’s orders “to spare nothing” was directed
primarily at the property of prominent slaveholders who, in the mind of the general, had led the Southern people to a false rebellion. Reid writes that it was the
later tenets of the Lost Cause that have given Sherman “a wholly false diabolic presence in this self-indulgent and self-serving folklore of victimhood.” Professor Reid also sees in William T. Sherman a “dazzling literary stylist,” whose published writings and reports are cogent and eminently quotable. Reid uses this correspondence to explore the general’s evolving and complicated relationships with Ulysses Grant, Henry Halleck, John McClernand, Joseph Hooker, Henry Stanton, and, above all, his wife Ellen. It was her Ewing connections and letter writing prowess that was instrumental in Sherman’s reinstatement to command after his temporary breakdown in November 1861. Brian Reid’s biography of General Sherman is deeply researched, written at an academic level, and filled with historical insight and commentary. Its pages will be enjoyed by readers who already have a firm grasp on how the Civil War was won and lost. Sherman’s strikingly individualistic personality shines throughout this crisply written biography and Reid’s refined opinions are welcome, whether the reader ultimately accepts or rejects them. The author appropriately closes his new book with a quote from Rutherford B. Hayes, who described William T. Sherman, quite simply, as “the most interesting and original character in the world.” Finally, as good as Reid’s contribution is to an understanding of the mercurial Sherman, this is not to say that American biographers have nothing important to say about General William Tecumseh
Sherman. In the last twenty years, Sherman has drawn full-length biographies from Lee Kenneth
The Atlanta Campaign The American Civil War was the first war in w
used entrenchments, repeating rifles, ironcla communications. It was also the first American War to be exte Mathew Brady, Alexander Gardner and Timothy O having made iconic photographs in the Civil W
George N. Barnard deserves to be ranked in th work in the war’s western theater. A civilian photographer hired by Gen. William
take pictures of fortifications around Atlant them in and around the city in the fall of 18 100 Significant Civil War Photographs: Union Maj. Gen. James B. McPherson’s death in 1864. Thus far, no comprehensive, definitive listin Atlanta Campaign presents a riveting work. The Library of Congress has 130 images; the U Point, New York, has at least 98 photographs, collection of George Barnard’s camera Other repositories, such as the Gilder Lehrma New York City, have smaller collections.
For this book we have chosen a hundred images work. Most of the photographs are from other students may wonder at some of our sele
We hope that this work will stimulate further
Barnardiana, and that other scholarly volumes Barnard’s time in Atlanta, mid-September
Federal occupation of the city. 128 pages, photographs,
advances the scholarly literature of ISBN: 978-1-61850-151-6.
(2001), John Eisenhower (2014) Robert O’Connell (2014), and James McDonough (2016). The last word, from this side of t pond, is, in my opinion, James Lee McDonough’s 816-page William Tecumseh Sherman: In the Service of My Country: A Life. The author of nine books the western theater, McDonough a professor emeritus of histor Auburn University, put his lif time of scholarship behind a n anced analysis of Sherman as a military general and as a note American icon. Readers of Civi War history are without questi blessed to have so much recent scholarship published on one o America’s most gifted military leaders.
Cliff Roberts is the President General Barton and Stovall His & Heritage Association and cothor of Atlanta’s Fighting 42n Joseph Johnston’s “Old Guard”, published by Mercer University Press in 2020.
Directory is out. To view or download a free copy visit:
