Technology and Humanity in the Civil War: An Illustrated Journey
Reviewed by Wayne L. Wolf
The Civil War neophyte and reader just being introduced to the men, material, medicine, and individual trauma of the Civil War will find this small volume both informational and historically sound. It is voluminously illustrated, covering the Civil War from the initial enthusiasm of enlistment, through the realization of what “seeing the elephant” really meant for the individual soldier. It includes chapters on the soldier’s camp life, the organization of the Southern army, weapons of war, caring for the dead and wounded, naval warfare, prisoners of war, and the hardships faced by soldiers returning home.
Particularly helpful to the new Civil War buff is a glossary of terms emanating from the war as well as a section on how to research your Civil War ancestor. Another useful addition is a state-by-state listing of some more prominent Civil War sites in each state one may wish to visit. In total, this small volume illustrates the Civil War from its inception through the final surrenders and provides a starting point for new historians to further their research.
My only suggestions for improvement would be to increase the size and/or clarity of many of the photographs. This would have allowed the author an opportunity to explain many nuances that remain hidden in the small, dark, and occasional grainy photos. Also, a helpful addition to the appendices would be hours open, phone numbers, and resources available. Despite these shortcomings, the book is recommended for those just entering on a study of the Civil War as it provides a good overview of the men and machines that fought America’s most divisive war.
Wayne L. Wolf is Professor Emeritus at South Suburban College and the author of twenty books on the Civil War including The Last Confederate Scout and Two Years Before the Paddlewheel. He is past president of the Lincoln- Davis Civil War Roundtable.
A Yankee Regiment in Confederate Louisiana: The 31st Massachusetts Infantry in the Gulf South. By Larry Lowenthal. Hardcover. Maps, notes, bibliography, index, 398 pp. Louisiana State University Press. lsupress.org, 2019. www.lsupress.org. Hardcover, $48.
Reviewed by Robert L. Durham
The 31st Massachusetts Infantry was born in controversy on Nov. 20, 1861. The founder of the 31st was Benjamin Franklin Butler, who also organized other Massachusetts regiments in the hope of their being united as a brigade, with Butler as commander, and a general. Unfortunately, Massachusetts Governor John A. Andrew had other uses in mind for the 31st. Andrew wanted control of the regiments Butler raised, using them to make up the Massachusetts quota.
Andrew also wanted to defend his prerogative of having the right to promote officers of his own choosing while Butler, naturally, wanted to promote his own. This disagreement thrust the regiment squarely into the middle of political controversy before their Civil War adventure began and delayed their starting for the front. Eventually, President Lincoln decided he could not risk losing the support of Butler, one of the few democrats who supported the war, so he promoted Butler to brigadier general with the right to choose his own officers.
Butler was a notorious and a divisive Union general, earning a nickname among southern secessionists as “Beast” Butler, and a reputation among his superiors as a sub-par general. However, he always looked out for his men, securing their affection and loyalty, feelings that never left them. In A Yankee Regiment, Larry Lowenthal lays the groundwork for the birth and unusual career of the 31st Massachusetts, known as the “Western Bay State Regiment.”
When the 31st eventually left Massachusetts, they endured a rough sea voyage, in the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico, until they finally landed on Ship Island, off the Mississippi coast. There, they prepared and trained for an attack on New Orleans, which was taken by the Union Navy under Admiral David Glasgow Farragut. On May 1, 1862, the 31st was the first Union regiment to enter the city they spent many months garrisoning.
In December 1862, Butler was replaced by General Nathaniel P. Banks. Their first campaign under Banks was the Teche Campaign. This consisted of fruitlessly pursuing Confederate troops under General Richard Taylor through Louisiana. In May and July 1863, the 31st participated in the Siege
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On Dec. 9, 1863, the regiment became a cavalry regiment. It was now, officially, the 6th Massachusetts Cavalry but no one paid much attention to the re-designation and it was still known to everyone as the 31st. Before the end of its service, the regiment was consolidated into five companies making the regiment a battalion. The regiment would be changed from cavalry to mounted infantry and back again. The shifts consisted only of trading in their rifles for carbines when they became cavalry and vice versa when they became mounted infantry. Their duties remained basically the same.
In 1864, the 31st took part in Banks’ Red River Campaign. The last major campaign they shared in was the 1865 siege of Mobile, Ala., in 1865. When the war finally ended, the 31st remained on duty until September.
Lowenthal has done a masterful job of describing the inner workings of the 31st Massachusetts Infantry from November 1861 to September 1865. Born amid political turmoil, the regiment continued to experience internal discord throughout its service. This is an interesting volume, replete with fascinating facts about the unusual career of a Yankee regiment. They served in a relatively unknown theater of the war.
Robert L. Durham has been a history buff for some sixty-five years. He is retired and is currently back in school to get his history degree. His main interests are the Civil War and old West history, but lately he has been broadening his horizons into WWII and the Korean War. He has written numerous articles for Military Heritage magazine.
A Civil Life in an Uncivil Time: Julia Wilbur’s Struggle for Purpose. By Paula Tarnapol Whitacre. Illustrated, notes, Bibliography, Index, Potomac Books, An Imprint of the University of Nebraska Press, 2017, 291 pp., $22.95 softcover. Reviewed by Wayne L. Wolf
Julia Wilbur was a spinster from Rochester, N.Y., whose early life consisted of teaching, caring for family members, and dabbling in the abolitionist movement. From the age of 29 when she began teaching until she arrived in Alexandria, Va., at 47, she kept an extensive diary of her life to which she added until her death at age 80. Her early diary entries evidenced a woman searching for meaning to her life. She supported the Temperance Movement, attended lectures by notables Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison, advocated women’s issues like equal pay and voting rights, but did not wholeheartedly embrace any of these issues as her mission in life.
That all changed in 1862 when she volunteered with the Rochester Ladies Anti-Slavery Society for an assignment in Alexandria, Va., ministering to the needs of newly freed slaves. The Civil War transformed Julia into an advocate for the thousands of contrabands flooding Union lines in Alexandria. For the next four years Julia struggled with the demands of her new vocation. She saw the misery confronting newly freed people and sought to alleviate their suffering. She lived in cramped quarters near the contraband camps, solicited help and supplies from military authorities, fought corrupt administrators, begged Northern connections for money and clothing, and strongly supported the policies of the Lincoln administration.
Julia had found her calling in life. She became the first white woman in Alexandria to labor on behalf of freed people. Her commitment was total. She socialized with free blacks, prayed with them, and became their friends and colleague for the rest of her life. Most importantly she made a change in their lives, helping them in the first months of their transition to freedom, visiting them in hospitals and their homes, dispensing clothing and food, and advocating their fair treatment.
After the Civil War, Julia spent four years working for the Freedman’s Bureau and continuing her quest to end inequality. The next 25 years saw her working as a clerk in the Patent Office while continuing to help her sister and niece financially, attending lectures and social events, travelling, and taking up the cause of women’s rights. Yet it was her service to the contraband community and soldiers recuperating in Alexandria’s hospitals that defined her extraordinary life.
Paula Whitacre does a commendable job of weaving together the diary entries of Julia with historical events, social trends, and political roadblocks to equality that defined the Civil War and Reconstruction. What she has achieved is a well-researched and timely novel that serves as one woman’s story of finding herself in helping others less fortunate. The historian interested in social history this book should be added to their library.
Wayne L. Wolf is Professor Emeritus at South Suburban College and the author of numerous books and articles on the Civil War, particularly focused on the life of the common soldier. He is past president of the Lincoln- Davis Civil War Roundtable.
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Hardship, Greed, and Sorrow–An Officer’s Photo Album of 1866 New Mexico Territory. Devorah Romanek. Photos, notes, bibliography, index, 165 pp., 2019. University of Oklahoma Press, www.oupress.com. $29.95 Reviewed by Tom Elmore
To say that the Civil War and Reconstruction west of the Mississippi River have not gotten their due is an understatement. While several good books have been written dealing with this aspect of the war, they are few and far between.
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Mexico architect bought it from some New York rare book dealers. What happened to it between 1866 and its purchase is still a mystery. It was then donated to a Santa Fe archive. It is now a part of the Palace of the Governors Photo Archives. Though many of the images have appeared in other books, this is the first time the whole collection has been presented.
The images are arranged thematically and start with ousted Mexican President Benito Juārez and members of his cabinet. Subsequent images include U.S. Army officers, the town of Santa Fe, and the army posts Fort Union and Fort Summer in New Mexico, and El Paso, Texas. Most powerful are the images of the Navaho. These are the oldest known photographs of the tribe’s members. The looks in the Navaho’s faces tell the story of a proud people now subjugated. In their eyes one can easily see looks of despair, anger, and defiance.
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Whoever took these photos did an amazing job, especially given the harsh conditions they worked in. The strength of the images is that they show real life, something rarely shown in Hollywood westerns.
The book is accompanied by a number of essays that give proper context and background on the photos. One essay tries to solve the matter of who took the photos, and makes a very good case for who did it.
For those interested in any aspect of western United States history, this is an excellent book to add to your collection.
Tom Elmore’s interest in western history was whetted when he spent a summer on the staff of Philmont Scout Ranch in Cimarron, New Mexico.
Since 1955 Maryland Timonium, MD
42 “the U.S Civil War did not dramatically change the British Army…”
Bull Run To Boer War: How the American Civil War Changed the British Army. By Michael Somerville. Photos, footnotes, bibliography, index. 384 pp. Maps. 2019, softcover. Helion and Company. www.helion.co.uk. $43.34.
Reviewed by John Michael Priest
I requested this book because, having never studied the war from a European perspective, the title intrigued me. The major purpose of this hefty, thoroughly documented, and researched book is to examine how much the American Civil War influenced the British Army up through the Boer War and to decide whether the British Army has been justifiably criticized for not adapting its tactics to meet those of 20th Century warfare. The author meticulously assessed four major topics that British officers reported upon while acting as observers in both armies: Artillery and Engineers; Cavalry, Infantry, and Aeronauts. Overall the British Army selectively adopted and adapted tactics from the Crimean War, the U.S. Civil War, the Austrian Wars, and the Franco- Prussian War to suit their needs in the various types of fighting that occurred within their empire, while not necessarily using them in regard to the professional army involved in a “civilized” war on the European Continent.
By examining the American Civil War through the writings of contemporary British military observers, Mr. Somerville clarifies the influence the American Civil War upon the British military. The observers did write about and discuss their observations and suggested changes to the British system but did not particularly change operation of the established British Regular Army. The high command viewed the American Army much like a colonial or yeoman militia force comprised of non-professional soldiers who fought well but did not use cavalry very effectively. The Americans fought more like mounted infantry whenever possible but were not true cavalrymen. They used too much antiquated smoothbore artillery and were reluctant to switch to breech loading rifles. They often fought bloody battles without decisive victories.
To their credit, American engineers developed rifle pits, good skirmish tactics, and a balloon corps, which they did not properly utilize. The British actually, through observing the Franco- Prussian War and other European conflicts, had started to adopt more modern weapons, including machine guns well ahead of the United States.
The book, I believe, illustrates, in part, the difference between an isolationist United States and a nation involved in imperialism long before the United States existed. The United States did not become a global player until the Spanish American War. During the Civil War, Britain and, probably the rest of Europe, viewed the United States as a provincial country that the military establishment could supply with its military surplus while it modernized.
Bull Run To Boer War: How the American Civil War Changed the British Army thoroughly explains how the U.S. Civil War did not dramatically change the British Army as has been previously believed. This objective study places the impact of the Civil War upon the British Empire in a new perspective.
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Jefferson Davis, Napoleonic France, and the Nature of Confederate Ideology, 1815–1870. By Jeffrey Zvengrowski.Notes, index, 355 pp., Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, LA, $55.
Reviewed by Thomas J. Ryan
Once the United States became engulfed in the Civil War in April 1861 over the fundamental issue of slavery expansion into the western territories, the burden of leadership fell on Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, and Jefferson Davis, President of the newly formed Confederate States. Davis brought with him years of experience as a public servant in congressional, senatorial, and governmental administrative positions. Over time he also developed a political philosophy resembling the ideology of the French emperor, Napoleon III.
As Jeffrey Zvengrowski describes in this illuminating study, Davis looked to France, not only as a model for the political agenda he desired to implement, but for diplomatic and substantive support in the effort to sustain a vulnerable nascent Confederacy against Northern resistance to secession. Davis’s viewpoints about the French governing philosophy date from his earliest days of involvement in the military and political arena.
The author describes the motivating force behind Davis’s early participation in the U.S. political process as a desire to prevent “treasonous Anglophile Republican abolitionists from perverting the federal government to impose inequality among whites and racial equality across the Union.” Davis and his fellow Democrats viewed themselves as “conservatives” who were preserving “the true nature of the American nation.” As a result, in searching for an ally to help sustain the breakaway states, Davis looked to the French rather than the British, because the latter espoused “white inequality as well as racial equality,”—both inimical to Davis’s outlook on life.
Zvengrowski lays the groundwork with a look at a “pro-Bonaparte Democratic tradition” in the U.S. espoused by Southern luminary John C. Calhoun who reformed West Point’s curriculum along Napoleonic lines in the early 19th century. Calhoun, a slave holder and hard taskmaster, mentored Davis in opposition to the British attempt to “promote racially egalitarian abolitionism in the Americas.” Davis, labeled a “disciple” of Calhoun, claimed the political mantle of “that distinguished statesman” in the 1850’s by urging the South toward industrial and agricultural development, and called for slaves to be employed in factories and mines. Davis also espoused U.S. expansion through acquisition of Cuba and the Yucatan Peninsula.
Years prior to the Civil War, Davis warned against Northern abolitionism that he predicted would lead to shedding blood. As Secretary of War in the Pierce Administration, he advocated moving Indians to western lands and developing transcontinental railroads to help stabilize control of California threatened by the British who were seeking to dominate commerce in the Pacific. However, he opposed reopening the international slave trade that would cause the country to be “overrun with the African race.” Davis and his supporters did not help the Northern Democratic candidate for president in 1860, Stephen A. Douglas, which led to Republican victory and “destruction” of the Union.
The author addresses Davis’s preference for the politics of Napoleon III’s France, particularly favoring “white equality and supremacy.” Yet, Davis denounced the “outrages” of the French Jacobins, who were on the far left politically, and French intrusion in the Americas while, at the same time, they were promising to respect the Monroe Doctrine. However, those of French descent living in Louisiana, supported the growing power of France.
Zvengrowski goes into considerable detail about French influence in the U.S. leading up to the Civil War and its impact on Davis’s political leanings, and addresses the issues involving white supremacy and equality among whites in the Confederacy that became more problematical after
Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. Yet, as the war turned in favor of the North, Davis had to deal with the sensitive issues of organizing “corps of negroes” initially as laborers for military purposes, with later consideration given to employing them in combat and awarding freedom, but not equality, for their service to the Confederacy.
Along the way, Davis solicited Napoleon III’s help in his struggle to prevent the Confederacy’s destruction. The French foresaw potential for monopolizing global cotton exports through an alliance with the South, along with commercial advantages in its competition with Great Britain and other European countries. Davis also cheered when the French captured the border town of Matamoros, Mexico, opening a trading port for the South that was otherwise hampered by the Northern blockade of its Atlantic and Gulf ports.
The author writes about the intricacies and intrigues on the international scene as France competes with Great Britain, and Russia plays a role as well by aiding the U.S. blockade of the South. Davis’s attempt to gain recognition from France and/or England is another topic of discussion, while diplomatic complications arise when the Confederacy contracts for construction of warships and sale of munitions and other products from European countries.
As the Confederacy’s hope for success against the Northern forces faded in late 1864 and early 1865, Davis had to face reality. His desire for French intervention on the Confederacy’s behalf never materialized, and France lost its hold on Mexico in 1866. Although from the North’s perspective, Napoleon III had been “fully in sympathy with the Rebellion,” this sympathy never translated into substantial support. As a result, Davis, became a man without a country after the American Civil War ended, decided against being a resident of France which, in his eyes, was in decline and its citizens reminded him of “our neglected braves and their unprovided orphans” in the South.
Jeffrey Zvengrowski closes with a summation of the complex events leading to and during the American Civil War with European countries, especially France and Britain, playing key roles. Davis, as a disciple of Calhoun, believed that the Union would achieve its “Manifest Destiny” by forging an alliance with France against Great Britain. While Davis supported the French incursion in Mexico to restore white rule in that country, France denied diplomatic recognition that may have facilitated the Confederacy’s independence from the North.
Jefferson Davis, Napoleonic France, and the Nature of Confederate Ideology, 1815– 1870 is an intensely-researched tour de force that enhances our understanding of both the motivation for Southern secession from the Union, and Jefferson Davis’s political philosophy that was opposed by many citizens, not only
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Living by Inches: The Smells, Sounds, Tastes, and Feeling of Captivity in Civil War Prisons. By Evan A. Kutzler. Photos, notes, index, 208 pp., 2019. University of North Carolina Press, www.uncpress.org. Softcover, $29.95. Reviewed by Ken Williams
As I sit here writing this review, we are in the midst of a pandemic where we are all being urged to wash our hands as often as possible. But imagine not being able to wash not just your hands but everything, body, clothes. Imagine a stench you can smell miles away and that permeates your existence. Imagine hunger that haunts your dreams, if you can sleep.
Evan Kutzler, assistant professor of history at Georgia Southwestern State University, brings this all to light in unsettling but fascinating detail in his in the North, but in the South as well. Be forewarned, this is a meticulous study with multifaceted themes, but the resilient reader will be rewarded.
Thomas J. Ryan is author of the multiple award-winning books ‘Lee is Trapped and Must Be Taken’: Eleven Fateful Days after Gettysburg, July 4-14, 1863 (with co-author Richard R. Schaus), and Spies, Scouts, and Secrets in the Gettysburg Campaign: How the Critical Role of Intelligence Impacted the Outcome of Lee’s Invasion of the North, June-July 1863.
work on the sensory experience of Civil War soldiers both North and South. Working from a basis in sensory history, the author weaves a narrative drawn largely from diaries kept and letters often never mailed. This gives it more of the immediacy we desire than relying on memoirs written sometimes decades after the war which either gloss over the difficulties or magnify them out of proportion.
Kutzler also gives us a sense of what it meant to be a man, or sometimes a woman, in 19th century America. Unlike many preconceptions, cleanliness was often seen as next to godliness; the lack of it in others, and worse, ultimately the lack of it for oneself was an experience that scarred immediately, and for many, permanently as well. I find that perhaps those boys of ’61 were not all that different in their attitudes toward cleanliness from many of us today.
As our nation struggles to manage a crippling outbreak, I take heart in that I am not “Living by Inches.” Highly, highly recommend this book.
Kenneth D. Williams is a graduate of Gettysburg College and West Virginia University. He was a park ranger at Gettysburg National Historic Site and is a long-time student of the American Civil War. He is currently a Museum Educator at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, an UNESCO World Heritage property.
German Americans on the Middle Border: From Antislavery to Reconciliation 1830–1877. By Zachary Stuart Garrison. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. 213 pp., 2020. Southern Illinois University Press. www.siupress.com. Softcover. $30.
It is a joy to discover in the first few pages of a book that the author is taking you on a journey to an area that has not been part of your previous studies. This reader had preconceived thoughts about the German population that settled in central or western Pennsylvania or eastern Ohio. This background led me to picture a population of non-violent, politically inactive families making their living off the land and not playing any active part in this time period.
Garrison captured my attention in the introduction and had me sitting up straighter as I turned the pages. Highlighter in hand and also marking pages with paper slips, I slipped deeply into a
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study of political ideology shaping an area unsure of its own identity.
The German Americans came in large numbers to work the lands opening up to settlement in the Midwest.
Their reasons for leaving the old country did not blend well with the culture of a slave holding society. Garrison does a good job pointing out how this difference led to many actions and reactions. Formation of the Republican Party was helped by the liberal convictions of the new German American citizens. Guerilla warfare in many cases was directed at these new residents leading many to enlist to fight for freedoms they were denied in Europe.
Garrison’s deep research behind the points he makes leads the reader to an understanding of not what happened but why. This is not just a history book but one that could be used in political science or sociological studies. The book follows the trends of the
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population changes pre and post war. Radical Republicanism later turning to a more moderate approach during the Reconstruction is well explained in these pages about a region that is somewhat ignored in many Civil War publications.
Civil War Roundtables in the Missouri, Kentucky, Southern Illinois, and Indiana areas would find Garrison’s work a fascinating topic to discuss. Non-Civil War students would find this book interesting in dealing with how cultural migration affected areas in the American political thought.
I recommend this book for Civil War enthusiasts. It is refreshing to read about the deeds of the German American soldiers beyond the Eleventh Corps.
Mike Shovlin is a graduate of Westminster College where he majored in history. He is currently the lead at the Rupp House History Center for the Gettysburg Foundation.