Thomas J. Ryan’s Top Ten Civil War Books

Originally published November 2020 · pp. 14–15

Thomas J. Ryan’s Top Ten Civil War Books Because of my long experience and interest in the gathering and application of intelligence during wartime, a number of my top ten fall into this general category. Others are classics that would make many top ten lists, while still others reflect an interest in biography and fiction. My list includes: 1. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era by James M. McPherson. Ballantine Books, 1988. This comprehensive analysis was one of the first books I read about the Civil War. It awakened an interest in that era, and a desire to visit the battlefields. 2. Come Retribution: The Confederate Secret Service and the Assassination of Lincoln by William A. Tidwell with James O. Hall and David Winfred Gaddy. University Press of Mississippi, 1988. At the time this book was published, I was working in the same office at the National Security Agency with one of the authors, David Winfred Gaddy. I purchased a copy from him after he gave a speech about the book in the NSA auditorium. I had an intense interest in the intelligence aspects of this wartime period. 3. The Secret War for the Union: The Untold Story of Military Intelligence in the Civil War by Edwin C. Fishel. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1996. Like Dave Gaddy, Ed Fishel also worked at NSA, and, at the time, I was aware he was working on a book that focused on Northern intelligence operations, just as “Come Retribution” had dealt with Southern intelligence operations. I purchased a copy of this book when it was first published in 1996, and it serves as a foundation for my own extensive investigation and publication of books and articles dealing with Civil War intelligence operations. 4. The Gettysburg Campaign: A Study in Command by Edwin B. Coddington. Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1968. Upon a number of visits to the Gettysburg battlefield in the 1990’s, I became a member of Friends of the National Parks at Gettysburg (later known as the Gettysburg Foundation), and began to acquire publications dealing with the Gettysburg Campaign. One of the first books I read was

Coddington’s, and it was a good launching point for many other books about the battle in that small Pennsylvania town. 5. Gettysburg by Stephen W. Sears. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003. At the time this book was published, Coddington’s book had become somewhat dated, and Sears’ “Gettysburg” was the perfect update to that battle’s story. In particular, Sears used Fishel’s “The Secret War for the Union” as a source, and, therefore, introduced many people in the Gettysburg community to the intelligence operations conducted by the Army of the Potomac’s Bureau of Military Information. This was a major enhancement of Coddington’s version of the Gettysburg campaign. 6. Grant’s Secret Service: The Intelligence War from Belmont to Appomattox by William B. Feis. University of Nebraska Press, 2002. Undoubtedly, this is one of the best books written about Civil War intelligence operations, and, perhaps, one of the most overlooked Civil War books in general. It is a deeply-researched rendition of how Ulysses S. Grant pioneered employment of intelligence operations out west, and continued to benefit from Col. George H. Sharpe’s Bureau of Military Information when he came east as General in Chief of the Union armies. Grant would be the first to admit that his success in combat operations depended heavily on the amount of information collected and provided to him by his intelligence staff about the disposition, strength, and intentions of the enemy forces. 7. Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: the True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, A Union Agent in the Heart of the Confederacy by Elizabeth R. Varon. Oxford University Press, 2003. This story brings to light a clandestine operation based in Richmond that provided Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and his forces a steady flow of information about the strength, movements, and logistics of Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia while it was under siege in the Petersburg/Richmond area in 1864/65. Those conducting these spying operations were pro-Union Southerners and slaves, the latter often acting as messengers carrying information from inside Richmond to Union positions in the surrounding area. A prominent member of Richmond society, Elizabeth Van Lew, played the key role in orchestrating this espionage ring. 8. Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Simon & Schuster, 2005. One of the best biographies I’ve read about President Abraham Lincoln as seen through the eyes of those who worked closely with him during the Civil War. It captures the personality and talent of these brilliant men, as well as the intrigue inherent in a politically disparate group attempting to work together to save the country from destruction. 9. Cold Mountain: A Novel by Charles Frazier. Atlantic Monthly Press, 1997. This is one of my favorite novels about the Civil War. A story about a Southern soldier who has experienced the trauma of war, and deserts from a hospital after surviving a bloody battle in Virginia. The story revolves around his attempt to make it back to his home in the mountains of western North Carolina and the strange mixture of people he comes in contact with along the way. A brilliant, haunting rendition. Cold Mountain won the National Book Award for Fiction. 10. Major General George H. Sharpe and the Creation of American Military Intelligence in the Civil War by Peter G. Tsouras. Casemate Publishers, 2018. In the field of Civil War biography, this is one of the best I’ve read. Peter Tsouras, who spent his career in military and civilian intelligence operations, brings alive George Sharpe’s role as the Army of the Potomac’s intelligence chief beginning with the 1863 battle at Chancellorsville, through Petersburg/Richmond, to Appomattox. This book portrays the contribution intelligence operations made during the last two years of the war, and, in particular, highlights Grant’s siege and victory over Lee that brought the war to an end. Thomas J. Ryan’s publications include Lee is Trapped and Must be Taken: Eleven Fateful Days after Gettysburg, July 4-14, 1863 (with co-author Richard R. Schaus). It won the Edwin C. Bearss

Scholarly Research Award, and the Mahoning Valley Civil War Round Table Scholarship Award. He also authored 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. It won the Gettysburg Civil War Round Table Distinguished Book Award, and the Bachelder-Coddington Literary Award. He served 38 years in the United States Army and the U.S. Department of Defense in various intelligence-related capacities. He and his wife live in Bethany Beach, Delaware.