Book Reviews

Book Reviews — December 2021

Originally published December 2021 · pp. 40–44

Civil War News book reviews provide our readers with timely analysis of the latest and most significant Civil War research and scholarship. Contact email: [email protected].

Cincinnati’s Role in the Civil War Cincinnati In The Civil War – The Union’s Queen City. By David L. Mowery. 2021, The History Press, Charleston, SC. 319 pp., Softbound. $26.99.

Reviewed by Charles H. Bogart

In 1861, Cincinnati, located on the Ohio River in the southwest corner of Ohio, was one of the United States’ centers of economic power. Cincinnati, the largest city west of the Appalachian Mountains and the seventh largest in the United States, was a hub of transportation, industry, commercial, and financial facilities. The author expands his story of Cincinnati to include both Newport and Covington, Kentucky, located directly across the river from Cincinnati. These two Kentucky cities were tied to Cincinnati by ferry.

While Cincinnati was connected directly to the North by railroads and canals, the city lacked direct rail and water access to the South. A railroad did run south from Covington to Nicholasville, Ky., but ended some 100 miles short of the Tennessee line. Cincinnati thus moved its war supplies, men, and materials to Southern battlefields by boats, which steamed some 200 miles down the Ohio River to junctions with the Cumberland, Tennessee, and Mississippi Rivers and by rail that reached Louisville, Ky., by two indirect routes, both requiring ferries to cross the Ohio River.

Cincinnati was a city of immigrants who valued the Union; they went to war to preserve this Union. The abolition of slavery was not a driving force for men enlisting in Union regiments formed by the citizens of Cincinnati. The city raised not only English speaking but German speaking regiments. Camp Dennison, located some 15 miles outside Cincinnati, became a major army training base. The Cincinnati Maritime Hospital became the keystone of an extensive military hospital complex. Newport Barracks served as a Regular Army recruiting center. A 12-mile ring of fortifications, constructed in Northern Kentucky, protected Cincinnati from Confederate troops advancing north through Kentucky. Twice, in 1862 and in 1863, Confederate soldiers approached the outskirts of Cincinnati but not get into the city.

With the outbreak of the Civil War, Cincinnati went into a steep economic decline that lasted for a few months until War and Navy Department purchase orders flowed into the city. It was then that the economy expanded exponentially. Exports from the city grew from $67,000,000 in 1861 to $293,000,000 in 1865. Cincinnati became a major supplier of western river gunboats to the Union Navy. Among the gunboats she provided were USS Tyler, USS Lexington, and USS Conestoga. Some 2,000 citizens of Cincinnati enlisted in the Union Navy to man them.

The book is full of numerous maps, illustrations, and charts that bring life to the text. One who has never visited Cincinnati will be able to understand the city’s story by consulting them. There is even a list of the ten most popular theatrical performances that played in Cincinnati during the course of the war.

Overall, the book is divided into a main text and five supporting annexes. These five annexes cover 1) warships and transports built, purchased, or fitted out at Cincinnati; 2) the location of Civil War fortifications in and around Cincinnati; 3) Civil War sites within the greater Cincinnati area, including surviving fortifications; 4) Spring Grove Cemetery, the site of a Civil War burial ground and final resting place for many prominent union Civil War soldiers; and 5) a list of military units with a Cincinnati connection.

I am a native of the greater Cincinnati area and considered myself knowledgeable about the area’s Civil War history. The author, within the pages of this book, showed me I am but a novice when it comes to the Civil War history of Cincinnati and surrounding communities. The pages of this book are full of facts of which I was unaware. This book is a must read for anyone interested in the Union home front during the Civil War. It is doubtful that without the industrial and manpower support of Cincinnati the Union Army could have prevailed in the Western Theater. Having said the above, the reviewer must state that the book is but an introduction to Cincinnati in the Civil War. Hopefully, someday someone will write a comprehensive history of Cincinnati during the Civil War.

Charles H. Bogart has a BA from Thomas More University and an MCP from Ohio State University. He is employed as a tour guide at the Fort Boone Civil War Battle Site in Frankfort, Ky., serves as President of the Frankfort Civil War Roundtable, and is a board member of the Kentucky Civil War Roundtable. He has written several books and articles on military and naval history.

Lee: Husband, Father, Friend, and General From Arlington to Appomattox: Robert E. Lee’s Civil War Day by Day, 1861– 1865. By Charles R. Knight. Illustrated, bibliography, index, Savas Beatie Publishers, 2021, 558 pp., hardcover, $39.95. Reviewed by Wayne L. Wolf

What the Lincoln Centennial Association did for Abraham Lincoln, Charles Knight does for Robert E. Lee. By chronicling Lee on a daily basis, he illuminates Lee in his multifaceted roles. As a husband, he advises his wife Mary to relocate to avoid danger, chastises her for requesting commissary stores for her use while his army is starving, directs her to emancipate their slaves, and even recommends a first floor bedroom to ease mobility from her arthritis. As a father, he meets frequently with sons Rooney, Robert, and Custis, uses his influence to arrange an exchange for the captured Rooney, advises his daughters Agnes, Annie, Mary, and Mildred on schooling and household matters, mourns the passing of his daughter-in-law Charlotte, and grieves the loss of his homes at Arlington and White House. He is in fact now a nomad with his homes seized or destroyed, and only a salary in depreciating Confederate currency to support his family. As a friend, Lee takes time to answer letters from neighbors and wives of his soldiers on topics ranging from leaves of absence to knitting socks for his troops. As a commanding general, his correspondence reveals how he planned to defend the South, juggling troops to simultaneously fight in several theatres, solving staff problems (e.g. the feud between Generals Wise and Floyd), and trying to feed, clothe, and arm the Army of Northern Virginia’s fighting men. As the war progresses, the strain on the man becomes ever more burdensome. He is tormented by rheumatism, breaks one wrist and injuries another, is grazed by a bullet, and suffers from a poor diet and little sleep. Yet, he refuses to sleep in fancy homes but utilizes a tent outside as an example to his suffering troops. All these attributes endear him to his men and they exert their all from the boost in morale he provides. Following Lee day by day enables the reader to not only experience the stress and burden of command but to appreciate the man who had to make life and death decisions, not only on the battlefield but for deserters, stragglers, and criminals. His compassionate nature often conflicted with military duty. At the end of the war he had to decide whether to surrender to the inevitable or endorse a guerrilla war where animosity would further degrade the South. He chose peace and solidified his legacy. Charles Knight, both in his eminently readable text and voluminous footnotes gathered from the Official Records to letters and diaries of family and military aides, crafts an indispensable reference that any scholar of Lee or the Civil War will find an invaluable aid in understanding both military strategy and the moral, economic, and political reality of war. This book is highly recommended and should be on the shelf of every Civil War enthusiast. Wayne L. Wolf is Professor Emeritus at South Suburban College and the author or editor of numerous Civil War books and articles including The Last Confederate Scout and Soldiers, Sailors and Scoundrels of the Civil War. He is past president of the Lincoln-Davis Roundtable and specializes in the life of the common soldier.

Cincinnati’s Role in the Civil War that the economy expanded exponentially. Exports from the city grew from $67,000,000 in 1861 to $293,000,000 in 1865. Cincinnati became a major supplier of western river gunboats to the Union Navy. Among the gunboats she provided were USS Tyler, USS Lexington, and USS Conestoga. Some 2,000 citizens of Cincinnati enlisted in the Civil War News book reviews provide our readers with timely Union Navy to man them. The book is full of numerous analysis of the latest and most significant Civil War research and maps, illustrations, and charts scholarship. Contact email: [email protected]. that bring life to the text. One who has never visited Cincinnati will be able to understand the city’s story by consulting them. There is even a list of the ten most popular theatrical performances that played in Cincinnati during the course of the war. Overall, the book is divided into Cincinnati In The Civil War did run south from Covington a main text and five supporting – The Union’s Queen City. By to Nicholasville, Ky., but ended annexes. These five annexes David L. Mowery. 2021, The some 100 miles short of the cover 1) warships and transports History Press, Charleston, SC. Tennessee line. Cincinnati thus built, purchased, or fitted out 319 pp., Softbound. $26.99. moved its war supplies, men, and at Cincinnati; 2) the location of materials to Southern battlefields Civil War fortifications in and Reviewed by Charles H. Bogart by boats, which steamed some around Cincinnati; 3) Civil War 200 miles down the Ohio River to sites within the greater Cincinnati including surviving junctions with the Cumberland, area, Tennessee, and Mississippi fortifications; 4) Spring Grove Rivers and by rail that reached Cemetery, the site of a Civil War Louisville, Ky., by two indirect burial ground and final resting routes, both requiring ferries to place for many prominent union Civil War soldiers; and 5) a list cross the Ohio River. Cincinnati was a city of of military units with a Cincinnati immigrants who valued the connection. Union; they went to war to I am a native of the greater preserve this Union. The Cincinnati area and considered abolition of slavery was not a myself knowledgeable about driving force for men enlisting in the area’s Civil War history. Union regiments formed by the The author, within the pages of citizens of Cincinnati. The city this book, showed me I am but raised not only English speaking a novice when it comes to the but German speaking regiments. Civil War history of Cincinnati Camp Dennison, located some and surrounding communities. 15 miles outside Cincinnati, The pages of this book are full In 1861, Cincinnati, located on became a major army training of facts of which I was unaware. the Ohio River in the southwest base. The Cincinnati Maritime This book is a must read for corner of Ohio, was one of the Hospital became the keystone anyone interested in the Union United States’ centers of economic of an extensive military hospital home front during the Civil power. Cincinnati, the largest complex. Newport Barracks War. It is doubtful that without city west of the Appalachian served as a Regular Army the industrial and manpower Mountains and the seventh recruiting center. A 12-mile ring support of Cincinnati the Union largest in the United States, was of fortifications, constructed in Army could have prevailed in the a hub of transportation, industry, Northern Kentucky, protected Western Theater. Having said the commercial, and financial Cincinnati from Confederate above, the reviewer must state that facilities. The author expands troops advancing north through the book is but an introduction his story of Cincinnati to include Kentucky. Twice, in 1862 and to Cincinnati in the Civil War. both Newport and Covington, in 1863, Confederate soldiers Hopefully, someday someone Kentucky, located directly across approached the outskirts of will write a comprehensive the river from Cincinnati. These Cincinnati but not get into the history of Cincinnati during the two Kentucky cities were tied to city. Civil War. Cincinnati by ferry. With the outbreak of the Civil While Cincinnati was War, Cincinnati went into a steep Charles H. Bogart has a BA from connected directly to the North economic decline that lasted for a Thomas More University and an by railroads and canals, the few months until War and Navy MCP from Ohio State University. city lacked direct rail and water Department purchase orders He is employed as a tour guide at access to the South. A railroad flowed into the city. It was then the Fort Boone Civil War Battle

New angles, new voices in Civil War women’s history The Women’s Fight: The Civil War’s Battles for Home, Freedom, and Nation. By Thavolia Glymph. Photos, notes, index, 379 pp., 2020. UNC Press, www.uncpress.org. $34.95. Reviewed by Brian Matthew Jordan

In this long awaited contribution to the University of North Carolina Press’s Littlefield History of the Civil War Era series, Thavolia Glymph, a professor of history and law at Duke University and a leading authority on slavery and emancipation, offers a stunning reassessment of how women experienced the nation’s defining conflict. Discarding old paradigms and amplifying new voices, Glymph weaves a more complete, more nuanced, and ultimately more human history of the war. Throughout, she is attentive to the diversity and multivocality of women’s experiences. The war brought women together in new combinations, exposing old tensions and hierarchies, but failed to forge a “sisterhood” that could transcend race, class, politics, or section. While historians in recent decades have produced an impressive body of work illuminating the lives of women and building connections between the war’s military and non-military spheres, Glymph argues that a full accounting of women’s participation in the conflict remains elusive. In particular, poor, non-slaveholding white and African American women are neglected in the literature. Rooted in archival spadework and punctuated with keen historiographical insights that will have students of the war nodding and underlining, The Women’s Fight serves up a range of interpretive possibilities. Juxtaposing white and black, rich and poor, northern and southern women, Glymph reveals that the Civil War was not just a contest between men, but “a fight among and between women” as well (15). The book is divided into three sections. The first considers southern women. “The Civil War,” the author writes, “set women across the South in flight” (20). War, occupation, and the collapse of slavery “forced reckonings in the meaning of home that white Southerners had not anticipated” (21). As slaveholding women took to the road and sought refuge from the invading Yankees, they came into close contact with poor women, competing for dwindling food, space, and resources in ways that raised troubling questions about the Confederate experiment. While the war congested the roads with refugees, it nonetheless “enlarged the space for the slaves’ war” and “opened to wider view existing crevices in Southern slave society” (89-90). Black women “fought, prayed, sacrificed, and died” for the Union (88). The second section turns to the experiences of northern women. Glymph reminds the reader that “the vast majority of white Northern women and men neither began nor ended the war as abolitionists, though their ranks grew and deepened over the course of the war” (158). The author tallies the benevolent and relief work of northern women, but without the usual dose of sentimentalism or celebration. Scholars, she argues, have not yet accounted for “the class antagonism and racism that plagued the work” of the United States Sanitary Commission (150). Such assumptions factor into the next chapter, which considers the Northern women who hurried South during the war as missionaries, teachers, and relief workers. Once again, the war brought women together, in this case, Southern black women and white northern abolitionists. Yet they occupied uneven ground. “Refusing a sisterhood of equality with black women,” Glymph concludes, white northern women “helped to refurbish the racial ideology that had defended slavery and would work to constrain black women’s lives for decades to come” (195). The final section explores how women experienced the “hard hand of war.” Excellent, recent books by Stephanie McCurry and Amy Murrell Taylor have tilled some of this ground, but Glymph further dissolves the fictive boundary between the battlefield and home front. In particular, she reminds us that memories of the American Revolution informed southern women’s experiences of military occupation. A wrenching chapter on slave refugee camps recalls the unique path out of bondage for African American women, a path marked by withheld wages, sexualized violence, and attacks from Confederate guerrillas. The bonegrinding toil of black women on behalf of the Union war effort that has remained invisible, but placed emancipation undeniably at the center of the war. The best books raise more questions than they answer. By that measure, The Women’s Fight is a triumph. To its agenda for future research, however, I would add a fuller accounting of the lives of young women, soldiers’ mothers, veterans’ wives, and widows. The author has focused our attention on how antebellum experiences informed wartime actions, but we need much more work on how wartime events shaped postwar lives. Serious students of the war and general readers alike will profit from this major work that boldly reimagines Civil War women’s history as something more than sewing circles, bandage rolling, and relief work. Brian Matthew Jordan teaches Civil War history at Sam Houston State University. His book Marching Home was a finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize in History.

Contentious Relationship between Custer and Merritt The Boy Generals: George Custer, Wesley Merritt, and the Cavalry of the Army of the Potomac. By Adolfo Ovies. Eight maps, 33 images, 384 pp. Savas Beatie, savasbeatie.com. Hardcover, 2021. $34.95. Reviewed by Leon Reed

As the Army of the Potomac was gathering in late June 1863 for its Gettysburg showdown with Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, Brig Gen Alfred Pleasonton, acting commander of the Army of the Potomac’s cavalry corps, reached deep into his ranks and promoted two young captains to the rank of brigadier general: George Armstrong Custer, and Wesley Merritt. Both were given command of brigades, replacing political generals who Pleasonton was dissatisfied with. They served under division commanders Judson Kilpatrick (Custer) and John Buford (Merritt). Merritt and Custer served with distinction for the rest of the Civil War and beyond. This book tells their story, through their years at West Point and the somewhat frustrating early years of the Civil War, and ending with the Battle of Gettysburg. There are plenty of books about cavalry in the Civil War, especially in the Gettysburg Campaign, but this book was a treat to read. It has an excellent discussion of cavalry’s role in McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign. Particularly good is the description of Merritt’s involvement in the bloody repulse at Gaines’s Mill and his baptism into the cesspool of Army of the Potomac politics following the battle. The book also has really clear discussions of how the cavalry fights in northern Virginia at the beginning of the Gettysburg campaign (Brandy Station,

Middleburg, Upperville, etc.) affected the campaign and spurred advancement of the “Boy Generals;” and how the cavalry battles at Hanover and East Cavalry Field tied in with and influenced the outcome of the Gettysburg campaign. Custer and Merritt only occasionally crossed paths during this segment of their careers and didn’t develop the antagonism that defined their relationship until later. Both boy generals were affected by Army of the Potomac politics and both suffered the loss of their mentors in 1862—Merritt when General Phillip St. George Cooke was unfairly blamed, mainly by Fitz John Porter, for the Union defeat at Gaines’s Mill and Custer when McClellan was relieved of command and sent home. In the months before Gettysburg, Custer and Merritt overlapped briefly on Pleasonton’s staff, but Merritt escaped after a few weeks to a job commanding troops. Custer continued on the staff, although frequently inserting himself into action and gaining his daredevil reputation, until the day they were promoted and given brigades. The book also makes you feel you know the two protagonists. Custer in particular comes off as a more complex character than the happy-go-lucky daredevil described in many movies and books. The daredeviltry is there, but he emerges as a smart tactician and a superb manager of troops. Merritt also gets his due and emerges as a solid leader and a tough fighter. There was one thing I wanted much more of. The author introduces the idea that Custer and Merritt represented opposite poles of contending philosophies about the proper use of cavalry and the future equipping and organization of cavalry forces. The book’s dust cover refers to: “… the steadily deteriorating relationship of these two cavalrymen with opposing tactical philosophies … Custer was a hussar – a firm believer in the shock power of the mounted saber charge. Merritt was a dragoon, his tactics rooted in the belief that the purpose of the horse was to transport the trooper to the battlefield, where he could fight dismounted with his carbine. Such diametrically opposed belief systems made a

Rose Greenhow’s My Imprisonment: An Annotated Edition Edited by Emily Lapisardi. Illustrated, photos, notes, index, 398 pp., 2021. Winston Lewis Publishing, https://www.winstonlewis.com/, 2021 Hardbound. $45.00. Reviewed by Juanita Leisch Jensen

Since the Civil War, historians have studied the arms & equipment and the hardtack & coffee minutiae of soldier life, but it is by highlighting the battles & leaders that most people come to understand the bigger picture and overall chronology of this primarily military event. As such, the subject of women’s roles and involvement in the Civil War sometimes encounters a big “so what”? It’s widely acknowledged and easily proven that women provided logistical, moral, medical, monetary, mourning, memorial, social, spiritual, and psychological support for the war effort. So what? In evaluating the importance or impact of women’s roles the most legitimate criteria seems to be whether the soldiers themselves credited the women with making a positive impact on their ability to fight. Fortunately, thousands of contemporary accounts describe the importance and impact of women’s role on soldiers and on units. Historians have found it much more challenging to find similar contemporary accounts documenting roles in which women made a significant difference in a battle, much less an entire campaign. In an effort to write women back into Civil War history, some modern historians celebrate the spouses of military and civilian leaders, but are unable to show many, or any, would have made a similar impact in the absence of their having a personal relationship with the leader. Other historians highlight individual women who served as soldiers, lauding them as prescient supporters and promoters of modern views of feminism. Still others think it remarkable that a few identifiable women in that period might have understood political situations to the point of making insightful, if caustic, comments about personalities and events. Even the most fervent of these historians struggle to find incidents where any of these women made a greater difference to battles or campaigns than to the women themselves. Finally, when historians have found evidence that a woman provided advice that was later followed by military leaders, they struggle to find evidence that the military or political leaders of the time appreciated, much less implemented, advice from a woman. There is, however, one woman who is a notable exception. Rose O’Neal Greenhow was a southern sympathizer and a self-identified spy. She admitted that she ‘used every gift God gave me’ to befriend and charm military and civilian sources in Washington, D.C. Starting in 1861, she arranged to pass valuable and actionable intelligence about planned military and political actions to southern contacts. The efficacy of her clandestine operation was acknowledged during the war, and by the civilian and military leadership of both sides. Rose O’Neal Greenhow made a difference to battles, leaders, and campaigns, and did so as a completely independent woman. Some have asserted that General P. G. T. Beauregard, President Jefferson Davis, and members of his cabinet, including Judah Benjamin and Stephen Mallory, were simply being polite when they praised her efforts as a Southern spy. The same cannot be said of civilian and military leaders on the Union side, including General McClellan, Alan Pinkerton, William H. Seward, and Edwin M. Stanton, all of whom considered her a most dangerous person, and testified to her effectiveness. In 1861 General McLellan complained that her treachery forced him to several times change his plans for the campaign that ultimately resulted in the Battle of Manassas. Officials in the Lincoln cabinet, including Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, and command structure, such as General George B. McClellan, feared she would continue her espionage even if exiled to the South, so they instead took the extraordinary action of imprisoning her in Washington, D.C., for nine months. When she was eventually released, Jefferson Davis personally thanked her for her efforts, and endorsed her selection as a semi-official emissary to undertake a diplomatic mission to Europe on behalf of the Confederate government. During her overseas mission, she met with high-ranking officials in England and France. As noted in the Introduction to Rose Greenhow’s My Imprisonment: An Annotated Edition, Greenhow’s biographer, Ann Blackman, argues that her mission as a female governmental emissary on foreign soil was unprecedented. In France, Emperor Napoleon III granted her a private audience. In England, Edward Smith-Stanley, three times prime minister of the UK, declared her the best diplomatist he had ever seen. While in Europe, Rose published an account of her imprisonment as part of her efforts to encourage England and France to support the Confederacy. Rose drowned during her 1864 return trip to America and was given a funeral with full military honors. Why, you may ask, does she not top every list of the most important /most significant / most honored women of the Confederacy? In large measure it is Rose’ own fault. Hundreds of women wrote diaries, journals, and memoirs focused on their lives and accomplishments; they are rightly lauded for their war-time activities. A small number even gave presentations after the war publicizing their activities. If Rose had named names, she might have had a best seller, but instead she wrote and published an account focused on exposing the wrongs of the Federal government. Her published work was an extension of her mission to generate support in Europe for the south. Rose published her account in England, directing it to a European rather than American audience. Far from being widely read in the U.S., it was a very rare book until digitized and published online by the University of North Carolina. Even then, any juicy and informative bits were virtually inaccessible as Rose peppered her account with so many biblical and classical references, foreign phrases, and allusions to political and military events that the document is extremely difficult to read, much less fully understand. Enter Emily Lapisardi. Emily has studied Rose Greenhow for twenty-four years, immersing herself in Rose’s life through reading, research, and travel. She has also portrayed Rose Greenhow for museums, historical societies, round tables, and educational institutions throughout the U.S., including the International Spy Museum, several National Park Service sites, the Surratt Society, and book launching events for Ann Blackman’s biography, Wild Rose. Emily is currently serving as the Director of Musical Activities for the Catholic Chapel at the United States Military Academy. After spending two decades studying Rose Greenhow’s life, Emily spent three years editing and annotating Rose’s account of her imprisonment. Emily has made Rose’s account not only readable but also understandable. She uses clear and concise footnotes to explain each of hundreds of references to biblical, classical, and foreign words and phrases. In addition, she identifies people Rose has mis-named, mis-identified, or failed to identify by name at all. Emily’s encyclopedic knowledge of Rose’s world, neighborhood, and personality enabled her to provide backstories of people, places, and events that would be entirely lost to most modern readers. In so doing, she reinforces the story of Rose as someone who not only observed, analyzed, and made caustic comments about political and military events, but also took actions supporting her beloved Confederacy. Her espionage network was so effective she was considered an ongoing threat by the highest-ranking general in the Union Army. The Confederacy considered her services so valuable she was compensated considerably more than other spies, the equivalent of about $65,000. Far more than a temptress and amateur spy; she was a valued and respected Confederate asset. The military and civilian leaders of the U.S. government considered her so dangerous that they arrested her on August 23, 1861, and put her under house arrest. Since she continued her espionage while under house arrest, in January

Who was Rose Greenhow?

1862, they moved her to the Old Capitol Prison, a building where she spent part of her childhood. They kept her imprisoned there for an additional five months until she was released and “exiled to Dixie” May 31, 1862. Perhaps they expected her to follow their order to remain in Dixie. She did not. In 1863, Rose embarked on the semiofficial diplomatic mission to Europe where she tried to generate support for and public recognition of the Confederacy and published My Imprisonment. On her return voyage, the blockade-running Condor ran aground a few hundred yards off the North Carolina coast. Rose drowned when she tried to escape capture. She is the only woman granted a funeral with full military honors during the war by the Confederacy. In the study of women’s roles in the Civil War, Rose Greenhow stands alone as an independent woman whose successful espionage efforts were acknowledged by the civilian and military leaders of both sides and as the first independent woman sent on a diplomatic mission by an American president. We owe a debt of gratitude to Emily Lapisardi for making Rose Greenhow’s account of her wartime activities both readable and understandable. Emily’s book and Rose’s account give us, at long last, an example of an independent woman who made a significant difference to the ‘battles and leaders’ of the Civil War. This book is a must-have and must-read for anyone interested in women and their roles in the Civil War. Reviewer Juanita Leisch Jensen is a Fellow and former Governor of the Company of Military Historians, and a past president of the Society for Women and the Civil War. She is the author of Who Wore What and An Introduction to Civil War Civilians.

The Seven Days that would led to important battles

Decisions of the Seven Days: The Sixteen Critical Decisions That Defined the Battles. By Matt Spruill. Maps, photos, notes, index, 212 pp., 2021. The University of Tennessee Press. www.utpress.org. $29.95.

Reviewed by David Galli, MD

In the spring of 1862, at the little-remembered Battle of Fair Oaks, Confederate General Joseph Johnston suffered a grisly leg wound. Who would replace this West Point educated leader of the army assigned to defend the rebel capital of Richmond? This was one of many “critical decisions” that would develop into the Seven Days battles, a struggle fought in a compact zone of eastern Virginia, leading to roughly 35,000 casualties. The battles destroyed Union Major General George McClellan’s Peninsula Campaign and efforts to bypass Confederate defenses, capture Richmond, and end the Civil War. McClellan would forever be disgraced, and the legend of Confederate General Robert E. Lee would be born. Matt Spruill is a retired U.S. Army colonel and historian. He has an impressive series of “Critical Decision” themed books on the Civil War. He also has no doubt the added joy of researching his works with his sons, themselves scholars of Civil War military history. This is a fantastic addition to that collection.

While many readers skip over a preface and dive into chapter one of a book, Spruill did not do this. He explains the layout of the book, and what differentiates decisions, of which there are thousands in a battle, into what makes one “critical.” This is not a blow-by-blow account of the Seven Days, though Spruill does a nice job of relaying the events in a concise and engaging way. The methodology of Spruill’s work presents a situation, options left to officers or politicians, final decisions, and the consequent results and impact on the later war. In one example of first presenting a situation: Lee and his army were mauled at the Battle of Malvern Hill. The Confederates lost almost 30% of their total forces in one attempt to repulse the Union Army. McClellan gained the upper hand and was in position to make a critical decision; his options are reviewed. He can remain in place and let a reckless Lee keep attacking and bleeding his army white. McClellan himself can counterattack; or the Northern forces can retreat to safety, despite being comfortably entrenched against a weakened foe. McClellan, burdened with a sad personality flaw, took the cautious approach and retreated, with the result being a loss of faith by many of his subordinate officers, as well as deflating the fighting will of his army. Other critical decisions, sixteen in all, look backward well ahead of the Peninsula’s battles, as well as going forward to the final point after fighting ceased and Major General Henry Halleck, Generalin-Chief of Union forces, gave the final decision to evacuate the Army of the Potomac to Washington. Criticism by Spruill is rare as he remains a detached and cool storyteller and interpreter of events. But McClellan rightfully makes an easy target as a cautious man characterized by battlefield victory followed by retreat.

Lee is aggressive, focused on a strategic goal of ridding threats to

Richmond even at high cost, and at times seemingly impetuous in his desire to keep pushing a timid opponent into fighting.

Around one third of the text is dedicated to an appendix. Again, readers often skip this part of a book, but Spruill uses this as a modern guide to the battlefields of the Seven Days. Touring battlefields can be perplexing and frustrating. Old landmarks are missing, or the peace and imagination experienced while strolling hallowed ground, often through areas now overrun by major roads, cars, homes, and businesses, makes the experience seem inauthentic. Spruill tries to give the reader a guide for appreciating the flavor of the carnage, and make sense of the critical decisions, in light of the modern layout. The appendix also includes primary source material, giving a sense of the confusion, doubts, and gruesomeness. The Seven Days battles would never receive the fame of the great

Civil War battles of Gettysburg,

Shiloh, or Antietam but the critical decisions set off a domino effect that would impact the years of fighting ahead, characterized by Confederate boldness, along with Union vacillation, swapping in and out commanders until finally settling on the genius of Lieutenant General Ulysses Grant. A blueprint of how the war in the Eastern Theater would be waged was firmly established in this fascinating and awful week of the summer of 1862,

Spruill’s book is an excellent guide for its understanding.

David Galli, MD is a physician, clash inevitable.” I opened this book looking forward to an extended discussion of these issues. I thought the rivalry between the two would make for good fun, but what I really hoped for was an extended discussion of the parameters of the debate and perhaps how it echoed through the years even into the transition to tank warfare. So were the advocates of using tanks primarily as infantry support and antitank weapons the 20th century dragoons? Were the advocates of slashing armored breakouts the hussars? Of course, this book is a stagesetter, part 1 of a three-part story. Later volumes will discuss the service of Merritt and Custer, presumably starting with the Battle of Monterey Pass and the rest of Lee’s retreat, then the Overland Campaign, and with fAdmission Coupon f O $1 To Any MKShows Event

Sheridan in the Shenandoah Valley; the growing rivalry and hard feelings between the two; the further development of their philosophies; and the echo of their dispute down through the ages. Even lacking the drama of the Custer-Merritt war for the army’s soul, Boy Generals is a fine book on its own merits. It’s an excellent description of the Civil War cavalry and an outstanding profile of two of its most important leaders. I’m looking forward to the next volumes of this story. Reed is a former U.S. Senate aide and U.S. history teacher. He lives in Gettysburg and is the author of No Greater Calamity for the Country: North-South Conflict, Secession, and the Onset of Civil War (2019).