Download or read book Grant Invades Tennessee written by Timothy B. Smith and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2021-10-29 with total page 536 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When General Ulysses S. Grant targeted Forts Henry and Donelson, he penetrated the Confederacy at one of its most vulnerable points, setting in motion events that would elevate his own status, demoralize the Confederate leadership and citizenry, and, significantly, tear the western Confederacy asunder. More to the point, the two battles of early 1862 opened the Tennessee River campaign that would prove critical to the ultimate Union victory in the Mississippi Valley. In Grant Invades Tennessee, award-winning Civil War historian Timothy B. Smith gives readers a battlefield view of the fight for Forts Henry and Donelson, as well as a critical wide-angle perspective on their broader meaning in the conduct and outcome of the war. The first comprehensive tactical treatment of these decisive battles, this book completes the trilogy of the Tennessee River campaign that Smith began in Shiloh and Corinth 1862, marking a milestone in Civil War history. Whether detailing command-level decisions or using eye-witness anecdotes to describe events on the ground, walking readers through maps or pulling back for an assessment of strategy, this finely written work is equally sure on matters of combat and context. Beginning with Grant's decision to bypass the Confederates' better-defended sites on the Mississippi, Smith takes readers step-by-step through the battles: the employment of a flotilla of riverine war ships along with infantry and land-based artillery in subduing Fort Henry; the lesser effectiveness of this strategy against Donelson's much stronger defense, weaponry, and fighting forces; the surprise counteroffensive by the Confederates and the role of their commanders' incompetence and cowardice in foiling its success. Though casualties at the two forts fell far short of bloodier Civil War battles to come, the importance of these Union victories transcend battlefield statistics. Grant Invades Tennessee allows us, for the first time, to clearly see how and why.
Download or read book Forts Henry and Donelson The Key to the Confederate Heartland written by Benjamin Franklin Cooling and published by Univ. of Tennessee Press. This book was released on 1989 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Where the South Lost the War written by Kendall D. Gott and published by Stackpole Books. This book was released on 2011-07-20 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With the collapse of the Confederate defenses at Forts Henry and Donelson, the entire Tennessee Valley was open to Union invasion and control.
Download or read book Fort Donelson s Legacy written by Benjamin Franklin Cooling (III) and published by Univ. of Tennessee Press. This book was released on 1997 with total page 442 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Fort Donelson's Legacy portrays the tapestry of war and society in the upper southern heartland of Tennessee and Kentucky after the key Union victories at Forts Henry and Donelson in February 1862. Those victories, notes Benjamin Franklin Cooling, could have delivered the decisive blow to the Confederacy in the West and ended the war in that theater. Instead, what followed was terrible devastation and bloodshed that embroiled soldier and civilian alike. Cooling compellingly describes a struggle that was marked not only by the movement of armies and the strategies of generals but also by the rise of guerrilla bands and civil resistance. It was, in part, a war fought for geography - for rivers and railroads and for strategic cities such as Nashville, Louisville, and Chattanooga. But it was also a war for the hearts and minds of the populace ... In exploring the complex terrain of 'total war' that steadily engulfed Tennessee and Kentucky, Cooling draws on a huge array of sources, including official military records and countless diaries and memoirs. He makes considerable use of the words of participants to capture the attitudes and concerns of those on both sides."--Dust jacket.
Download or read book War on the Waters written by James M. McPherson and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2012-09-17 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although previously undervalued for their strategic impact because they represented only a small percentage of total forces, the Union and Confederate navies were crucial to the outcome of the Civil War. In War on the Waters, James M. McPherson has crafted an enlightening, at times harrowing, and ultimately thrilling account of the war's naval campaigns and their military leaders. McPherson recounts how the Union navy's blockade of the Confederate coast, leaky as a sieve in the war's early months, became increasingly effective as it choked off vital imports and exports. Meanwhile, the Confederate navy, dwarfed by its giant adversary, demonstrated daring and military innovation. Commerce raiders sank Union ships and drove the American merchant marine from the high seas. Southern ironclads sent several Union warships to the bottom, naval mines sank many more, and the Confederates deployed the world's first submarine to sink an enemy vessel. But in the end, it was the Union navy that won some of the war's most important strategic victories--as an essential partner to the army on the ground at Fort Donelson, Vicksburg, Port Hudson, Mobile Bay, and Fort Fisher, and all by itself at Port Royal, Fort Henry, New Orleans, and Memphis.
Download or read book Personal Memoirs of U S Grant written by Ulysses Simpson Grant and published by New York, C. L. Webster & Company. This book was released on 1885 with total page 606 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Faced with failing health and financial ruin, the Civil War's greatest general and former president wrote his personal memoirs to secure his family's future - and won himself a unique place in American letters. Devoted almost entirely to his life as a soldier, Grant's Memoirs traces the trajectory of his extraordinary career - from West Point cadet to general-in-chief of all Union armies. For their directness and clarity, his writings on war are without rival in American literature, and his autobiography deserves a place among the very best in the genre.
Download or read book The Battle of Fort Donelson No Terms but Unconditional Surrender written by James R. Knight and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2011-03-04 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In February 1862, after defeats at Bull Run and at Wilson's Creek in Missouri, the Union army was desperate for victory on the eve of its first offensive of the Civil War. The strategy was to penetrate the Southern heartland with support from a new "Brown Water"? navy. In a two-week campaign plagued by rising floodwaters and brutal winter weather, two armies collided in rural Tennessee to fight over two forts that controlled the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers. Those intense days set the course of the war in the Western Theater for eighteen months and determined the fates of Ulysses S. Grant, Andrew H. Foote and Albert Sidney Johnston. Historian James R. Knight paints a picture of this crucial but often neglected and misunderstood turning point.
Download or read book Grant s River Campaign written by Jack H. Lepa and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2013-11-08 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Tennessee in the early months of 1862, Ulysses S. Grant captured forts Henry and Donelson and opened the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers to military and commercial shipping. In April the first of many terrible battles of the Civil War was fought near Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River around a decrepit meeting-house known as Shiloh. This costly victory established Federal control over much of central Tennessee. These early Union victories gave the Federals control of two of the major rivers in the region--the highways of the period--opening large areas of the Confederacy to Federal invasion. Other important results were the end of the Confederate threat to control Kentucky and possibly close off the Ohio River. These victories also were a major factor in forcing the abandonment of a key Confederate fort on the Mississippi River at Columbus, Kentucky. This book describes not only the actual fighting that took place but how important political and economic factors influenced the overall military strategy in the region.
Download or read book Struggle for the Heartland written by Stephen D. Engle and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2005-03-01 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Struggle for the Heartland tells the story surrounding the military campaign that began in early 1862 with the advance to Fort Henry and culminated in late May with the capture of Corinth, Mississippi. The first significant Northern penetration into the Confederate west, this campaign saw the military coming-of-age of Ulysses S. Grant and offered a hint as to where the Federals might win the war. For the South, it dashed any hopes of avoiding a protracted conflict. Stephen D. Engle colors in the details that bring great clarity and new life to the scene of these battles as well as to the social and political context in which they occurred.
Download or read book Decisions at Forts Henry and Donelson written by Hank Koopman and published by Univ Tennessee Press. This book was released on 2024-01-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Battles of Forts Henry and Donelson took place in February of 1862 and were early indicators of the success the US would have in the Civil War's Western Theater. Due to Kentucky's neutrality at the time, Brig. Gen. Daniel S. Donelson was instructed to find suitable sites for fortification along the Tennessee River but just inside the state boundaries of Tennessee. Forts Henry and Donelson were constructed in the summer of 1861 and were quickly identified by Gen. Ulysses S. Grant as strategic fortifications that, if conquered, would open the Federal Army's path to Alabama and Mississippi. Fort Henry fell to Federal control on February 6, 1862, and Fort Donelson fell six days later. With the Tennessee and Mississippi Rivers now open to Federal gunboats, Grant and his army would head southwest to Memphis and on to Vicksburg. Decisions at Forts Henry and Donelson explores the critical decisions made by Confederate and Federal commanders during the battle and how these decisions shaped its outcome. Rather than offering a history of the battle, Hank Koopman hones in on a sequence of critical decisions made by commanders on both sides of the conflict to provide a blueprint of the Battles of Forts Henry and Donelson at their tactical core. Identifying and exploring the critical decisions in this way allows students of the battles to progress from a knowledge of what happened to a mature grasp of why events happened. Complete with maps and a driving tour, Decisions at Forts Henry and Donelson is an indispensable primer, and readers looking for a concise introduction to these battles can tour this sacred ground--or read about it at their leisure--with key insights into the campaigns and a deeper understanding of the Civil War itself. Decisions at Forts Henry and Donelson is the eighteenth in a series of books that will explore the critical decisions of major campaigns and battles of the Civil War.
Download or read book The Confederate Command During The Fort Henry Fort Donelson Campaign February 1862 written by Major Kendall D. Gott and published by Pickle Partners Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-06 with total page 69 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study investigates the decisive factors that affected the Fort Henry-Fort Donelson campaign in February 1862. The thesis is relevant not only to the study of history, but as a series of lessons for all commanders. In the final analysis, the ultimate failure of the Confederates during this campaign can be attributed directly to the actions of General Albert Sidney Johnston. He failed to develop an adequate strategy to meet the expected invasion from the North or to insure that each subordinate command in his department was prepared for the onslaught. Johnston also failed to establish a command structure to support his Department. Most damaging of all, Johnston neglected the defenses of the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers, which served as invasion routes through the center of his department Ironically, one of the worst generals of the Confederacy correctly saw Fort Donelson as the key to stopping Grant and protecting Nashville. Had he been better supported by his superiors and by the officers serving at the fort with him, the Confederates may have won a victory at Fort Donelson and secured the Western Department for several months.
Download or read book Island No 10 written by Larry J. Daniel and published by University of Alabama Press. This book was released on 1996-04-30 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book is useful to historians of the Civil War who wish to draw on it for an authoritative account of this campaign, and Civil War buffs will want it in their libraries". -- James M. McPherson Princeton University
Download or read book Forts Henry and Donelson written by B. Franklin Cooling and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book From Fort Henry to Corinth written by Manning Ferguson Force and published by . This book was released on 1881 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Grant s River Campaign written by Jack H. Lepa and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2013-11-08 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Tennessee in the early months of 1862, Ulysses S. Grant captured forts Henry and Donelson and opened the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers to military and commercial shipping. In April the first of many terrible battles of the Civil War was fought near Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River around a decrepit meeting-house known as Shiloh. This costly victory established Federal control over much of central Tennessee. These early Union victories gave the Federals control of two of the major rivers in the region--the highways of the period--opening large areas of the Confederacy to Federal invasion. Other important results were the end of the Confederate threat to control Kentucky and possibly close off the Ohio River. These victories also were a major factor in forcing the abandonment of a key Confederate fort on the Mississippi River at Columbus, Kentucky. This book describes not only the actual fighting that took place but how important political and economic factors influenced the overall military strategy in the region.
Download or read book Jack Hinson s One Man War written by Tom McKenney and published by Pelican Publishing. This book was released on 2010-09-23 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The true story of one man's reluctant but relentless war against the invaders of his country.A quiet, wealthy plantation owner, Jack Hinson watched the start of the Civil War with disinterest. Opposed to secession and a friend to Union and Confederate commanders alike, he did not want a war. After Union soldiers seized and murdered his sons, placing their decapitated heads on the gateposts of his estate, Hinson could remain indifferent no longer. He commissioned a special rifle for long-range accuracy, he took to the woods, and he set out for revenge. This remarkable biography presents the story of Jack Hinson, a lone Confederate sniper who, at the age of 57, waged a personal war on Grant's army and navy. The result of 15 years of scholarship, this meticulously researched and beautifully written work is the only account of Hinson's life ever recorded and involves an unbelievable cast of characters, including the Earp brothers, Jesse James, and Nathan Bedford Forrest.
Download or read book The Mississippi River Campaign 1861 1863 written by Benton Rain Patterson and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2010-08-23 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Telling the story of the Civil War's Mississippi River Campaign through the experiences of leading officers, ordinary soldiers, and civilians, this book explains how the river campaign came to be one of the key tenets of the Union's strategy and a fundamental contributor to the war's ultimate outcome. It describes the Union's drive down the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois, the drive up the river from the Gulf of Mexico, and the capturing of key cities and rebel fortifications along the way, including New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Memphis, Vicksburg, and finally, Port Hudson, Louisiana. The text is supplemented with 24 historical photographs from the Library of Congress and the National Archives.
