Download or read book Lee and His Army in Confederate History written by Gary W. Gallagher and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Was Robert E. Lee a gifted soldier whose only weaknesses lay in the depth of his loyalty to his troops, affection for his lieutenants, and dedication to the cause of the Confederacy? Or was he an ineffective leader and poor tactician whose reputation was

Download or read book Trevilian Station June 11 12 1864 written by Joseph W. McKinney and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2016-03-02 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In June 1864, General Ulysses Grant ordered his cavalry commander, Philip Sheridan, to conduct a raid to destroy the Virginia Central Railroad between Charlottesville and Richmond. Sheridan fell short of his objective when he was defeated by General Wade Hampton's cavalry in a two-day battle at Trevilian Station. The first day's fighting saw dismounted Yankees and Rebels engaged at close range in dense forest. By day's end, Hampton had withdrawn to the west. Advancing the next morning, Sheridan found Hampton dug in behind hastily built fortifications and launched seven dismounted assaults, each repulsed with heavy casualties. As darkness fell, the Confederates counterattacked, driving the Union forces from the field. Sheridan began his withdrawal that night, an ordeal for his men, the Union wounded and Confederate prisoners brought off the field and the hundreds of starved and exhausted horses that marked his retreat, killed to prevent their falling into Confederate hands.

Download or read book South Carolinians in the Battle of Gettysburg written by Derek Smith and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2021-04-02 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: July 1, 1863. The Confederate Army of Northern Virginia under General Robert E. Lee advanced across the Pennsylvania countryside toward the small town of Gettysburg--less than 90 miles from Washington, D.C.--on a collision course with the Union Army of the Potomac. In Lee's ranks were 5,000 South Carolina troops destined to play critical roles in the three days of fighting ahead. From generals to privates, the Palmetto State soldiers were hurled into the Civil War's most famous battle--hundreds were killed, wounded or later suffered as prisoners of war. The life-and-death stories of these South Carolinians are here woven together here with official wartime reports, previously unpublished letters, newspaper accounts, diaries and the author's personal observations from walking the battlefield.

Download or read book Great Things are Expected of Us written by Cornelius Irvine Walker and published by Univ. of Tennessee Press. This book was released on 2009 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of letters written by Colonel C. Irvine Walker of the 10th South Carolina Infantry Regiment, C.S.A., to his fiance? during his service in the Civil War includes commentary on the campaigns in Tennessee and Kentucky in which his regiment participated. Among those mentioned in his letters are the battles of Chickamauga, Franklin, Murfreesboro, Nashville, Shiloh and Spring Hill in Tennessee and the Battle of Mundfordville in Kentucky. Included in this volume are postwar corrections and commentary that Walker added when he had his letters transcribed decades after the war.

Download or read book Confederate Phoenix written by Edmund L. Drago and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2008 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this innovative book, Edmund L. Drago tells the first full story of white children and their families in the most militant Southern state, and the state where the Civil War erupted. Drawing on a rich array of sources, many of them formerly untapped, Drago shows how the War transformed the domestic world of the white South. Households were devastated by disease, death, and deprivation. Young people took up arms like adults, often with tragic results. Thousands of fathers and brothers died in battle; many returned home with grave physical and psychological wounds. Widows and orphans often had to fend for themselves. From the first volley at Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor to the end of Reconstruction, Drago explores the extraordinary impact of war and defeat on the South Carolina home front. He covers a broad spectrum, from the effect of "boy soldiers" on the ideals of childhood and child rearing to changes in education, marriage customs, and community as well as family life. He surveys the children's literature of the era and explores the changing dimensions of Confederate patriarchal society. By studying the implications of the War and its legacy in cultural memory, Drago unveils the conflicting perspectives of South Carolina children--white and black--today.

Download or read book The Antietam Campaign written by Gary W. Gallagher and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2012-01-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Maryland campaign of September 1862 ranks among the most important military operations of the American Civil War. Crucial political, diplomatic, and military issues were at stake as Robert E. Lee and George B. McClellan maneuvered and fought in the western part of the state. The climactic clash came on September 17 at the battle of Antietam, where more than 23,000 men fell in the single bloodiest day of the war. Approaching topics related to Lee's and McClellan's operations from a variety of perspectives, contributors to this volume explore questions regarding military leadership, strategy, and tactics, the impact of the fighting on officers and soldiers in both armies, and the ways in which participants and people behind the lines interpreted and remembered the campaign. They also discuss the performance of untried military units and offer a look at how the United States Army used the Antietam battlefield as an outdoor classroom for its officers in the early twentieth century. The contributors are William A. Blair, Keith S. Bohannon, Peter S. Carmichael, Gary W. Gallagher, Lesley J. Gordon, D. Scott Hartwig, Robert E. L. Krick, Robert K. Krick, Carol Reardon, and Brooks D. Simpson.

Download or read book General Lee s Army written by Joseph Glatthaar and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-03-24 with total page 626 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A history of the Confederate troops under Robert E. Lee presents portraits of soldiers from all walks of life, offers insight into how the Confederacy conducted key operations, and reveals how closely the South came to winning the war.

Download or read book Lost Causes written by Bradley R. Clampitt and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 2022-06 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This groundbreaking analysis of Confederate demobilization examines the state of mind of Confederate soldiers in the immediate aftermath of war. Having survived severe psychological as well as physical trauma, they now faced the unknown as they headed back home in defeat. Lost Causes analyzes the interlude between soldier and veteran, suggesting that defeat and demobilization actually reinforced Confederate identity as well as public memory of the war and southern resistance to African American civil rights. Intense material shortages and images of the war’s devastation confronted the defeated soldiers-turned-veterans as they returned home to a revolutionized society. Their thoughts upon homecoming turned to immediate economic survival, a radically altered relationship with freedpeople, and life under Yankee rule—all against the backdrop of fearful uncertainty. Bradley R. Clampitt argues that the experiences of returning soldiers helped establish the ideological underpinnings of the Lost Cause and create an identity based upon shared suffering and sacrifice, a pervasive commitment to white supremacy, and an aversion to Federal rule and all things northern. As Lost Causes reveals, most Confederate veterans remained diehard Rebels despite demobilization and the demise of the Confederate States of America.

Download or read book Calamity at Frederick written by Alexander B. Rossino and published by Savas Beatie. This book was released on 2023-10-31 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The loss of Robert E. Lee’s Special Orders No. 191 is one of the Civil War’s enduring mysteries. In this meticulous study, Alexander Rossino presents a bold new interpretation of the evidence surrounding the orders’ creation, distribution, and loss outside Frederick, Maryland, in September 1862. Rossino makes extensive use of primary sources to explore these subjects and other important questions related to the orders, including why General Lee thought his army could operate north of the Potomac until winter; why Lee found it necessary to seize the Federal garrison at Harpers Ferry; what Lee hoped to accomplish after capturing Harpers Ferry; where Corporal Barton Mitchell of the 27th Indiana found the Lost Orders; and if D. H. Hill or someone else was to blame for losing the orders. The result is a well-documented reassessment that sheds new light while challenging long-held assumptions. Calamity at Frederick is the Confederate companion to The Tale Untwisted by Gene M. Thorp and Alexander Rossino, which told the story from the Union perspective.

Download or read book Facing Sherman in South Carolina written by Christopher G. Crabb and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2010-12-10 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Major General William T. Sherman's march from Savannah, Georgia, to Columbia, South Carolina, was marked by a battle with an unrelenting enemy: the swamps of the Palmetto State. For more than two weeks, Sherman's veterans faced an unforgiving quagmire, coupled by daily skirmishes with gallant bands of outnumbered Confederates. Along the way, a ruined countryside and wrecked towns marked the path of an army unlike any "since the days of Julius Caesar." It would take an army as adept with the axe as they were with the rifle to tame the rivers, tributaries and swamps of the South Carolina Lowcountry. Join historian Chris Crabb as he traces the steps of Sherman's sixty-thousand-man army in its "amphibious march" from Beaufort to Columbia.

Download or read book A History of the 2nd South Carolina Infantry 1861 65 written by Mac Wyckoff and published by Sergeant Kirkland's Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the role the 2nd South Carolina Infantry played in the great battles of the American Civil War. Includes a detailed roster.

Download or read book The Battle of Monroe s Crossroads written by Eric J. Wittenberg and published by Savas Beatie. This book was released on 2006-04-19 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A detailed tactical narrative of one of the most important but least known engagements of William T. Sherman’s Carolinas Campaign during the Civil War. As General Sherman’s infantry crossed into North Carolina, Maj. Gen. Judson Kilpatrick’s veteran Federal cavalry division fanned out in front, screening the advance. When Kilpatrick learned that Confederate cavalry under Lt. Gen. Wade Hampton was hot on his trail, he decided to set a trap for the Southern horsemen near a place called Monroe’s Crossroads. Hampton, however, learned of the plan and decided to do something Kilpatrick was not expecting: attack. On March 10, 1865, Southern troopers under Hampton and Maj. Gen. Joseph Wheeler launched a savage surprise attack on Kilpatrick’s sleeping camp. After three hours of some of the toughest cavalry fighting of the entire Civil War, Hampton broke off and withdrew. His attack, however, stopped Kilpatrick’s advance and bought another precious day for Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee to evacuate his command from Fayetteville. This, in turn, permitted Hardee to join the command of Gen. Joseph E. Johnston and set the stage for the climactic Battle of Bentonville nine days later. Noted Civil War author Eric J. Wittenberg has written the first history of this important but long-forgotten battle, and places it in its proper context within the entire Carolinas Campaign. His study features twenty-eight original maps and dozens of illustrations. Finally, an author of wide experience and renown has brought to vivid life this overlooked portion of the Carolinas Campaign. Praise for The Battle of Monroe’s Crossroads “All the elements that we expect in great battle are here: high drama, command decisions good, bad, and ugly; courage and cowardice, sacrifice, and fortitude. Readers both new to the genre and veteran to the literature will find much of value in The Battle of Monroe’s Crossroads.” —Noah Andre Trudeau, author of The Last Citadel: Petersburg, June 1864–April 1865 “Features a marvelous cast of characters and a riveting story impeccably researched and judiciously interpreted. It is the definitive account of this fascinating battle.” —Mark L. Bradley, author of Last Stand in the Carolinas: The Battle of Bentonville

Download or read book The Battles for Spotsylvania Court House and the Road to Yellow Tavern May 7 12 1864 written by Gordon C. Rhea and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 2005-03 with total page 498 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The second volume in Gordon C. Rhea's peerless five-book series on the Civil War's 1864 Overland Campaign abounds with Rhea's signature detail, innovative analysis, and riveting prose. Here Rhea examines the maneuvers and battles from May 7, 1864, when Grant left the Wilderness, through May 12, when his attempt to break Lee's line by frontal assault reached a chilling climax at what is now called the Bloody Angle. Drawing exhaustively upon previously untapped materials, Rhea challenges conventional wisdom about this violent clash of titans to construct the ultimate account of Grant and Lee at Spotsylvania.

Download or read book God s Almost Chosen Peoples written by George C. Rable and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 600 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout the Civil War, soldiers and civilians on both sides of the conflict saw the hand of God in the terrible events of the day, but the standard narratives of the period pay scant attention to religion. Now, in God's Almost Chosen Peoples, Li

Download or read book Sumter After the First Shots written by Derek Smith and published by Stackpole Books. This book was released on 2015-07-15 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Everyone knows the story of how the Civil War began at Fort Sumter, but what happened to the fort after the first shots were fired there? The North wanted to restore Sumter to its rightful place in the Union and close the vital Confederate supply port of Charleston while the South needed to defend its birthplace and keep the supplies flowing--thus making Fort Sumter one of the most fervently attacked and most tenaciously defended pieces of real estate in the United or Confederate States of America throughout four years of war.

Download or read book Ends of War written by Caroline E. Janney and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2021-09-13 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Army of Northern Virginia's chaotic dispersal began even before Lee and Grant met at Appomattox Court House. As the Confederates had pushed west at a relentless pace for nearly a week, thousands of wounded and exhausted men fell out of the ranks. When word spread that Lee planned to surrender, most remaining troops stacked their arms and accepted paroles allowing them to return home, even as they lamented the loss of their country and cause. But others broke south and west, hoping to continue the fight. Fearing a guerrilla war, Grant extended the generous Appomattox terms to every rebel who would surrender himself. Provost marshals fanned out across Virginia and beyond, seeking nearly 18,000 of Lee's men who had yet to surrender. But the shock of Lincoln's assassination led Northern authorities to see threats of new rebellion in every rail depot and harbor where Confederates gathered for transport, even among those already paroled. While Federal troops struggled to keep order and sustain a fragile peace, their newly surrendered adversaries seethed with anger and confusion at the sight of Union troops occupying their towns and former slaves celebrating freedom. In this dramatic new history of the weeks and months after Appomattox, Caroline E. Janney reveals that Lee's surrender was less an ending than the start of an interregnum marked by military and political uncertainty, legal and logistical confusion, and continued outbursts of violence. Janney takes readers from the deliberations of government and military authorities to the ground-level experiences of common soldiers. Ultimately, what unfolds is the messy birth narrative of the Lost Cause, laying the groundwork for the defiant resilience of rebellion in the years that followed.

Download or read book I Dread the Thought of the Place written by D. Scott Hartwig and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2023-08-22 with total page 977 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The definitive account of the Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest day of the Civil War. The memory of the Battle of Antietam was so haunting that when, nine months later, Major Rufus Dawes learned another Antietam battle might be on the horizon, he wrote, "I hope not, I dread the thought of the place." In this definitive account, historian D. Scott Hartwig chronicles the single bloodiest day in American history, which resulted in 23,000 casualties. The Battle of Antietam marked a vital turning point in the war: afterward, the conflict could no longer be understood as a limited war to preserve the Union, but was now clearly a conflict over slavery. Though the battle was tactically inconclusive, Robert E. Lee withdrew first from the battlefield, thus handing President Lincoln the political ammunition necessary to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. This is the full story of Antietam, ranging from the opening shots of the battle to the powerful reverberations—military, political, and social—it sent through the armies and the nation. Based on decades of research, this in-depth narrative sheds particular light on the visceral experience of battle, an often misunderstood aspect of the American Civil War, and the emotional aftermath for those who survived. Hartwig provides an hour-by-hour tactical history of the battle, beginning before dawn on September 17 and concluding with the immediate aftermath, including General McClellan's fateful decision not to pursue Lee's retreating forces back across the Potomac to Virginia. With 21 unique maps illustrating the state of the battle at intervals ranging from 20 to 120 minutes, this long-awaited companion to Hartwig's To Antietam Creek will be essential reading for anyone interested in the Civil War.