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Author: Archie K. Davis
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 080786661X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 421
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Book Description
Henry King Burgwyn, Jr. (1841-63), one of the youngest colonels in the Confederate Army, died at the age of twenty-one while leading the twenty-sixth North Carolina regiment into action at the battle of Gettysburg. In this sensitive biography, originally published by UNC Press in 1985, Archie Davis provides a revealing portrait of the young man's character and a striking example of a soldier who selflessly fulfilled his duty. Drawing on Burgwyn's own letters and diary, Davis also offers a fascinating glimpse into North Carolina society during the antebellum period and the Civil War.
Author: Archie K. Davis
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
ISBN: 080786661X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 421
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Book Description
Henry King Burgwyn, Jr. (1841-63), one of the youngest colonels in the Confederate Army, died at the age of twenty-one while leading the twenty-sixth North Carolina regiment into action at the battle of Gettysburg. In this sensitive biography, originally published by UNC Press in 1985, Archie Davis provides a revealing portrait of the young man's character and a striking example of a soldier who selflessly fulfilled his duty. Drawing on Burgwyn's own letters and diary, Davis also offers a fascinating glimpse into North Carolina society during the antebellum period and the Civil War.
![Colonel John Pelham: Lee's Boy Artillerist [Illustrated Edition] PDF](https://books.google.com/books/content/images/frontcover/Vx9wCwAAQBAJ?fife=w80-h100)
Author: William W. Hassler
Publisher: Pickle Partners Publishing
ISBN: 1782898433
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 185
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Book Description
Includes more than 30 maps, diagrams and portraits of Pelham, his artillery and his commanders. “Even before the end of the Civil War Colonel John Pelham had become a legendary figure of the Confederacy. General Lee called him “the gallant Pelham,” and on seeing the young artillerist employ but a single gun to hold up the advance of three Union divisions and over a hundred guns at Fredericksberg, he exclaimed: “It is glorious to see such courage in one so young.” “Stonewall” Jackson, who relied implicitly on Pelham in tight situations said: “It is really extraordinary to find such nerve and genius in a mere boy. With a Pelham on each flank I believe I could whip the world.” “Jeb” Stuart, the dashing cavalry chief, claimed that “John Pelham exhibited a skill and courage which I have never seen surpassed. I loved him as a brother.” Major John Esten Cooke, a fellow-officer and tent-mate, wrote: “He is the bravest human being I ever saw in my life.” And one of Pelham's veteran gunners asserted: “We knew him-we trusted him-we would have followed him anywhere, and did.” Shortly after the outbreak of hostilities in the spring of 1861, Cadet Pelham slipped away from West Point to join the Confederacy. Following the fierce Battle of First Manassas, in which he fought side-by-side with “Stonewall” Jackson, Pelham was assigned to “Jeb” Stuart's command with orders to organize the Stuart Horse Artillery. This mounted unit-dashing from action to action on the battlefield-provided General Lee's army with invaluable mobile firepower which saved many desperate situations. In over sixty battles Pelham's blazing guns saw furious action against Union infantry, cavalry, artillery, gunboats and even locomotives. Although he fought against tremendous odds, Pelham never lost an artillery duel or a single gun! This action-packed book fully describes the incredible feats of the adventurous, romantic artillery genius of the Confederacy.”-Print Ed.
Author: Scott L. Mingus
Publisher: Grub Street Publishers
ISBN: 1611211301
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 599
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Book Description
An award-winning biography of one of the Confederacy’s most colorful and controversial generals. Winner of the 2013 Nathan Bedford Forrest History Book Award for Southern History Nominated for the 2014 Virginia Book Award for Nonfiction Despite a life full of drama, politics, and adventure, little has been written about William “Extra Billy” Smith—aside from a rather biased account by his brother-in-law back in the nineteenth century. As the oldest and one of the most controversial Confederate generals on the field at Gettysburg, Smith was also one of the most charismatic characters of the Civil War and the antebellum Old South. Known nationally as “Extra Billy” because of his prewar penchant for finding loopholes in government postal contracts to gain extra money for his stagecoach lines, Smith served as Virginia’s governor during both the war with Mexico and the Civil War; served five terms in the US Congress; and was one of Virginia’s leading spokesmen for slavery and states’ rights. Extra Billy’s extra-long speeches and wry sense of humor were legendary among his peers. A lawyer during the heady Gold Rush days, he made a fortune in California—and, as with his income earned from stagecoaches, quickly lost it. Despite his advanced age, Smith took to the field and fought well at First Manassas, was wounded at Seven Pines and again at Sharpsburg, and marched with Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania. There, on the first day at Gettysburg, Smith’s frantic messages about a possible Union flanking attack remain a matter of controversy to this day. Did his aging eyes see distant fence-lines that he interpreted as approaching enemy soldiers—mere phantoms of his imagination? Or did his prompt action stave off a looming Confederate disaster? This biography draws upon a wide array of newspapers, diaries, letters, and other firsthand accounts to paint a portrait of one of the South’s most interesting leaders, complete with original maps and photos.
Author: Berry Benson
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820342254
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 289
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Book Description
Confederate scout and sharpshooter Berry Greenwood Benson witnessed the first shot fired on Fort Sumter, retreated with Lee's Army to its surrender at Appomattox Courthouse, and missed little of the action in between. This memoir of his service is a remarkable narrative, filled with the minutiae of the soldier's life and paced by a continual succession of battlefield anecdotes. Three main stories emerge from Benson's account: his reconnaissance exploits, his experiences in battle, and his escape from prison. Though not yet eighteen years old when he left his home in Augusta, Georgia, to join the army, Benson was soon singled out for the abilities that would serve him well as a scout. Not only was he a crack shot, a natural leader, and a fierce Southern partisan, but he had a kind of restless energy and curiosity, loved to take risks, and was an instant and infallible judge of human nature. His recollections of scouting take readers within arm's reach of Union trenches and encampments. Benson recalls that while eavesdropping he never failed to be shocked by the Yankees' foul language; he had never heard that kind of talk in a Confederate camp! Benson's descriptions of the many battles in which he fought--including Cold Harbor, The Seven Days, Manassas, Sharpsburg, Fredericksburg, Spotsylvania, and Petersburg--convey the desperation of a full frontal charge and the blind panic of a disorganized retreat. Yet in these accounts, Benson's own demeanor under fire is manifest in the coolly measured tone he employs. A natural writer, Benson captures the dark absurdities of war in such descriptions as those of hardened veterans delighting in the new shoes and other equipment they found on corpse-littered battlefields. His clothing often torn by bullets, Benson was also badly bruised a number of times by spent rounds. At one point, in May 1863, he was wounded seriously enough in the leg to be hospitalized, but he returned to the field before full recuperation. Benson was captured behind enemy lines in May 1864 while on a scouting mission for General Lee. Confined to Point Lookout Prison in Maryland, he escaped after only two days and swam the Potomac to get back into Virginia. Recaptured near Washington, D.C., he was briefly held in Old Capitol Prison, then sent to Elmira Prison in New York. There he joined a group of ten men who made the only successful tunnel escape in Elmira's history. After nearly six months in captivity or on the run, he rejoined his unit in Virginia. Even at Appomattox, Benson refused to surrender but stole off with his brother to North Carolina, where they planned to join General Johnston. Finding the roads choked with Union forces and surrendered Confederates, the brothers ultimately bore their unsurrendered rifles home to Augusta. Berry Benson first wrote his memoirs for his family and friends. Completed in 1878, they drew on his--and partially on his brother's--wartime diaries, as well as on letters that both brothers had written to family members during the war. The memoirs were first published in book form in 1962 but have long been unavailable. This edition, with a new foreword by the noted Civil War historian Herman Hattaway, will introduce this compelling story to a new generation of readers.
Author: David Emmons Johnston
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 426
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Book Description
Author: Robert Gould Shaw
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820342777
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 481
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Book Description
On the Boston Common stands one of the great Civil War memorials, a magnificent bronze sculpture by Augustus Saint-Gaudens. It depicts the black soldiers of the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry marching alongside their young white commander, Colonel Robert Gould Shaw. When the philosopher William James dedicated the memorial in May 1897, he stirred the assembled crowd with these words: "There they march, warm-blooded champions of a better day for man. There on horseback among them, in the very habit as he lived, sits the blue-eyed child of fortune." In this book Shaw speaks for himself with equal eloquence through nearly two hundred letters he wrote to his family and friends during the Civil War. The portrait that emerges is of a man more divided and complex--though no less heroic--than the Shaw depicted in the celebrated film Glory. The pampered son of wealthy Boston abolitionists, Shaw was no abolitionist himself, but he was among the first patriots to respond to Lincoln's call for troops after the attack on Fort Sumter. After Cedar Mountain and Antietam, Shaw knew the carnage of war firsthand. Describing nightfall on the Antietam battlefield, he wrote, "the crickets chirped, and the frogs croaked, just as if nothing unusual had happened all day long, and presently the stars came out bright, and we lay down among the dead, and slept soundly until daylight. There were twenty dead bodies within a rod of me." When Federal war aims shifted from an emphasis on restoring the Union to the higher goal of emancipation for four million slaves, Shaw's mother pressured her son into accepting the command of the North's vanguard black regiment, the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts. A paternalist who never fully reconciled his own prejudices about black inferiority, Shaw assumed the command with great reluctance. Yet, as he trained his recruits in Readville, Massachusetts, during the early months of 1963, he came to respect their pluck and dedication. "There is not the least doubt," he wrote his mother, "that we shall leave the state, with as good a regiment, as any that has marched." Despite such expressions of confidence, Shaw in fact continued to worry about how well his troops would perform under fire. The ultimate test came in South Carolina in July 1863, when the Fifty-fourth led a brave but ill-fated charge on Fort Wagner, at the approach to Charleston Harbor. As Shaw waved his sword and urged his men forward, an enemy bullet felled him on the fort's parapet. A few hours later the Confederates dumped his body into a mass grave with the bodies of twenty of his men. Although the assault was a failure from a military standpoint, it proved the proposition to which Shaw had reluctantly dedicated himself when he took command of the Fifty-fourth: that black soldiers could indeed be fighting men. By year's end, sixty new black regiments were being organized. A previous selection of Shaw's correspondence was privately published by his family in 1864. For this volume, Russell Duncan has restored many passages omitted from the earlier edition and has provided detailed explanatory notes to the letters. In addition he has written a lengthy biographical essay that places the young colonel and his regiment in historical context.
Author: Frank Schaller
Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Press
ISBN: 9781570037016
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 228
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Book Description
An ambitious German commanders views of military life and courtship in the Confederacy
Author: Earl J. Hess
Publisher: UNC Press Books
ISBN: 1469628767
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 544
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Book Description
As a leading Confederate general, Braxton Bragg (1817–1876) earned a reputation for incompetence, for wantonly shooting his own soldiers, and for losing battles. This public image established him not only as a scapegoat for the South's military failures but also as the chief whipping boy of the Confederacy. The strongly negative opinions of Bragg's contemporaries have continued to color assessments of the general's military career and character by generations of historians. Rather than take these assessments at face value, Earl J. Hess's biography offers a much more balanced account of Bragg, the man and the officer. While Hess analyzes Bragg's many campaigns and battles, he also emphasizes how his contemporaries viewed his successes and failures and how these reactions affected Bragg both personally and professionally. The testimony and opinions of other members of the Confederate army--including Bragg's superiors, his fellow generals, and his subordinates--reveal how the general became a symbol for the larger military failures that undid the Confederacy. By connecting the general's personal life to his military career, Hess positions Bragg as a figure saddled with unwarranted infamy and humanizes him as a flawed yet misunderstood figure in Civil War history.
Author: James Lee Conrad
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 0811768406
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 225
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Book Description
Focusing on the South’s four major military colleges—the Virginia Military Institute (VMI), the South Carolina Military Academy (later The Citadel), the Georgia Military Institute, and the University of Alabama—The Young Lions is the story of young Confederate military cadets at war. From the opening of VMI in 1839 through the struggles of all the schools to remain open during the war, the death of Stonewall Jackson (a VMI professor), and the Pyrrhic victory of the Battle of New Market to the burning of the University of Alabama in 1865, this book reveals the everyday dramatic actions of cadets on battlefield and beyond.
Author: Noel C. Fisher
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 196
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Book Description
Prize-winning author Noel Fisher eloquently describes the violence and derpredations of the Civil War on the people who lived in and near the Great Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee and western North Carolina. The book describes hard fought battles, the actions of bushwackers, guerrillas, deserters, and home guards, and the devastating impacts on mountain families. Includes extensive index and notes.
