Booknotes: And Rest Under The Shade Of The Trees

New Arrival:

• And Rest Under The Shade Of The Trees: Essays In Honor of James I. Robertson, Jr. edited by Steven E. Woodworth, Christopher L. Jones, and Christopher J. Smith (Laurel Hill Pub, 2026).

Eminent Civil War historian James Irvin "Bud" Robertson Jr. passed away in 2019 at the age of 89. If you're around my age and serious interest in the ACW blossomed during the late-80s and throughout the 90s, heavies such as Robertson, Gary Gallagher, and Jack Davis were frequently encountered on both the written page and the television screen. Truth be told, I haven't read the majority of Robertson's books, but among those that I have read the Stonewall Jackson biography is the clear standout (a common feeling, I'm sure).

Earlier this year, Tom Perry's Laurel Hill Publishing released And Rest Under The Shade Of The Trees: Essays In Honor of James I. Robertson, Jr., edited by Steven Woodworth, Christopher Jones, and Christopher Smith. It honors Robertson "by bringing together a collection of essays that explore several aspects of the Civil War that were subjects of Bud's long and productive career of research, writing, and teaching."

The volume includes ten essays plus an epilogue from Robertson's widow, Elizabeth Lee Robertson. Along with the three co-editors, the list of chapter contributors includes William C. Davis, James Finck, Allen Guelzo, Akhil Rajasekar, David Snead, Emory Thomas, Brian Steel Wills, and Kelly Witherspoon.

In addition to the historical essays tied to themes drawn from a consideration of Robertson's career are perspectives and memories of Robertson himself. From the description: "From the high-ranking generals of the Civil War, to the gritty experiences of the soldiers in the ranks, to the travails of the civilians on the home front, this volume sheds new light on topics Bud might well have addressed had he lived longer, topics such as the real cause of Stonewall Jackson's death, a true understanding of the operational possibilities at the end of the Battle of Gettysburg, or the memory of the Confederacy in modern America. In addition, the book includes several reminiscences of Bud and his career, including his advisory role in the planning of the funeral of President John F. Kennedy." Click on the Read Sample button at the title link above to find the full table of contents.

Booknotes: The Civil War in Hampton Roads and the Outer Banks

New Arrival:

• The Civil War in Hampton Roads and the Outer Banks by Matthew Ericson (Arcadia Pub & The Hist Press, 2026).

Over their prolific (and, for the latter, ongoing) runs, The History Press's Civil War Sesquicentennial Series and Civil War Series published a number of titles covering various military events in southeastern Virginia and coastal North Carolina during 1861-62. Matthew Ericson's The Civil War in Hampton Roads and the Outer Banks brings much of that material together into a single integrated overview that incorporates early-war Union land and sea operations that secured Fort Monroe and surrounding areas, seized key towns and forts along North Carolina's Outer Banks and coastal plain, and finally forced the Confederate abandonment of Norfolk.

All of these Union victories achieved during the first twelve months of the war held significant strategic value, both in the short term and the long term. From Fort Monroe, "Union forces launched bold campaigns that would define the early course of the war. Their presence threatened Confederate supply lines and opened the way to North Carolina’s vulnerable shoreline. Across both regions, two vital canals linked the Confederate heartland to the coast, transforming Hampton Roads and the Outer Banks into a single, high-stakes theater of war." Ericson "unites these interconnected battles into one compelling narrative."

As is the case with all studies of this type from this publisher, photographs, illustrations, and maps abound.

Booknotes: A Michigan Cavalryman

New Arrival:

• A Michigan Cavalryman: The Life and Untimely Death of Major Noah Henry Ferry, Fifth Michigan Cavalry by Eric J. Wittenberg (Fox Run Pub, 2026).

One of the publishers that the late Eric Wittenberg developed a close relationship with over his prolific writing career was Keith Jones's Fox Run Publishing. As indicated in this press release from back in late March of this year, Eric had a number of projects going at the time his health took a tragic turn for the worst. His final finished work, a biography of Union cavalry officer Noah Ferry, was entrusted to Fox Run and is getting a wide release starting today.

A Michigan Cavalryman: The Life and Untimely Death of Major Noah Henry Ferry, Fifth Michigan Cavalry is a "detailed portrait of a Civil War cavalry officer’s life, leadership, and sacrifice at Gettysburg, emphasizing his legacy and battlefield experiences."

From the description: "Noah Ferry was one of the wealthiest and most influential men in Michigan. Major Ferry and his men were only in their second major combat on July 3, 1863, where his life ended abruptly." With the famed Michigan Brigade, Ferry was killed instantly during his regiment's dismounted fighting along a Rummel Farm fence line on what we now call East Cavalry Field.

More: Wittenberg's biography "presents the compelling tale of Ferry’s life, legacy, and military experience. We learn about Ferry’s family legacy, uncanny business and leadership abilities, and finally his rise in rank from captain of a company of cavalry to a charismatic major destined to sacrifice his life in a heretofore obscure farm field in Gettysburg." The main narrative runs a brisk 120 pages in largish font and is supported by eight maps and numerous illustrations.

Review - "Ironclad Ambush: Confederates Strike Lincoln's Mississippi River Blockade at the Head of Passes, October 12, 1861" by Neil Chatelain

[Ironclad Ambush: Confederates Strike Lincoln's Mississippi River Blockade at the Head of Passes, October 12, 1861 by Neil P. Chatelain (Savas Beatie, 2026). Hardcover, 12 maps, photos, illustrations, footnotes, appendix, bibliography, index. Pages main/total:xviii,209/255. ISBN:978-1-61121-795-7. $32.95]

As Civil War naval historian Neil Chatelain revealed in his excellent 2020 study Defending the Arteries of Rebellion: Confederate Naval Operations in the Mississippi River Valley, 1861-1865, Union victory and Confederate defeat along the length of the Mississippi River could not be fully explained through simple recitation of the wide disparities in financial, industrial, and military resources available to each side. Of course, those differences, as stark as they were, defined the conflict in many ways, but it is also true that fairly prodigious amounts of Confederate funding and material were thrown into defending both ends of the great river valley. Unfortunately for the region's defenders, a lack of unified direction, competition between government and civilian authorities, interservice rivalries, and general dispersal of effort critically hindered the creation of an effective naval counter to the rapidly expanding and increasingly aggressive U.S. Navy.

Nevertheless, some noteworthy tactical victories were achieved by those scratch Confederate naval forces, one of which occurred quite early in the war at the Head of Passes on October 12, 1861. A number of brief overviews of the battle can be found in the literature (arguably the best being the relevant section of Chester Hearn's broader study The Capture of New Orleans, 1862 (1995), but Chatelain's new book Ironclad Ambush: Confederates Strike Lincoln's Mississippi River Blockade at the Head of Passes, October 12, 1861 is the first full-length account.

The October 12 battle occurred at a time when blockading Union naval forces were rapidly gathering at the mouth of the Mississippi River as well as other key points of Gulf shipping ingress and egress. Even at this early stage of that process, enforcement had reached the point that Union forces felt confident enough to ascend the river and work toward constructing a fortified land battery below the Head of Passes. It was under this developing situation that the battle was fought, and Chatelain's study deals with matters associated with the establishment and tightening of the blockade during this period at length. Pertinent to that discussion is a detailed review of the types and capabilities of the ships involved as well as the uneven quality of their captains.

Arrayed against the growing Union threat was a hastily marshaled "mosquito fleet" led by Confederate naval captain George Hollins that consisted of a number of converted steamers with fire raft support, but what boosted Confederate confidence most was the availability and promise of the newly completed ironclad ram Manassas. Contradictory contemporary claims and assorted mysteries still impact modern appraisal of the vessel. They include what the ironclad really looked like, and design features as simple as whether it had one or two smokestacks (although Chatelain is confident in his answer to that latter question). Throughout his many attempts at cutting through the haze of conflicting accounts on a variety of matters, Chatelain judiciously weighs each side of a particular contested issue (explaining his thought process in the main text) and offers his own interpretation based on the best available evidence. A number of fresh insights emerge from this thorough review of the original source material, among them are some consensus-challenging suggestions surrounding the timing, place, and circumstances of Manassas's incorporation into the C.S. Navy. Every major secondary source claims that Manassas, a civilian-financed and owned privateer, was forcibly seized by Confederate authorities for their own use, but Chatelain cites primary source evidence strongly supportive of the possibility that Manassas's civilian captain, John Stevenson, first offered his powerful ram's services to the government.

The best writers of Civil War land campaign and battle narrative are able to convey a vivid mental picture and deep understanding of battlefield landscape and topography to their readers, and Chatelain is able to do much the same for the geology and hydrology of the Mississippi River's mouth. Knowledge and awareness of the shifting sand bars, scouring forces, "mud humps," and other noteworthy (and militarily significant) physical features of the river mouth geography are essential to reader understanding of the fleet action that occurred there, and the author provides that background information in full. Chatelain's detailed description and analysis of the river's five main passes (Southwest, South, Southeast, Northeast, and Pass á l'Outre) that branch off the aptly named Head of Passes like the fingers of a glove demonstrate why blockading the mouth of the Mississippi was difficult while at the same time in some ways simpler than one might realize. With those matters in mind, it's clear to see why both sides so closely coveted control of the inland Head of Passes.

The battle itself, which lasted only a few early-morning hours and apparently resulted in no casualties on either side, is recounted thoroughly and well. Map support is strong, with a series tracing ship movements and positions of both sides during each phase of the battle and its immediate aftermath. This is easily the most detailed account of the battle to date, unlikely to be surpassed unless a significant body of new source material emerges. After Manassas successfully, but not fatally, rammed the powerful steam sloop U.S.S. Richmond, the Union flotilla fled from the Head of Passes. Three ships (including the Richmond) ran aground below Southwest Pass and struggled mightily to refloat themselves. Under long-range harassing fire from the tug C.S.S. Ivy and fearing return of Manassas, which unbeknownst to them withdrew upriver after partially dislodging its ram and losing an engine during its strike on Richmond, some officers panicked and miscommunication even led to premature vessel abandonment.

In addition to exploring the battle itself in all its intricacies, Chatelain persuasively conveys to readers a solid sense of both its meaning and depth of its shadow. Head of Passes was the war's first fleet action as well as its first use of an ironclad in combat. As the author explains, the battle did not spark the ensuing flurry of ironclad building in general nor did it prompt the construction of ram fleets on the Mississippi (both initiatives were already well in swing by the time of the battle), but the limited success of Manassas offered encouraging proof of concept. October 12 was a very bad day for the U.S. Navy, and its handling of the engagement was shaky from top to bottom. After allowing themselves to be surprised, the Union vessels retreated in unseemly haste and, as mentioned before, orders to abandon grounded vessels were unnecessarily issued on more than one occasion. However, Chatelain makes an interesting point that the embarrassing U.S. defeat very well might have had a silver lining of major proportions. The command shakeup after the battle, which included reassignment of area commander Capt. William McKean and the sidelining or outright cashiering of his most underperforming subordinate ship captains, brought to the West Gulf Blockading Squadron daring new leadership that performed their duties phenomenally well during the devastatingly effective New Orleans campaign of the following spring. The author's suggestion that that decisive outcome might have been seriously in doubt had the October 12 battle not gone so poorly and the original leadership remained in place is an intriguing counterfactual to consider.

Recent years have been good ones for filling in gaps in the Civil War naval warfare and blockade literature, and Neil Chatelain's Ironclad Ambush represents yet another fresh and original contribution to those areas of study. In addition to providing the first truly comprehensive history of the Head of Passes naval battle, Chatelain's book adds essential context to our knowledge and understanding of the early-war blockade of the Mississippi River mouth. Highly recommended.

Booknotes: "Now I'm With the Invalids"

New Arrival:

• "Now I'm With the Invalids": The Veteran Reserve Corps in America’s Civil War by David A. Welker (Casemate, 2026).

Returning combat disabled soldiers to the army fulfilled an acute need for the government and recovered wounded alike. The U.S. military, facing ever increasing manpower pressures as the war progressed, searched far and wide for volunteers to fill needed roles of all kinds. A willing source was found in the tens of thousands of wounded veterans who still wished to contribute to the Union war effort. The existence of the corps is well known among Civil War students, but it is probably fair to say that few know the full story. That history is presented in comprehensive fashion for the first time in David Welker's "Now I'm With the Invalids": The Veteran Reserve Corps in America’s Civil War.

From the description: The struggle to come up with a workable and mutually beneficial arrangement was "solved by creation of the Invalid Corps—later renamed the Veteran Reserve Corps—which put these combat veterans to work in important military roles throughout the Union rear supporting the draft process, working in hospitals and government offices, guarding vulnerable locations, and in myriad other tasks." The Corps proved effective in its defined range of activities, the scope and nature of which widened under the exigencies of war. "Expanded in size and function by the war’s progress and demands, the Corps took on an ever-increasing list of new missions which further contributed to Union victory by performing important rear-area duties and freeing able-bodied men to continue fighting at the front. In a few notable cases, the “invalids” themselves even returned to battle, including playing a vital role in defending Washington DC from enemy attack in 1864." All of this is recounted and explored in Welker's study.

Useful reference material can be found in the appendix section. Detailed deployment information (by date range and place) for the various VRC units is provided in the first appendix. The Confederacy's own Invalid Corps, smaller and less effectively organized than its Union counterpart, is briefly explored in another appendix, as is a collection of celebratory poetry and song lyrics inspired by the U.S. Invalid Corps.

Through their service, the members of the VRC had a major impact on public perception of the image and capabilities of disabled veterans. More from the description: "The Corps not only helped enable Union victory, it also provided the sixty thousand men who served in its ranks a means to prove to the American public—and themselves—that their war wounds and injuries did not make them less than full men. In this way, those who served in its ranks carried on the Corps’ contribution long after the organization had ceased to be."

Booknotes: The Second Day at Gettysburg, July 2, 1863

New Arrival:

• The Second Day at Gettysburg, July 2, 1863 by Britt C. Isenberg (Casemate, 2026).

From the description: "The second day at Gettysburg has defined what most Americans know today about 1863’s most pivotal campaign in the Civil War’s eastern theater. Two veteran armies in transition clashed desperately, in the process immortalizing sites such as Devil’s Den, the Slaughter Pen, Little Round Top, The Wheatfield, the Peach Orchard, Cemetery Ridge, and Culp’s Hill for all time."

The latest Civil War-related volume in the Casemate Illustrated series is Britt Isenberg's The Second Day at Gettysburg, July 2, 1863, its account "detailing troop deployments, tactics, and battlefield actions" on that brutal day of fighting, which had "serious implications for both armies that would affect not only the outcome of the bloodiest battle, but the entire war." The volume's narrative content is enhanced and supplemented by an event timeline, B&W period photographs, modern color photography, profiles of key generals, color maps of various kinds, and topical sidebars.

As one might have guessed, Isenberg's Day 2 series contribution was preceded by last year's The First Day at Gettysburg, July 1, 1863 volume authored by James Hessler.

Booknotes: Grant & Meade

New Arrival:

• Grant & Meade: An Uneasy Alliance by Bradley M. Gottfried & Linda I. Gottfried (Seminole Pr, 2026).

When U.S. Grant was brought to Washington by President Lincoln to head the entire Union war effort as general-in-chief, Army of the Potomac commander George Meade assumed, as did many others, that Grant would appoint a trusted and familiar western general in his place. When Grant did not do so, Meade was grateful for the support and confidence placed in him, but that gratitude quickly eroded amid the trials and stresses of the 1864 Overland Campaign.

From the description: "The relationship began cordially with Grant initially promising to only provide broad strategic directions to Meade. The latter would then direct his army as he desired. However, as the war churned on and Grant believed Meade's army was underachieving, he took a progressively stronger role in its activities." That caused more than a little strain in the relationship as well as deep frustration on Meade's part. "How these two strong-willed military leaders worked together to achieve a common goal was not easy. The thin-skinned Meade constantly worried about losing his job and railed against any hint of disrespect by the press, politicians, or the general public. Grant worried less about image and concentrated on ending the war." Many historians have also criticized the arrangement, which added an extra layer to the army chain of command, as being unwieldy.

The Grant-Meade relationship has been discussed and analyzed extensively within modern studies of the Overland, Richmond-Petersburg, and Appomattox campaigns of 1864-65, but Bradley and Linda Gottfried's Grant & Meade: An Uneasy Alliance devotes an entire book to the subject, a central goal of which is to "help explain the complex and evolving relationship between the two men."

More on the 1862 war in Virginia through the end of the Seven Days

Posting yesterday's review of Brian Burton's Forward to Richmond: The Virginia Campaign of 1862 made me wonder yet again whether we'll ever get a treatment of the Peninsula Campaign on the order of Gordon Rhea's Overland series or David Powell's multi-volume Chickamauga and Atlanta projects.

Thematically similar to Burton's single-volume overview, but fleshed out over multiple books, is Ethan's Rafuse's new Virginia campaign of 1862 series published by University Press of Kansas. The first volume, From the Mountains to the Bay: The War in Virginia, January-May 1862, was reviewed positively on the site. Its follow-up, From the Valley to the Tidewater: The War in Virginia, May 21–June 12, 1862, will be out in November. I am looking forward to it. It's still unclear, at least to me, exactly how far Rafuse plans to take this. If he visits here, perhaps he can chime in. There was no series roadmap revealed in the first book. In fact, no future volumes were mentioned at all. Perhaps everything will be explained in From the Valley to the Tidewater. It ends with the launching of Jeb Stuart's first "Ride Around McClellan," so I would imagine that there is at least one Seven Days installment in the works to follow that one.

Though quirky and largely one-sided in its approach, the late Russel Beatie's enormously ambitious Army of the Potomac project is also worth mentioning. Alas, it's author was only able to finish three volumes before he passed away: The Army of the Potomac: Birth of Command, November 1860-September 1861; (Volume 2) McClellan Takes Command, September 1861-February 1862; and (Volume 3) McClellan's First Campaign, March 1862-May 1862. Years ago, Savas Beatie co-founder and current director Ted Savas hinted at the possibility, uncertain as it was, of putting together a fourth volume out of Beatie's unfinished material, but I haven't come across any update on that since then.

Review - "Forward to Richmond: The Virginia Campaign of 1862" by Brian Burton

[Forward to Richmond: The Virginia Campaign of 1862 by Brian K. Burton (University of Nebraska Press, 2026). Hardcover, 17 maps, illustrations, endnotes, bibliographic essay, index. Pages main/total:xiv,259/335. ISBN:978-1-4962-2971-7. $39.95]

Brian Burton's Forward to Richmond: The Virginia Campaign of 1862 is the twelfth installment in University of Nebraska Press's Great Campaigns of the Civil War series, which is now just over a quarter-century old. The purpose of each volume is not to revisit a major Civil War campaign in exhaustive operational and tactical detail but rather to offer new and experienced readers alike a relatively concise synthesis of the modern scholarly treatment of the campaign in its military, political, social, and international contexts. Burton's contribution to the series fulfills all those requirements in robust fashion.

Existing single-volume histories of the 1862 Peninsula Campaign, of which Stephen Sears's To the Gates of Richmond (1992) remains the standard, typically treat decisions and events outside the coastal plain as ancillary. That rather insular perspective of the campaign has been considerably altered (for the better) of late. To be fair, every good examination of the campaign has acknowledged important ties with concurrent operations in the Shenandoah Valley, but it is only recently that historians have stressed to this degree a portrait of the fighting in Virginia during that time as a single integrated, theater-wide campaign. This broader understanding is exemplified in Ethan Rafuse's excellent recent book From the Mountains to the Bay: The War in Virginia, January-May 1862 (2023), the follow-up volume of which is currently scheduled for release later this year. Strongly influenced by that earlier work, Burton's interpretation of the Virginia campaign for this series is very much in that vein. His narrative discusses relevant military operations across the breadth of the state: from the Shenandoah Valley (bordered by the Alleghenies to the west and the Blue Ridge mountains to the east) to the central corridor between Washington and Richmond (the Piedmont) to the fingers of coastal plain flanked by navigable rivers and jutting into Chesapeake Bay (the Tidewater). These geographically separated operations are presented as linked events with intertwining military and political impacts that the author lucidly explains.

After President Abraham Lincoln stripped George B. McClellan of his general-in-chief duties in March 1862, assuming them himself with the assistance of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, management of the Union war effort in Virginia was left entirely in the hands of civilian novices. Burton joins many other writers and historians in judging the level of micromanagement that came out of the White House and War Department during this time as often inefficient and frequently detrimental. Burton would probably agree with Donald Stoker, who greatly admires Lincoln's strategic vision in the broadest sense but sees Lincoln's hands-on management of the events covered in this book (situated between McClellan's demotion and the appointment of Henry Halleck as general-in-chief) as a low point. Confronted with a steep learning curve, the president also failed to appreciate how much conditions and logistical constraints limited the speed and range of operations. On the other side, the Confederates had the opportunity for creating unity of command under a military man after President Jefferson Davis brought in Robert E. Lee as his chief military advisor, but the top-level advisory position was not seamlessly integrated into the formal chain of command. This led to avoidable situations such as when a bewildered Richard Ewell and his wandering division received directions from three different superior officers (Joe Johnston, Stonewall Jackson, and Lee).

Most historians deem Lincoln's decision in May 1862 to launch a large-scale Valley offensive aimed at trapping Jackson's seemingly exposed command as a serious mistake that diverted forces poised to tip the balance in the fight over Richmond, the theater's primary strategic point. Burton acknowledges the strengths behind that argument, but he also is highly sympathetic toward the wisdom of a Valley offensive. As that argument goes, a reasonable opportunity to trap and destroy an enemy force of 17,000, which would have been a major event at any point in the war, was hard to pass up, and, if successful, would have only cost the Union forces time that they could have afforded. In the end, the degree to which one might be persuaded depends on how much one believes a Valley offensive capable of strategic results against Jackson and to what degree its timing was critical in denying reinforcements to McClellan's forces on the Peninsula.

Burton's examination of the modern literature's current understanding of the campaign includes critical engagement with its analyses and conclusions. Upon his narrative's arrival at key moments of contingency, Burton does a fine job of identifying and exploring the options available to each side along with the advantages and challenges that factored into each (inserting his own informed commentary in a non-heavy handed manner). Much like the process central to University of Tennessee Press's Campaign Decisions in America's Civil War series, Burton's emphasis is primarily placed on understanding why particular decisions were made instead of judging them in the end as wholly good or bad.

Generally speaking, Burton sees the Confederate forces as developing two main advantages over their Union foes during this time: operational speed and secrecy. Most recent scholarship has treated Stonewall Jackson's legendary command secrecy even more harshly than before. Burton acknowledges the faults inherent in that command trait, but he also sees a not inconsiderable associated benefit to Jackson keeping even his own principal subordinates in the dark and Johnston keeping his army strategy close to the vest. In going to those extremes, it significantly lessened the chance that Confederate plans and movements could be leaked to the enemy either intentionally or unintentionally. In terms of speed, everyone is aware of Jackson's effective exploitation of unencumbered mobility in the Valley, and Lee achieved two great moments of potentially decisive concentration (first at Gaines's Mill and second at Glendale) during the Seven Days. Burton ranks among those who believe Glendale to have been a great missed opportunity to significantly cripple, if not destroy, McClellan's retreating army. In the author's view, the failure to achieve greater results from Lee's massing of forces against vulnerable parts of McClellan's army was less about employing overly complicated plans and more about astoundingly poor staff work (for which Lee bears much responsibility) and bad performances from inexperienced and/or incompetent subordinate commanders.

What the Confederates couldn't match, in the opinion of many (including Burton), were clear Union superiorities in artillery firepower and military engineering. Most sources praise Union logistical capabilities during the campaign, but the author finds room for criticism in how both sides handled logistics during this still learning stage of the war. Burton is largely impressed with how most Union corps and division leaders performed during their first big tests in a major campaign. The defects he sees in McClellan's conduct are of the traditionally cited sort, among them major flaws in the gathering and interpretation of military intelligence (especially when it came to enemy numbers), general underappreciation of the political impact of military decisions, and absenting himself from the fighting front during key battles.

While the primary focus of the study is on the campaign's military aspects, considerable attention is paid to social, political, and diplomatic consequences. Widespread and sustained soldier-civilian interactions across the theater during the period examined in the text hastened hardening attitudes all around, and there was mutual recognition that both sides were in clear earnest. Unlike some observers, Burton does not see Union military failure across the board as necessarily signaling the failure of conciliation policy, but radical factions were nevertheless able to win a war of perception, successfully linking personal military failure (McClellan was the army's chief proponent of conciliation) with policy failure in ways that paved the way for hard war and emancipation. More briefly explored are the ways in which the campaign shaped foreign relations between the North American combatants and the forces of public opinion and political leaders in Britain and France. Burton also makes it a point to discuss the impact of environmental conditions on both the health of the combatants and on operations. Of course, bad weather affects both sides, but, given that timing is everything when it comes to their effects, the author argues that, on balance, weather events tended to favor the Confederates most often during this period.

In a comprehensive narrative synthesis that begins with initial campaign planning debates and ends with Confederate victory in the Seven Days offensive, Brian Burton's Forward to Richmond: The Virginia Campaign of 1862 deserves to be regarded as a strong candidate for consideration as the best single-volume treatment of the expansive military contest in the eastern theater over the first half of that year, one that further recognizes the campaign's status as one of the war's most significant social and political inflection points.

Coming Soon (September '26 Edition)

Scheduled for SEPT 2026¹:
• "When All Our Troubles Will Be Forgotten": The Civil War Letters and Recollections of Captain George Henry Pettis ed. by Jerry Thompson.
• John M. Schofield: Soldier–Statesman of the Civil War and Gilded Age by Robert Wooster.
• "Now I'm With the Invalids": The Veteran Reserve Corps in America’s Civil War by David Welker.
• Texas and the Civil War: New Perspectives by Carl Moneyhon.
• Texas Cotton and Confederate Finance: Blockade Runners, Border Merchants, and Government Agents by Ellis & McCaslin.
• More Than Monument: Austin Blair, Ex-Governor-In His Own Words by Jack Dempsey.
• Camp Ford's Civil War: Captivity, Community, and Nature in the Dark Corner of the Confederacy by Matthew Stith.
• The 54th Pennsylvania Infantry in the Civil War by Christopher Baran.
• Westport 1864: Price's Raid and the Midwest's Greatest Battle by Brian Herder.
• Treason and Traitors in Texas: Facilitators of the American Civil War by Randolph Farmer.
• A Glorious Fate: The Life and Legacy of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw by Kevin Levin.
• How Lincoln Won: The 1860 Presidential Election and the Origins of the Civil War by DeWitt & Schwartz.
• The Atlanta Campaign, Volume 3: From the Chattahoochee to Peach Tree Creek, June 28-July 20, 1864 by David Powell.

Comments: A great-looking bounceback month after only getting three titles in the mail in August (so far).

¹ - These monthly release lists are not meant to be exhaustive compilations of non-fiction releases. They routinely do not include reprints that are not significantly revised/expanded, publisher exclusives, children's books, and digital-only titles. Works that only tangentially address the war years are also generally excluded. Inevitably, one or more titles on this list will get a rescheduled release (and they do not get repeated later), so revisiting the past few "Coming Soon" posts is the best way to pick up stragglers.

Booknotes: "When All Our Troubles Will Be Forgotten"

New Arrival:

• "When All Our Troubles Will Be Forgotten": The Civil War Letters and Recollections of Captain George Henry Pettis edited by Jerry D. Thompson (UNM Press, 2026).

University of New Mexico Press doesn't publish Civil War-related books very often, but when they do the release is always worthy of close attention. The essential library of the Civil War in the Desert Southwest contains many of their titles, and the latest candidate for consideration is "When All Our Troubles Will Be Forgotten": The Civil War Letters and Recollections of Captain George Henry Pettis.

Though an obscure figure to Civil War readers at large, Pettis is well known to those steeped in the study of the conflict in this particular region. His writings are an important resource for modern researchers and historians. From the description: "As the unofficial historian of the California Column, George Henry Pettis was a firsthand witness to a series of important historic events, including the march of Californians to New Mexico, the Confederate invasion of New Mexico, and the Indian Wars in the region."

A major part of the far-flung coordinated Union response to the 1861-62 Confederate invasion of New Mexico and Arizona was the organization of a large body of troops in southern California. While the Confederate incursion had already been defeated and expelled by the time these Union reinforcements arrived at their destination, the war was far from over for the men of the famed California Column.

More from the description: "By the time Pettis arrived on the Rio Grande, the Civil War in the Southwest had evolved into a radically different conflict from what he envisioned when he enlisted in the Union Army in 1861. Over the course of five years and fifteen days in the California and New Mexico infantry, Pettis marched an astonishing 4,245 miles across Arizona, New Mexico, and West Texas while suffering through sweltering summer heat and frigid winter cold—likely a greater distance than any soldier in the entire Union Army. The climax of Pettis’s career came at the Battle of Adobe Walls when he found himself in command of two small artillery pieces in Colonel Christopher “Kit” Carson’s vain, ill-advised, and far-reaching punitive expedition on the Texas plains against the Comanche and Kiowa." In between that action was the crushing boredom of garrison duty, and Pettis also "adeptly records the monotony of garrison life at remote military posts in the desert of West Texas as well as the army headquarters at Fort Marcy in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the Union fortresses of Fort Craig and Fort Union."

The preeminent historian of the Civil War in the Southwest, Jerry Thompson organizes Pettis's writings into three parts: memoirs (Pettis's recollections of the Confederate invasion, frontier duty, and the Battle of Adobe Walls), newspaper articles, and letters. Thompson's introduction, around two-dozen pages in length, serves as a background resource and mini-biography of Pettis. Extensive explanatory endnotes also accompany Thompson's editing of Pettis's prolific body of writings.

Booknotes: Ironclad Ambush

New Arrival:

• Ironclad Ambush: Confederates Strike Lincoln's Mississippi River Blockade at the Head of Passes, October 12, 1861 by Neil P. Chatelain (Savas Beatie, 2026).

I was excited to read news of this title's upcoming release. I've always been interested in the CSS Manassas, from its ungainly appearance resembling a surfaced whale to its managing to achieve that rarest of Confederate ironclad feats, fighting an offensive battle on its own terms (at Head of Passes) and achieving some success with it. Readers can find decent accounts of the battle in the literature, but Neil Chatelain's Ironclad Ambush: Confederates Strike Lincoln's Mississippi River Blockade at the Head of Passes, October 12, 1861 "is the first book-length treatment of this pivotal naval action."

From the description: "In early October 1861, United States warships entered the Head of Passes, where the Mississippi River’s multiple entrances converge into a single channel. The occupation simplified the blockade by enabling a handful of ships to seal off the “father of waters” and cut off supplies to New Orleans. Confederate Capt. George N. Hollins recognized the danger, assembled a makeshift flotilla, and launched a surprise attack on these enemy vessels."

Given the typical result of Civil War clashes between Union and Confederate squadrons, few of which were even-matched, the outcome was an embarrassment to the early-war U.S. Navy. More from the description: "The Battle of the Head of Passes marked the Civil War’s first major fleet engagement. The Southern privateer ironclad ram Manassas smashed into USS Richmond, and as the Federals retreated toward the Gulf of Mexico, two blockaders ran aground and crews abandoned ship as Confederate gunboats closed in. The clash represented the Confederacy’s first major naval victory, the first use of an ironclad in North American waters, and the first direct challenge to President Lincoln’s blockade."

Ironclad Ambush seeks to address persistent questions related to the battle at Head of Passes, among them: "Why did U.S. forces initially enter the Head of Passes? Why did Hollins seek to counter them? Which ships were involved? Why did two blockading crews abandon their vessels mid-battle? Why did the Confederates withdraw yet claim victory? Why does this seemingly minor and often overlooked engagement matter?" Moving beyond the battle, Chatelain's study also "unravels the complexities and contradictions of early Civil War coastal and riverine naval operations and places them within the context of the war."

Review - "Henry Eustace McCulloch: Texas Ranger, Legislator, Civil War General" by David Paul Smith

[Henry Eustace McCulloch: Texas Ranger, Legislator, Civil War General by David Paul Smith (Louisiana State University Press, 2026). Hardcover, 6 maps, photos, appendix section, endnotes, bibliography, index. Pages main/total:xiv,216/297. ISBN:978-0-8071-8599-5. $49.95]

Brothers Henry E. McCulloch and Benjamin McCulloch inhabited closely connected frontier lives. Though both were born and raised in Tennessee, their most enduring association with place was with the Republic and later state of Texas. The pair made a living as land surveyors and were notable Indian fighters, legislators, lawmen, famed Texas Rangers, and Mexican War veterans. Enthusiastic Confederates, Ben and Henry served as brigadier generals in the Trans-Mississippi theater. Ben achieved greater heights, commanding the small army that was victorious at Wilson's Creek in August 1861 and leading the Confederate contingent of Earl Van Dorn's combined army the following March at Pea Ridge (where he was killed in action very early on in the battle), but Henry served much longer, mostly in district-level administrative posts. Far exceeding his brother in the realm of historical memory, the elder McCulloch received full biographical treatment in 1993 with the publication of Thomas Cutrer's well-received book Ben McCulloch and the Frontier Military Tradition. It is only now, through David Paul Smith's excellent Henry Eustace McCulloch: Texas Ranger, Legislator, Civil War General, that Henry's life has been accorded the same level of comprehensive scholarly attention.

Perhaps due to source limitations, Henry's childhood and early life are summarized over only a handful of pages, and McCulloch is already well into his Texas period in the volume's opening chapter. Henry missed the pivotal Battle of San Jacinto but joined a Ranger company in 1838 to oppose Waco and Comanche raids. As Rangers, the McCulloch brothers distinguished themselves during the Great Comanche Raid of 1840, and Henry was wounded at the Battle of Plum Creek. Henry also opposed a major Mexican incursion into Texas in 1842. During the 1846-48 war with Mexico, Henry's volunteer Ranger service was with the U.S. Army. His unwanted diversion to Indian frontier patrol duty instead of riding into Mexico meant that he missed the glory and notoriety that other Texas Rangers achieved during the war's decisive campaigning. In Smith's view, this was the primary reason behind Henry not achieving the lasting fame that was attached to other Texas Rangers such as brother Ben.

During the 1850s, Henry McCulloch also swerved toward politics, serving in the legislature where he strongly advocated for state spending on frontier defense. The federal government was ostensibly responsible for protecting Texas settlements from Indian attacks, but the assignment of mostly infantry to the frontier produced an ineffective static defense that only improved when the new 2nd U.S. Cavalry regiment arrived. McCulloch also briefly flirted with the Know-Nothing Party before abandoning it in 1856 in favor of supporting James Buchanan in that year's presidential election.

A keen supporter of the new Confederacy, McCulloch played a major part in securing the surrender of U.S. troops and supplies in Texas during the 1860-61 secession crisis. He later was elected colonel of the twelve-month First Regiment, Texas Mounted Riflemen, which was tasked with protecting the sparsely populated western counties while other Texas troops headed to those parts of the state, the coastline and eastern border, where it was presumed they might encounter invading Union land and naval forces. One of the reasons why Smith is particularly well suited to be Henry McCulloch's biographer is that he literally wrote the book (1992's Frontier Defense in the Civil War: Texas' Rangers and Rebels) on the complicated military and political facets of Texas frontier defense during the 1861-65 period. Given logistical constraints, the vastness of the western frontier border, and the mobility and stealth of the raiders, it was impossible to stop all Indian incursions into Texas, but McCulloch, drawing upon past experience, developed a reasonably effective system of defense that achieved notable successes.

Upon conclusion of his regiment's term of enlistment, McCulloch was assigned a district command in NE Texas. The Confederate defeat at Pea Ridge sparked a major reorientation of Texas forces in the region. That flood of Texas regiments going to the aid of Arkansas and points beyond passed through McCulloch's district, where he diligently applied his headquarters and staff toward organizing and supplying the ragged arrivals for active service in the field. McCulloch himself briefly led a division before being superseded by John G. Walker. As a brigade commander in Walker's Texas Division, McCulloch directed the June 7, 1863 Battle of Milliken's Bend. Hamstrung by poor decision-making from those up the chain of command, McCulloch and his men nevertheless fought well against a determined foe, inflicting heavy casualties upon the Union defenders of the post (who were saved by the timely arrival of Union naval support). It would be the only major action against Union forces that Henry would lead in person during the entire war, a circumstance that undoubtedly contributed much to his remaining a relatively obscure Civil War general.

McCulloch would serve out the rest of the war occupying major administrative positions in his home state. His Northern Sub-District was the size of South Carolina, and in leading it he was tasked with strict enforcement of conscription law and suppression of armed bands of "brush men." This great abundance of army deserters, anti-Confederate draft dodgers, and general criminal types infesting the district outnumbered McCulloch's own forces (some unreliable themselves) by some margin. Determined to be fair-minded toward his fellow Texans, McCulloch tried both conciliatory measures and harsh approaches (though, in the latter case, Smith credits him for earnest attempts at stamping out the excesses perpetrated by subordinates such as James Bourland), but the task of reining in all of the anti-government violence in the region was an impossible one. In addition to that, McCulloch had to manage his district's significant supply, manufacturing, and munitions depots while at the same time dividing his attention among Indian raids from the west and the possibility of Union invasion from the north (via Indian Territory) and east (through occupied parts of Arkansas). Smith's overall assessment of McCulloch as a district commander from 1863-65 is one of an energetic and diligent military administrator who did the best he could under extreme hardships and circumstances.

As explained in the book's final chapter covering McCulloch's post-Civil War life, Henry worked to quickly restore his family's financial and social footing, building up extensive ranch properties and holding state postings such as superintendent of Texas's Institution for the Deaf and Dumb and employment with the State Land Board. He also returned to politics. In addition to being involved in the general brouhaha surrounding the Coke-Davis gubernatorial contest that ended Radical Republican leadership in the state, McCulloch became a leading figure in the new People's Party before declining health forced his retirement from public service.

David Paul Smith's fine biography firmly and persuasively reestablishes Henry E. McCulloch as a major figure in the nineteenth-century political and military history of Texas. Along with its groundbreaking biographical features, Smith's study contributes mightily to our knowledge and understanding of Texas's western frontier border defense before and during the Civil War. The book's detailed account of McCulloch's leadership of Confederate Texas district commands from the war's middle period onward also significantly illuminates the many challenges involved with sustaining the war effort along key parts of the state's northern frontier while also attempting to manage the growing dissent that erupted across the region. Highly recommended.

Booknotes: Researching Your Civil War Ancestor

New Arrival:

• Researching Your Civil War Ancestor: A Guide to Understanding Civil War Pension Files and Legislation by J.L.D. Woodruff (Savas Beatie, 2026).

"There is no better place to start researching the wartime experiences and postwar lives of your Civil War ancestors than the pension files held at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington, D.C.," and author J.L.D. (Laurie) Woodruff’s Researching Your Civil War Ancestor: A Guide to Understanding Civil War Pension Files and Legislation provides "a step-by-step guide to finding and unlocking this priceless information."

The same body of information that helped soldiers and their families file pension claims back then remains an invaluable tool for the inquisitive descendants and Civil War researchers of today to utilize. From the description: Pension files "reveal detailed information about the soldier, his wife, and his children: What happened to him during the war? How did it affect his health and life afterward? When and where was he born, and when did he die? What were his children’s names and dates of birth? When and where did the soldier and his wife marry? Where did they live? What did he do for a living?" Answers to many other questions emerge from the process, too. Of course, the amount of information available varies by individual and claim. As Damian Shiels recently highlighted in his celebrated recent study of Irish Americans in the Union armed forces during the war, pensions files can also contain supplemental letters and documentation (submitted at the time from a variety of sources to support claims by widows and dependents) that are a gold mine for modern research.

More from the description: Woodruff's guide "begins with a concise history of the pension system and a description—with examples—of the documents typically found in these files. Next, it explains how to locate your ancestor’s pension files and obtain copies of their complete contents through various methods." Because getting the most out of the pension records requires some knowledge and understanding of the legislation that created the system and modified it over time, the book also addresses those key elements. "Finally, it guides readers on accessing and interpreting Civil War pension legislation. Every public act passed by Congress from 1861 to 1958 that addressed Civil War pensions is summarized, with links provided to the original texts online." A sampling of high-quality scans of these documents and records offer the reader a sense of what to expect.

The appendix section makes up more than two-thirds of the volume. In it, one can find more detailed explanations of pension record index cards (which came in eight types); full wording of pension legislation, joint congressional resolutions, and other documents; and author commentary related to current estimates of pension claim totals.