October is going to be a great month for CW military history

After a lamest of lame summer, October is shaping up to be a banner month for new Civil War military history releases:

* The Battle of Pilot Knob: Thunder in Arcadia Valley by Bryce Suderow and Scott House. Decades ago, Bryce Suderow authored the first full length modern account of Pilot Knob. The new material in this revised 2nd edition, co-authored with Scott House, makes it twice the length of the original.

* Soldiers in the Army of Freedom: The 1st Kansas Colored, the Civil War's First African American Combat Unit by Ian Spurgeon. "(T)he first black regiment raised in a northern state, and the first black unit to see combat during the Civil War," this book is the first 1st Kansas regimental history.

* Work for Giants: The Campaign and Battle of Tupelo/Harrisburg, Mississippi, June-July 1864 by Thomas Parson. "Firsts" are becoming a common theme here. The Tupelo campaign and battle comprised a large part of Ed Bearss's Forrest at Brice's Crossroads and in North Mississippi in 1864, but no book has been devoted solely to the operation until now. For a detailed preview, see the author's feature article in the current issue of Blue and Gray Magazine.

* The Early Morning of War: Bull Run, 1861 by Ed Longacre. Harry and legions of others have been waiting for an all encompassing FBR study of this type for a long time. Here's wishing our high hopes will not be dashed.

* Shiloh: Conquer or Perish by Timothy Smith.  Finally, a Shiloh history that doesn't hurry itself over the battle's 2nd day. We should also look forward to it as a career's worth of highly respected Shiloh expertise put to page.

* To Retain Command of the Mississippi: The Civil War Naval Campaign for Memphis by Edward McCaul.  Perhaps the most neglected of the major Mississippi naval confrontations, the gunboat battles for control of the Memphis stretch of river get a book of their own at last.