Booknotes: The Fight for the Old North State

New Arrival:
• The Fight for the Old North State: The Civil War in North Carolina, January-May 1864
  by Hampton Newsome (UP of Kansas, 2019).

Standalone studies of mid to late war Confederate efforts in tidewater North Carolina to retake important posts lost since 1862 are rare birds. I counted myself lucky to get James White's slim New Bern volume a year ago, not knowing that Hampton Newsome was already in the latter stages of a more ambitious project of his own. Between Robert E. Lee's initial proposal in January 1864 and the opening in earnest of the Overland Campaign in Virginia that May, Confederate eyes turned toward North Carolina and Newsome's The Fight for the Old North State: The Civil War in North Carolina, January-May 1864 covers all operations in the area during that period. Lee's January dispatch to President Davis "would precipitate a momentous series of events as the Confederates, threatened by a supply crisis and an emerging peace movement, sought to seize Federal bases in eastern North Carolina. This book tells the story of these operations—the late war Confederate resurgence in the Old North State."

More from the description: "Using rail lines to rapidly consolidate their forces, the Confederates would attack the main Federal position at New Bern in February, raid the northeastern counties in March, hit the Union garrisons at Plymouth and Washington in late April, and conclude with another attempt at New Bern in early May. The expeditions would involve joint-service operations, as the Confederates looked to support their attacks with powerful, homegrown ironclad gunboats. These offensives in early 1864 would witness the failures and successes of southern commanders including George Pickett, James Cooke, and a young, aggressive North Carolinian named Robert Hoke. Likewise they would challenge the leadership of Union army and naval officers such as Benjamin Butler, John Peck, and Charles Flusser." 

Both author and publisher are well versed in the importance of cartography to detailed studies of this kind, and there are 18 original maps included. In the appendix section, you'll find opposing orders of battle for New Bern and Plymouth as well as estimated casualty tables for the latter fight.

Though primarily a military study, the book "does not neglect the broader context, revealing how these military events related to a contested gubernatorial election; the social transformations in the state brought on by the war; the execution of Union prisoners at Kinston; and the activities of North Carolina Unionists."

Of the books scheduled for release over the first half of the year, this is one of my most highly anticipated reads. I hope to get to it soon.