No comments about With the light guns in 61-65: Reminiscences of eleven Arkansas, Missouri, and Texas light batteries in the Civil War.

1 comments about The Alabama Confederate Reader (Library of Alabama Classics).

1. The late Dr. Malcolm McMillan, Head of the History Department of Auburn University, offers the only thoroughly-researched documentary of Alabama's role in the Confederacy. Utilizing the painstaking research for which he was well-known, Dr. McMillan manages to assemble a multitude of primary documents in a highly readable and valuable history. Providing his own short narratives as a segue, he produced the most comprehensive work on Alabama as a Confederate State. Just as his "Constitutional Development In Alabama" remains the most authoritative work on Alabama's six constititutions, his "Confederate Reader" is of such value that its mere existence has warded off foolhardy attempts by modern historians to duplicate or enhance it. This reviewer would also recommend Dr. McMillan's last work, concerning Alabama's three Civil War governors. Together with the "Confederate Reader", Dr. McMillan managed in his lifetime to achieve that level of pre-eminence occupied by Thomas Owen and A.B. Moore. Today's historians would do well to emulate the devotion of Dr. McMillan to research, the fundamental element of quality in historical writing.

No comments about Robert E. Lee (American War Biographies).

4 comments about Whip the Rebellion: Ulysses S. Grant's Rise to Command.

1. If u already know the history of GRANT in the CW, this book adds nothing. ZERO. With the provocative subtitle of Grant's rise to command, I expected tactical and strategic analysis and evaluation of grant's development as commander. This is just another rehashed history of Grant's campaigns with a few vignettes thrown in. By the way, it has NO MAPS or PICTURES.
   USELESS. DO NOT BUY THIS JUNK!



2. If the name "Ulysses S. Grant" means nothing to you other than "that bearded dude on the fifty dollar bill," this book might serve as a decent enough "introductory" volume. Otherwise, it is nothing more than yet another dismal waste of dead trees. The author (working, I assume, under an extremely short publishing deadline,) merely spliced together material from older, weightier books on Grant and the Civil War--and I'd be shocked to learn that he bothered to read any of those books more than once.
   
   Call me finicky, but when did original research and intellectual curiosity become unfashionable in historical circles? I am not a professional historian, but even I am aware that there is a wealth of unpublished and/or ignored primary source material on Grant's personality and career, just begging to be mined. Why do so many writers instead settle for cranking out lazy retreads of the same old books?
   
   Let me add another, admittedly less significant complaint--this is yet another Grant book that features one seriously ugly cover. Why is it that the covers of so many recent books about an attractive man like Ulysses Grant perversely display pictures that make him look like a dyspeptic werewolf?



3. A "beer n pretzel game" is a war game that is easy to learn and fun to play. While they do not require a great deal from you, you can have a good time with them. George Walsh's Civil War books are "beer n pretzel" books, easy to read, informative and great fun. They are an excellent introduction to a subject. While providing the more experienced reader a good review relaxation and enjoyment. My expectations are that I will enjoy myself without having to think overly much. "Whip the Rebellion" meets my expectations while surprising me a couple of times. First and foremost, this is a fun read while being informative.
   
   The book provides a good overview of Grant's rise to command without burdening the reader with all of the complex side issues. The book gives us a glimpse of the early relationship between Grant & Halleck, with enough details to help us understand it. Did Grant drink? This book has a simple but very good and complete coverage of the subject. The complexities of Mead's command problems are not given adequate coverage but are mentioned in passing, as they did not change the main story line. The book lacks maps but this is to common lately. Faulting Walsh for not writing a complex history is like faulting Pfanz for not writing "beer n pretzel" history. You need to know your author or look the book over.



4. I have been a Civil War buff for over 30 years and have seldom paid attention to Grants western phase of the war. I am more of an army of northern virginia and army of the potomac aspect. HOwever, this book not only filled in many blanks for me, it also has opened me to wanting to read many of the books referenced in it's covers and to explore this aspect that I have largely ignored.
   
   The book was well written and easy to read, and I recommend it to any enthusiast.

No comments about Clara James Herrick: A Memoir.

No comments about Semmes: Rebel Raider (Potomac Books' Military Profile Series).

3 comments about Black Judas: William Hannibal Thomas and the American Negro.

1. Black Judas provides the first biography of William Hannibal Thomas, who betrayed his race by writing The American Negro, an insulting attack on Afro-Americans. Black Judas examines the roots of Thomas' thinking and his transformation from an optimistic black nationalist to a man who attacked his race. The detail and in-depth coverage is invaluable.



2. In words that only a white bigot could appreciate, william hannibal thomas uses all manor of invective to decry the condition of his own black race. In his book 'the american negro', published in l901 by macmillan, thomas decries the condition of what he still called freedmen, 36 years after emancipation. Ironically, in the decades before publication of the book, thomas had been a most intelligent observer of conditions for blacks in the post-bellum south. he pointed out the degradation that had occurred as a result of the violence and intimidation by whites, angry at the privileges they lost from the civil war. attempts at race redemption were thwarted at every turn and there was no better example than the life of thomas himself. Thomas had some education as he grew up in ohio, partially as a result of brief schooling in his teen years and the rest from the efforts of his mother. he fought courageously alongside both free blacks and newly-freed slaves in the civil war, losing an arm in the final months of combat. The turning point in thomas's life as well as those of his darker skinned brethren was the election of l876 in which the election of rutherford b. hayes was traded for the end of reconstruction, removal of federal troops from the south, and the betrayal of the negro by resumption of white rule for the benefits of whites south of the mason-dixon line. in the process, thomas lost a seat in the south carolina legislature he gained by public vote and soon had to leave the state because improprieties and scandal of his own making made him a fugitive from the courts. the author of this biography, john david smith, pulls no punches in describing the wayward and sometimes corrupt behavior of thomas, but also presents evidence to redeem the character of the man who was to become a target of black leaders across the country. in many publications and speeches as a minister, thomas decried the conditions of former slaves in the south. neoslavery is the term used by thomas to describe the loss of the promise of the war and war amendments in the decades that followed. education, training and land were what was needed, but thomas also felt that moral transformation from the degradation and dependence fostered by slavery was of the utmost need. yet thomas deserted his wife and children, leaving them on public assistance in philadelphia, and eventually found a new wife and settled in in a suburb of boston. it was there that all the frustrations and failures to achieve national fame as a leader of his race came to a head. the constant pain from his wound also is said to play a major part in the transformation from an observer and critic of race relations to an unrepentent cynic and enemy of his own race. web dubois makes the obvious point that what is important in thomas's book is not the content, but what caused a black man to foresake his own race, perhaps to gain favor from those who had driven him to write it by their own degraded behavior with the blatantly stated purpose of maintaining political, social, and economic hegemony in the south. Despite all this, thomas has something to say to twenty-first century americans, black and white. redemption for the african-american, and just as much for the entire country, does not come from political action and social improvement. the moral content of each individual must be transformed or regenerated or the bonds of slavery will not be taken all the way off.



3. It is extremely racist for the author and other "liberals" to denounce William Hannibal Thomas for "betraying" his "race." Isn't "race" a fiction? A mulatto is not a Negro. Thomas was really no different from the average mulatto in his views regarding mulatto superiority and Negro inferiority. He was just more public about it. Even your mulatto "black" hero W.E.B. DuBois believed in mulatto superiority. What do you think his "Talented Tenth" was? Do you recall how DuBois described Marcus Garvey in the most perjorative racial terms because the latter was black and not mulatto?
   
   If the liberal author condemns Thomas as a "race traitor," then he is indirectly endorsing the view of white supremacists who believe in white "race traitors." If "race" is not a biological fact, how can there be any "race traitors"?
   
   In defense of Thomas and other Anglo mulattoes and mixed-whites who proudly reject the black stigma, may I ask why Latinos (also a mixed race, partially black group), Indians, Asians, etc. have never been condemned for the same "sins" of looking down on blacks and identifying more with whites? Mexican elites, for example, were willing to condemn blacks as inferior as long as Mexicans as a group could have the honored label of "white." Why don't they receive the condemnation and sneering that Anglos of mixed-race receive even when they just live their lives and make no statements on "race"? Why? Why don't liberals rejoice at THEIR misfortunes and proclaim that the uppity in-betweens had it coming to them?
   
   Smith should condemn himself as a "racist" for promoting the "one drop" myth and forced hypodescent. As a liberal, he misleads people of good will into endorsing anti-mulatto racism as a defense of blacks. That is the source of the "race traitor" accusation against William Hannibal Thomas. He is being used as a scapegoat.Legal History of the Color Line: The Rise And Triumph of the One-drop Rule

1 comments about Killing the Messenger: Journalists at Risk in Modern Warfare.

1. When a Japanese sniper killed legendary journalist Ernie Pyle during World War Two, it was largely incidental and accidental when reporters died while covering warfare. In today's world, however, reporters are often the selected targets of political and religious terrorists seeking to maximize the reach of their message and the impact of their actions. In Killing the Messenger: Journalists at Risk in Modern Warfare, Herbert Foerstel examines why the practice of covering war has changed over time, becoming arguably more dangerous for reporters. War itself has, since World War Two, changed from conflicts between established nations to violent squabbles--often ethnic or religious in nature--between disorganized armed factions in remote regions of third-world countries or revolutionary uprisings against the governments of those nations.
   Foerstel interviews reporters who have been kidnapped, tortured or seen their fellow journalists--both American and foreign-- killed while doing their jobs. Those he interviews tell of how the strategic political entanglements of their native nations can make it difficult for reporters to be trusted by their suspicious sources, especially in Middle Eastern conflicts, where, in many minds, "America" equals "Israel," which, to many Muslims, is the political and religious equivalent of Satan. Kidnapped Chicago Tribune correspondent Phillip Caputo, for instance, tells of how it was almost a fatal mistake to carry two old Israeli business cards into Lebanon while covering the fedayeen in 1973. On the other side, sources tell of Israeli and American soldiers "accidentally" destroying equipment or killing correspondents seen as purveyors of propaganda.
   Foerstel discusses reasons why journalists have gone from enjoying "hands off" status--as they had during the Viet Nam war--to being prized targets. Not listed among the reasons are that they are symbols of "freedom," as some would have us believe. The reasons in reality are, sadly, much more cynical. First, reporters have monetary value. Kidnappers believe they can bargain for ransom with the media outlets for whom the journalists work and, indeed, have been paid handsomely in the past for the safe return of reporters. Next is publicity. Kidnappers know that reporters suddenly disappearing make world headlines and that any political message attached thereto gets broadcast and rebroadcast. Another reason news gathering has become more dangerous is the loss of objectivity. Reporters in the west have, especially since 9/11, felt compelled to take sides in global conflicts, echoing the "civilization versus terror" party lines of the Bush and Blair regimes. This has not gone unnoticed in the Middle East where the pro-West advocacy is seen by many as an anti-Islamic hostility. Finally, there is the dangerous and arguably stupid practice of intelligence agencies around the world using press credentials as cover for its operatives. The execution of journalists can be the only expected result as paranoid revolutionaries and terrorists find it hard to believe that a reporter in a sensitive area is who he says he is.
   
   In the final section of the book, Foerster examines some suggestions from the journalistic community regarding ways to keep reporters safer while they cover events in combat zones. The challenge, reporters say, is to stay safe without compromising news-gathering. Some suggestions are realistic "hostile environment" training, the use of "fixers," who are essentially local residents of dangerous areas who know the ins and outs of setting up meetings with newsworthy persons or getting into (and out of) hostile areas, better security training for American journalists (who have long lagged behind European journalists in this regard), and embedding reporters with military units charged with their safety. Some have even suggested--to the chagrin of many journalists--that journalists be armed and charged with their own protection.
   Killing the Messenger is thoroughly researched, very well written and the interviews, especially those with reporters who have been the victims of kidnapping and torture, are compelling. A recommended read.

No comments about McClellan's Own Story: The War for the Union; The Soldiers Who Fought It and The Civilians Who Directed It.

1 comments about Emma Spaulding Bryant: Civil War Bride, Carpetbagger's Wife, Ardent Feminist: Letters 18601900 (Reconstructing America).

1. Deftly compiled and edited with narrative by Ruth Douglas Currie (Professor of History and Political Science, Warren Wilson College, Asheville, North Carolina), Emma Spaulding Bryant Civil War Bride, Carpetbagger's Wife, Ardent Feminist - Letters And Diaries 1860-1900 is an extraordinary biographical collection of correspondence and writings that detail the life of a woman of faith, integrity, and high moral principles, who learned the hard way to become self-sufficient during years when her husband's demanding political career brought about long periods of separation. Her eloquence deftly reveals her experiences with poverty and hardship, as well as her own political passion and championing of the agendas of women's rights and temperance. A revealing portrait of late nineteenth and early twentieth century America, as surely as it is the captivating tale of a strong-willed, outspoken woman's life.