5 comments about General Lee: A Biography of Robert E. Lee.

1. from the prospective that it does include personal letters from Lee. The recounting of the campaigns is prefunctory though Fitzhugh does come down heavily on Longstreet and eagerly takes up the cudgel for the Gettysburg-wasn't-Lee's-fault crowd.



2. As a the great-great-great-great grandson of Robert W. Lee and his slave/mistress Ophelia, I thought this book provided a profound insight into the life of the man who led the Army of Northen Virginia to so many improbable victories.



3. I am a student of the civil war, and I've made most of my studies from Actual Memoirs of the event. I figured that I'd rather take the word of the people who were actually there than 3rd person commentary. I've read Grant, Sheridan, J.B. Gordon, E.P. Alexander, and of course, Sam Watkins, Frank Wilkeson, and Berry Benson, to name some of the best. Regrettably, Robert Lee died before he could record his own personal reminiscences. Through my desire to read about him in the same way I'd read about other participants of the war, I found this book-and I figured that Fitzhugh Lee's biography would be as near as I could get to the famed General, for Fitzhugh Lee was not only a Relative of the famed General's, but a General himself in the War of the Rebellion. Half way through the book, I felt thoroughly betrayed. After the first 70 pages, the book becomes the most average of monologues about the movements of troops during the civil war. The only difference between this book and the memoirs of certain other officers engaged in the same battles is the Fitzhugh Starts his recitations with, "General Lee's Order were that...", and has less maps, that usually ease the strain of describing obscure movements.
   I will say, though, that the author does spend at least a quarter of the book On the life of R.E. Lee outside of the civil war- the first 70 pages focusing on his Lineage, his training at West point, and his engagements in Mexico, and the Last 20 on his Presidency at Washington-Lee College. Also, sparsely placed throughout the book, Fitzhugh makes use of General Lee's personal correspondance with his wife and family. I would have appreciated seeing more of that, but people 150 years late to the party can't be choosers. Of the Author's style, it is mostly factual, highly romantic(though nothing like Gordon's memoir), and at times he makes allusions and references that let you know he's highly intelligent. This Book doesn't make any in-depth study of General Lee, and mostly considers his character to be untouchable....



4. ...read and enjoyed this book. Being the recently acknowledged illegitimate child of General Lee, I agree that it is a worthy book.



5. I found this book to be wonderful. I used it in a research report and it was very helpful. It stood out among the other hundreds of Lee biographies

4 comments about The Custer Story: The Life and Intimate Letters of General George A. Custer and His Wife Elizabeth (Bison Book).

1. To the points made in several reviews - just because Libby Custer expresses something, doesn't necessarily make her history any more valid. Very few histories are not tainted in some way by the presenting historian - and most that are not are just boring facts. I am sure Luise Jodl also expressed deep love, and that Gen. Jodl in a similar fashion was a devoted husband, and at times struggling, conflicted military leader. In the Custer histories, the troubles come when we retroactively apply the standards and culture of today as the lens for viewing and judging a completely different timeframe. What personal letters and direct history such as this book provide is an unfiltered view of how the individuals of that time saw, judged, and created their circumstances. It renders history as "real," and in that sense is invaulable. However, again the source must always be considered. I'm sure the private diaries and letters of Frederick Benteen - describing facts as he saw them - might render a differing perspective :-)



2. I grew up like most people being fed the lies of Hollywood and those with an ax to grind about American history and blamed George Custer.
   I have read 3 books now on the Custers, My Life on the Plains, Boots and Saddles by his wonderful wife Libby and now this one of their personal letters.
   In all of these books, the reader will find a husband and wife emerge who were deeply in love with each other, solid in their Christian faith, of good morals, temperate, loved and respected by all....who enjoyed life to it's fullest.
   General Custer even emerges as thee soldier who did not want the Indian Wars, and, for an extra history eye opener, you will find he went to great lengths to rescue the Cheyenne from military confrontation....a people who would later massacre him and his command at Little Big Horn.
   I can not say enough positive about this book. It is the truth and is a wonderful read with insights to America from the view of people who actually were part of our history.
   Where else are you going to read that Vice President Andrew Johnson was drunk at Lincoln's Inaugural from the eye witness Libby Custer.
   This is real...this is true. You will find a General who was always careful in his planning....never reckless as his late critics spout in so many lies.
   George and Libby Custer's words should be REQUIRED reading by all the "experts" before they are allowed to publish their thoughts on people they never knew.
   This is a cheap book...and worth 10 times the cost.



3. From the Foreword: "This assembling of their intimate letters was prepared at Mrs. Custer's request. ...[T]here are personal things one cannot say or suffer to be said during one's lifetime, but which ought to be said. For some decades, ending in 1933 at her death, I was [Mrs. Custer's] nearest friend."

   Originally published in 1950, this reprint of Ms. Merrington's work interleaves selections from the personal letters of the Custers between a sympathetic narrative of their personal lives, providing an intimate view of his controversial career and their happy marriage. We see him as he leaves his family homestead in New Rumley, Ohio, for a military education at West Point; spy long glimpses of him during his rise to prominence in the Union Cavalry to early fame as the acclaimed Boy General; saunter alongside as he courts Judge Bacon's daughter Libby in Monroe, Michigan; march behind him during his daring campaign on the Washita; sit in silent shock during his unwarranted court martial; and watch with growing trepidation as he delivers his forthright testimony before Congress about the mismanagement by the War Department immediately prior to his return to Fort Lincoln and his final campaign in the Dakota Territory. We see Custer through his own eyes, and through the eyes of his devoted wife, and what we view is a portrait of a strong, courageous leader whose skill, gallantry, and wit account for his remarkably successful military career. It is customary in these later years to deny the underlying truth of this view and paint the man in colors few of his contemporaries would recognize. But there are enough artists of history to paint horns where none may have existed; we may suffer the Custers to sketch a faded halo above his engaging visage, and let it serve to counter the later brushstrokes of politically corrected historians and politicians.




4. In studying history and people in history we usually base our opinions on second and third hand descriptions of people. In the case of George Custer, a voluminous writer; we have his book, articles and these edited letters to his wife. While these letters are edited, they do give us insights into the character and personality of this man from which to form our own opinions. Readers will likely react differently to the same passages based on their response to the words expressed. Taken in the context of the society of the time, we can each draw conclusions relative to his intelligence, wit and character. History is considerably more real and more alive when we have such an advantage to get to know its' participants.

2 comments about Yearning to Breathe Free: Robert Smalls of South Carolina and His Families.

1. Robert Smalls (1839 - 1915) is a little known figure outside of South Carolina but he deserves to be known by everyone, especially by those who love great stories.
   
   I stumbled upon the story of Smalls's infamous escape as a slave during the American Civil War (May 1862) by accident. Several years later after thorough ongoing research has rewarded my diligence with finding this book by Billingsley.
   
   The author takes a sociological approach throughout making it for an interesting angle to consider the life and accomplishments of Smalls.
   
   There are several other fine books available about Robert Smalls - mostly out of print - so this edition is updated, accurate, fairly comprehensive and a rich source for understanding Smalls.
   
   Well-documented and carefully researched.



2. The book Yearning to Breathe Free is biographical novel which pertains to the life of Robert Smalls of South Carolina and his family. I enjoyed reading this book because it includes lots of factual information regarding to the over all purpose of Robert Smalls as being an influential person in history. I have read several other biographical novels about the lives of slaves, congressman and even statesmen. Those books failed to acknowledge evidence about the individuals life because they were mostly opinionated books about slavery and its importance. In Billingsley, Yearning to Breathe Free he includes numerators amounts of accounts of Smalls life which proves ideas stated about Smalls as being true and factual information. Additional to the factual information he includes a bibliography and index that reference all the sources required for him to right the biography on Robert Smalls of South Carolina. This will help readers like myself further my knowledge and understanding about Robert Smalls go don't be afraid to purchase it today on Amazon.

No comments about The Lincoln Assassination: The Evidence.

1 comments about Pickett's Charge: Eyewitness Accounts At The Battle Of Gettysburg (Stackpole Military History Series).

1. Contains lots of 1st person accounts of various stages of Pickett's charge (a.k.a. PPT charge, after Pickett Pettigrew & Trimble). Contains narratives from both the Confederate and Union perspectives, with details leading up to the charge (including preparation & cannonade), as well as multiple accounts leading up to and at the climax of the attack.
   
   A great supplement to any more general treatise - as the emphasis on micro-details, having a good general knowledge of the subject would be quite helpful.

1 comments about Army Life in a Black Regiment: and Other Writings (Penguin Classics).

1. Several years ago I urged John Seelye to edit this work for Penguin. A couple of years after that, he asked me to do it instead, and I did. This is a remarkable book about a literate Yankee (Higginson "discovered" the poet Emily Dickinson) who "discovers" the South. It's also "about" Black soldiers in a white war, white officers in a Black regiment, self-discovery, rivers, and hope. Much of the imagery and characterization in the movie GLORY seems to have been lifted from this book: it is, after all, a first-hand narrative of war by an idealist sorely tested by politics and physical hardship. Higginson's writing of the book is in part his attempt to deal with what today we would call Post-Traumatic-Stress Disorder, and it is no wonder that the tone sometimes reminds the reader of Hemingway's "Big Two-Hearted River." Because the teller of this story emerges as an interesting person per se, this edition includes some of his other essays, ranging from his fascination with slave rebellion to his appreciation for poetry.

No comments about Memoirs of General W.T. Sherman, both volumes in a single file.

3 comments about Father Abraham: Lincoln's Relentless Struggle to End Slavery.

1. I picked this up in a general English language bookstore here in Bangkok, without any expectations, encouraged only by the fact that James McPherson strongly recommends it on the back cover. It's a beautifully researched, well-written, engaging, and convincing overview of Lincoln's attitudes to slavery and emancipation.
   
   The author has a strong thesis and a clear point of view, but whatever your views on Lincoln are at the start, you won't feel bullied (always my experience when I read anti-Lincoln books). The author demolishes all the old arguments for the view that Lincoln had no interest in ending slavery.
   
   The opening chapters were the best and clearest single summary of the build-up to the civil war that I have yet read.
   
   Let me mention two things that I did not understand before I read this book, that I now understand fully, and that most people still have serious misconceptions about.
   
   First, it is often claimed that the civil war was at least partly, and perhaps mostly, caused by an argument over 'tariffs' and only partly by the debate over slavery. Striner points out that John Calhoun, the most famous opponent of the tariffs, was at first very much in favor of them. He later reversed his position. Why? Because it dawned on him that federally funded projects might not just lead to things like roads and railroads (which he was in favor of), but also to publicly funded emancipation of slaves (which he was against). People like Calhoun also felt (and stated at the time) that the tariff issue was just a test case for blocking the power of central government in general, and that their only goal in blocking that power was to prevent any future constitutional interference with slavery.
   
   Second, I used to think that Lincoln 'only wanted to save the union' and saw emancipation as a means to that end. I now see that that was a very simplistic view. The threat to the union only arose in the first place because of the argument over slavery. Lincoln was against its expansion into new territories, because he (rightly) felt that its expansion meant its perpetuation, while its containment in the slave states held out the possibility of its extinction. Through his entire political career after the repeal of the Missouri compromise, he was driven by that desire to bring about the eventual extinction of slavery.
   
   Once his election had caused secession (because of his anti-slavery stance) he then insisted on saving the union, but not if that meant compromising his goal of extinguishing slavery, his original purpose in entering politics in the first place. His goal was to preserve a union still dedicated to what he considered its original principles of human equality and freedom. This account of his thinking seems to me to make far more overall sense.
   
   If you are cynical about Lincoln, or about politics in general, read this book and feel free to take a more positive view.



2. It has become fashionable in recent decades for historians and commentators from the extremes of the ideological spectrum to depict Lincoln as a cautious racial conservative, even a racist, only brought in the end to reluctantly embrace the destruction of slavery as a measure to win the Civil War. In such a view, Lincoln is far from the traditional "Great Emancipator"; instead he is limited to following in the wake of those persons more forward-looking, more morally courageous than Lincoln himself. Richard Striner's book persuasively demolishes such a picture and, on the contrary, portrays Lincoln as a dedicated enemy of slavery (and a friend to racial equality, at least in 19th century terms) who labored consistently and at great length to at last crush the hated institution. Striner does this with a careful survey of Lincoln's career from his earliest political days until his death. And Striner boldly takes on each of the quotes from Lincoln speeches and writings that are usually used to "reveal" Llncoln as a racial conservative who adopted emancipation much against his real will, showing those quotes in their broader contexts, describing not only what else was going on at the time and what else Lincoln was simultaneously doing, but also examining those quotes in context of what else was said in that particular speech or document. Lincoln was a politician of great skill, willing to publically advocate a course seemingly adverse to his real goals but, in the long run, laying down a pathway towards accomplishing those goals. And, perhaps more than any other American president, Lincoln was a master of language, sometimes crafting a phrase, a sentence, or a paragraph that superficially says one thing while meaning, upon close examination, something else.
   
   Stiner also provides a valuable look at the very real fears that Lincoln and his associates had in the years leading up to the Civil War that slavery was on a road towards expansion, not extinction. Moreover, Striner shows that the South's leading spokespeople on the subject of tariffs (sometimes cited as the "real" underlying cause of Southern secession, instead of the uncomfortable issue of slavery) privately admitted that their real concern was slavery, with tariffs providing a convenient stalking horse at a particular moment. The shadow of slavery lay darkly over antebellum America, and Striner's book retores the portrait of Lincoln as a dedicated leader in bringing the country forward to the end of the "peculiar institution".



3. I met the author through a friend, and was intrigued at the wonderful conversations I had with Striner. As we discussed "Father Abraham," which at that point had not yet been released, I was very anxious to get ahold of it. Having finally acquired the book, I am nothing but impressed at the detailed information that backs every assertion made, and the very much conversational style writing that Striner uses. The book is an easy read and really gets the gears turning in your mind.

1 comments about Best Little Ironies, Oddities, and Mysteries of the Civil War.

1. Having a passing familiarity with the standard stories of the Civil War, odd and ironic enough by themselves, I was expecting this book to deliver extreme ironies and true oddities. No such luck. This book is a tiresome litany of banalities and pointless connections that I had to force myself to read. Did you know that brother fought brother in the Civil War? Wow! Or how about that the guy who introduced Lincoln at his first inauguration? He was from Oregon - the very state whose governorship Lincoln turned down! Whoa! And on and on its goes.
   
   Sadly or my family (the book was a birthday gift) this book failed to live up to expectations. It should have been titled, "Boring, Pointless and Uninteresting Minutia about the Civil War." Should be put out of its misery with a minié ball to the spine.

5 comments about Bedford Forrest: and His Critter Company (Southern Classics Series).

1. History can suffer at the hands of its practitioners, but that is certainly not the case here. Lytle can write and Forrest is the beneficiary of his talent. Lytle seeks to communicate the essence of the man and his time and largely succeeds. Although a vivid portrait of Forrest the man emerges, my one word impression of Forrest after reading this book is Warrior! I found it hard to put down. But I wouldn't want to run in to him in a dark alley wearing a Yankee uniform!



2. Andrew Lytle was the dean of Southern writers, and in this work -- one of his earliest -- he not only brought to life America's greatest military figure, but an age and a people as well. It was Lytle's aim to make the times of Nathan Bedford Forrest come alive for the reader. He devoted himself to intensive research of the Tennessee where Forrest was born and the Mississippi where he lived.
   
   In reading this book we not only learn about the marvellous -- indeed, often incredible -- feats of a military genius, but we learn at the same time about the people, the places, the morals, the values, and the way of life of a people long gone now. (Lytle's subsequent book, A Wake for the Living, deals more pointedly with how much of the good of those days we have lost.)
   
   This book, although a worthy history, reads like a novel. It truly is one that is hard to put down once you get started.



3. In terms of his impact on modern warfare, no general of the Civil War had more than Lt. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest. Not Grant, not Lee, not Longstreet or Sherman. This is the man. No less a general than Erwin Rommel studied Forrest's tactics and implemented them with modern weaponry when his Afrika Korps marched all over Libya and Egypt in World War II.

   The reason I say this book isn't for the "politically correct" is that it was written some 70 years ago, by a man of the old South who obviously idolized Forrest and everything he stood for. As you know already, not everything Forrest stood for was good. He was 100 years ahead of his time as a soldier, but stuck in 1860 in his personal beliefs.

   But...getting into the book. He was a brilliant commander who never had enough men under his command to turn the war in the South's favor. Still, he was a hero to the people of the Tennessee river valley where he won most of his victories, with good reason. When the Union troops overran these areas and placed them under military rule, Forrest made sure they treated the citizens decently. Once he even saved a group of innocent men from a flaming death at the hands of vengeful Union soldiers whom he was defeating in battle. Reading these and other stories makes you understand why he was such a hero to the author, who would have heard first-hand accounts of Forrest's exploits.

   Lytle believes that the South would have won the war if Forrest had been placed in command of the main Confederate army in the west, and he's probably right. Forrest was an extraordinary individual who had more impact on the 20th century than any other Civil War general.




4. I never fully appreciated the intellect of Forrest until I finished this book. It peels away the myths about the man, and tells about what he was really like. I loved it, and often flip around in it from time to time. A must for Civil War buffs!



5. Cunning as the Devil was Nathan Bedford Forrest and this book indicates just how quick and clever this military genius was. Little wonder then that Lee considered this dark knight to be his finest soldier, above even the legendary Stonewall Jackson.