Book Review : Spies, Scouts, And Raiders Irregular Operations

The Killer Angels is a very interesting and intriguing novel about The Civil War and gives us day by day actions through out it all. That is what really interested me in the way this book was set up. Every day, there was a diary from different characters. Because of this, we get to see different views from different characters and how each one of them have their own stories in the war and how they got through the war. At the very beginning of the story, we meet a spy named Harrison, who loves his Shakespeare. He sees that the Union Army is coming, because he sees about twenty thousand men all at once. He is so scared and surprises and runs to tell the two generals, General Longstreet and General Lee. This is our introduction to the character I will talk about

In 1994, McPherson wrote the book, What They Fought For: 1861-1865, about his exploration on the motivations of the soldiers that fought in the Civil War (“James M. McPherson” par. 6). He analyzed the letters and diaries of twenty-five thousand soldiers, ultimately determining the reasons for the soldier’s continuance to fight during the Civil War.

No other war seems to hold our focus like the Civil War. Scholars have chosen to make it their life's work, authors have written reams about it, and we all feel some kind of connection to the Civil War. This paper was created to highlight some of the major battles that took place during that conflict. Major battles usually marked a drastic change in the momentum from one side to the other or led to massive losses of troops. These battles and their results all played a huge part in the outcome of the war.

James M. McPherson sets out to discover what motivated the Confederate and Union soldiers to continue fighting in the Civil War in his book What They Fought For. McPherson analyses nearly a thousand letters, journals, and diary of Union and Confederate soldiers to determine what urged them to fight is this defining American Conflict. McPherson reads and groups together the common thoughts of the everyday soldier, from their letters and journals that none of which had been subjected to any sort of censorship, in that time period. He then generalizes the motivations that they used to fight for their country. Whether it be for slavery or for the Union, the author views both sides of the fighting to analysis their ideological issues, how deep their belief coursed through their veins to continue fighting, and how the soldiers held their convictions close to heart in the time of war.

The focus of this investigation will be, “To what extent was Robert E. Lee an effective leader of the Confederate Army?” The investigation will analyze Lee’s strengths and weaknesses that contributed to his effectiveness and the overall loss of the Confederacy in the Civil War. The overall character of Lee throughout his lifetime is too broad, therefore, this investigation will focus solely on the testimony of his military background, and the personality traits that led to Lee’s decisions during the Civil War. As a result, Lee the American by Gamaliel Bradford Jr. and Robert E. Lee: The Soldier by Sir F. Maurice are important sources to this investigation, due to the background they give on Lee’s military training, personality, and victories in the battles leading up to Gettysburg.

The romanticized version of the Civil War creates a picture of the North versus the South with the North imposing on the South. However, after reading “The Making of a Confederate” by William L. Barney, one can see that subdivisions existed before the war was declared. The documents analyzed by Barney primarily focus on the experiences of Walter Lenoir, a southern confederate and a member of the planter elite. His experiences tell a vivid story of a passionate and strongly opinioned participant of the Civil War as well as demonstrate a noticeably different view involving his reasoning when choosing a side. Between analyzing this fantastic piece of literature and other resourceful documents from “Voices of Freedom” by Eric Foner, one

William W. Freehling's book The South vs. The South: How Anti-Confederate Southerners Shaped the Course of the Civil War tells a unique story about the Civil War and one that is not typically discussed in history books. The book is about divisions within the southern culture, which might have led to the outcome of the war in favor of the Union. Perhaps all black southerners had a vested interest in the North's victory, but many white southerners felt the same way for many reasons. In The South vs. The South, Freehling discusses the way the Union used divisions in the south as a war strategy, such as by recruiting potentially neutral Americans living in border states. Recruiting soldiers from border states and western states with less entrenched plantation cultures versus their Dixie counterparts was one of Lincoln's key strategies and also helped General Grant secure some key military victories.

Although James McPherson presents Lincoln as having numerous qualities that defined him as a brilliant leader, he wastes no time in revealing what he believes to be Lincoln’s greatest strength. In his Introduction, McPherson states regarding Lincoln’s political leadership: “In a civil war whose origins lay in a political conflict over the future of slavery and a political decision by certain states to secede, policy could never be separated from national strategy…. And neither policy nor national strategy could be separated from military strategy” (McPherson, p.6). Lincoln could not approach the war from a purely martial standpoint—instead, he needed to focus on the issues that caused it. For the catalyst of the war was also the tool for its solution; a war started by differing ideologies could only be resolved through the military application of ideology. This non-objective approach to the waging of the war almost resembles the inspired approach McPherson brings to his examination of Lincoln himself.

Civil War historians view the Battle of Chancellorsville as General Robert E. Lee’s “greatest and most remarkable” victory (Sears 1). Lee, facing an army twice his size, defies all military doctrine and divides his army multiple times in order to out-maneuver and surprise the Union forces. The daring maneuver succeeds and ultimately forces the Union’s Army of the Potomac to retreat. The victory was another major blow to Union troops, but it came at a huge cost to the Confederacy: the loss of General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson. By evaluating the battle through the lens of the mission command activities, one can see how Lee’s daring maneuver was actually very calculated and his only option for victory. Throughout the rest of this paper, I will describe the timeline of the battle and how General Lee used the mission command activities of understand, visualize, assess, and lead to ultimately achieve victory at Chancellorsville.

The American Civil war is considered to be one of the most defining moments in American history. It is the war that shaped the social, political and economic structure with a broader prospect of unifying the states and hence leading to this ideal nation of unified states as it is today. In the book “Confederates in the Attic”, the author Tony Horwitz gives an account of his year long exploration through the places where the U.S. Civil War was fought. He took his childhood interest in the Civil War to a new level by traveling around the South in search of Civil War relics, battle fields, and most importantly stories. The title “Confederates in the Attic”: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War carries two meanings in Tony Horwitz’s

The pain, joy, bloodshed, death, and sorrow of the Civil War are all contained in the book called, "The Killer Angels." This book will show you the thoughts, feelings and actions of many of the leaders of both armies. By reading this book you will get an in depth view of the bloodiest days of the Civil War. Even if you know absolutely nothing about this war, you can still read and understand everything that is portrayed. This story not only gives you the view of many of the major leaders, but it also gives you the maps an strategies used in this war. It also shows you the conflicts in making these strategies. This book has inspired many, but the true question is will it inspire you? Reading this book will cause

During the Civil War, there were two sides, the Confederate Army and the Union Army. While the Confederates fought for slavery, the Union fought for their freedom. While the

For Cause and Comrades is a book written by James McPherson, with the help of diaries and letters written by soldiers from the Confederate and Union forces, he is able to formally detail accounts on why men fought in the civil war. Consequently, McPherson is able to shed light on the mentality and motives that soldiers possessed that made them fight in the war. Although we will never truly know why soldiers fought in the civil war, this book most definitely gives readers evidence that soldiers had certain values and morals that gave them reason to fight.

This book was a good analysis of Civil War soldiers' diaries, and letters to their loved ones. Which explains what they were going through in their lives and what they fought for and risked their lives for in this conflict. In the book the author James M. McPherson uses information from l00's of diaries and letters from the soldiers to learn why they fought in this war. The Union soldiers fought to preserve the Nation that was created in 1776, to save it from destruction. The Confederate soldiers fought for their independence, liberty, self government, and for revenge.

The reason for writing this book from McPherson’s point of view was because out of all the material out there about President Lincoln the vast majority of it is about other topics besides his role as Commander in Chief. McPherson believes that this is surely unthinkable due to the sheer amount of time and energy Lincoln had to put into being the commander of our army throughout the four long years the Civil War reigned. This book, in the eyes of James McPherson, is a long overdue explanation of Lincoln in his main role as Commander in Chief. He tells of numerous occasions when Lincoln must make important decisions that could make or break the union army. These