tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57360542012-01-30T23:00:15.541-05:00American Civil War historiography and publishing blogged daily by Dimitri Rotov.Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comBlogger38031100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-26610224064457882402012-01-30T21:35:00.004-05:002012-01-30T23:00:15.554-05:00

Hat tip to Ireland's Independent newspaper which tallies the years in which Lincoln has been in development - seven. Movies are ephemeral, but this has been ridiculous. It seems to be shooting now (January), so a few more lines may be in order.Search this blog and I'm sure there are posts for every one of those years. Let's review some memes.Recall first that Spielberg bought the rights to

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-88321168490486706882012-01-17T20:10:00.003-05:002012-01-17T20:22:13.496-05:00

Stanton returns this week in a thrilling conclusion to our thread.Meanwhile, pop quiz. Which Civil War head of state is this describing?"He was also very inclined to avoid overt responsibility for difficult decisions, operating from behind the backs of his generals to get his way, and distancing himself from them if failures occurred." Answer: You thought, "Of course, this could only be Abraham

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-33128457694428466652012-01-12T22:41:00.002-05:002012-01-12T22:45:53.995-05:00

Some snippets from Edwin McMasters Stanton: the Autocrat of Rebellion, Emancipation, and Reconstruction.A Thomas McCrary remembered: I lived with Ed Stanton from August, 1837, until March 1838. He was one of the kindest and most affectionate of men. I had many talks with him after his wife died and he could never speak of her without weeping. [...] Ed never hunted an hour in his life. He worked

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-4795551848545855902012-01-11T21:34:00.004-05:002012-01-11T23:32:14.417-05:00

Edwin Stanton's friend Donn Piatt gives us this: Stanton was a poet, ruled by his imagination. At the same time, he was a man of action and his actions, being driven by a powerful imagination, were incomprehensible to those around him.In the case of Ann Howard, we move past imagination to delusionally obsessive behavior. Stanton could not quench the fantasy that Ann Howard had been buried alive

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-729073114507868782012-01-10T22:12:00.003-05:002012-01-10T22:53:38.507-05:00

The episodes of "morbid instability" in Stanton's earlier life and his irrational public displays during and after the Civil War come to mind when reading a postwar reminiscence by Stanton's friend, Donn Piatt (shown right). From an article in the North American Review: The truth is, Stanton's imagination was through life the larger and most potent quality of his mind, and from first to last he

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-9391867835577850632012-01-09T22:46:00.004-05:002012-01-09T22:59:40.078-05:00

There is a quintet of stories about Stanton's displays of insanity, each triggered by grief except the last, which culminates in (rumored) suicide. I encountered these on the Internet and went to one of my Stanton biographies for a "sanity check."Harold Hyman posthumously finished a biography started by Benjamin Thomas (Stanton: The Life and Times of Lincoln's Secretary of War). The evidence

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-15023280043484991262011-12-20T20:46:00.003-05:002011-12-20T21:30:48.815-05:00

With March's "Uptonian" plan off the table, Wadsworth and Palmer began designing their own army. This (after political give and take) became the National Defense Act of 1920. There is a handy summary of what follows in The Second World War: Asia and the Pacific. I excerpt here at length: Palmer's ideas were not those of the majority of the Army's general staff officers, who were disciples of the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-64026972982753871522011-12-19T19:21:00.006-05:002011-12-19T20:24:52.915-05:00

Peyton March and John J. Pershing were the dueling prodigies of WWI.In June, 1917, March was a brigadier general with the artillery. By May 20, 1918 he was chief of staff of the Army. Our friends at Wiki write As Chief of Staff he reorganized the Army structure, and abolished the distinctions between the Regular Army, the Army Reserves, and the Army National Guard during war time. He created new

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-76021657158669179312011-12-18T23:40:00.000-05:002011-12-18T23:41:04.034-05:00

Now where were we?

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-62590184670181318972011-09-12T13:46:00.001-04:002011-09-12T13:49:21.280-04:00

Actually, Emory Upton got a down payment on what would be his due during his own lifetime in 1878 when Representative MG James Garfield introduced a military bill with Upton’s “expansible army” at the core. It stalled or was defeated – I’d like to know more about it (but don’t).James Garfield had thus launched a kind of children’s crusade, a preliminary fizzle followed by decades of intense

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-42468449660553273372011-08-17T21:03:00.002-04:002011-08-17T21:08:22.330-04:00

You can read Emory Upton's magnum opus, The Military Policy of the United States, thanks to Google. Likewise his Armies of Asia and Europe. By the turn of the century, Maj. Gen. (Brevet) Emory Upton was a very big deal.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-167868610967304302011-08-15T23:29:00.004-04:002011-08-16T00:03:57.307-04:00

Emory Upton went through the Civil War as a McClellan hater; after the war, with study and reflection, he became an admirer. Being brother-in-law to Frank Blair might have softened him up. Upton was a prodigy, entering the Civil War as a second lieutenant of artillery. By the end of the war, at 25, he was a general who had led all three branches well. He finished as a division commander. Sixteen

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-57982543182680021032011-08-11T20:16:00.003-04:002011-09-12T13:47:38.113-04:00

And so, James Wadsworth had an unusual career as political general.He began as a military celebrity, his reputation earned within the powerhouse New York state high command during the crisis of Lincoln's inaction. His federal career was launched under Stanton's (not Lincoln's) patronage, however, and where a Banks or Butler would occasionally have some role demanding political skill, Wadsworth

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-25305475174460567072011-08-10T19:55:00.004-04:002011-09-12T13:48:12.943-04:00

Just as we might view George McClellan's 1861 orders to D.C. as Lincoln's intended breakup of the powerhouse Dennison-McClellan team, so to the federalization of Generals Wool, Dix and Wadsworth appears to be the decapitation of Governor Edwin Morgan's amazing New York military high command, one that caused the president so much embarrassment at the war's start.Obviously James Wadsworth was the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-22063566339791992932011-07-24T23:24:00.004-04:002011-07-24T23:57:56.833-04:00

It's the greenback's birthday, says the Financial Times. Actually, August is the birthday of Chase's Demand Note, with the greenback's birthday happening in February. But you wouldn't expect the Financial Times to know arcana like that.You would expect them to know July from August."Today, the greenback is the primary reserve currency, largely due to tradition and lack of alternatives," says the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-54317948617301655952011-06-30T20:25:00.003-04:002011-06-30T21:19:15.976-04:00

James McPherson has long been the ACW go-to guy for his genre in the New York Review of Books. Currently, he has a long omnibus review of titles in that paper.Rather than do a long essay on McPherson's review, I want to show you how I read McPherson and why he is so objectionable to me. You get no continuity here, just a series of McP's statements in the order they occur and my comments.McPherson

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-11563957798167424432011-06-27T10:27:00.004-04:002011-06-27T10:29:46.848-04:00

The organizers of the Bull Run re-enactment have not been paying attention to heritage tourism trends; instead, they appear to have been buying into the endless hype. Not only are tickets about a third of what they need to be, only 44% of the re-enactors needed have signed on.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-46683273091564840992011-06-24T09:53:00.004-04:002011-06-24T10:22:41.647-04:00

Ted Savas commented on a story about the bestest selling digital author of all time, Michael Connelly. I have a different take on this than the mainstream press.Mr. Connelly's output is what we called in college "mindrot." Nothing wrong with that; I mention it because one can write formulaic genre fiction at a fast clip, thus making one quite a productive writer.Connelly's sale of a million is an

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-33469892127409266432011-06-21T09:17:00.001-04:002011-06-21T09:19:14.317-04:00

Drew Gilpin faust ponders the Centennial, the sesquicentennial, re-enactment, and the meaning of the Civil War.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-46452734643922311202011-06-20T22:23:00.002-04:002011-06-20T22:26:49.648-04:00

Australian tourists encounter Gettysburg and make a striking point: And yet what I found myself reflecting on repeatedly was notions of ‘authenticity’ and a living present in Gettysburg. As countless individuals are drawn to this beautiful historic town to feel the pulse of its part in America’s Civil War, where is its heart beat today, and why do all the visitors not really seem to care? ...

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-43702846099075780612011-06-20T22:12:00.000-04:002011-06-20T22:14:56.378-04:00

Who knew?

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-69789339583452523572011-06-16T20:48:00.001-04:002011-06-16T20:50:12.692-04:00

AL flames the wife of a prisoner: You protest, nonetheless, that you and he are loyal, and you may really think so, but this is a view of loyalty which is difficult to conceive that any sane person could take, and one which the government can not tolerate and hope to live.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-87797436836197792112011-06-16T20:05:00.000-04:002011-06-16T20:06:42.262-04:00

The last surviving CSA MG was a French prince. I had no idea.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-19453068923708074542011-06-12T17:32:00.003-04:002011-06-12T18:40:03.458-04:00

I had written a few days ago that I would have enjoyed re-enacting with the balloon corps on the mall.Spoke too soon. Didn't really think this through. Phony baloney event? Check. Run by public historians? Check. Staged in a geographic vortex of political psychosis? Check. All these factors came into play "big time" in re-enacting Thaddeus Lowe's 1861 balloon flight for President Lincoln. Or

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-24966302025741117432011-06-09T22:38:00.002-04:002011-06-09T22:43:30.669-04:00

Halloween, 2012: Children dress as Lincoln for trick or treat - masks, blood spattered clothing, axes. I dunno, maybe crossbows too.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-11290871842346923432011-06-09T22:33:00.000-04:002011-06-09T22:34:29.980-04:00

A problematic book gets a problematic review.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-17450621590064689572011-06-09T22:32:00.000-04:002011-06-09T22:33:05.248-04:00

This is a re-enactment I would enjoy doing.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-62663433742337784282011-06-08T20:05:00.003-04:002011-06-08T20:29:56.978-04:00

Mark the date. The movie Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter will premier 6/22/12. Says the screenwriter, It's hacking people's heads off and killing vampires left and right. The main character [Abraham Lincoln] has an axe, with which he kills countless amounts of vampires. It's a dark, cool, edgy, twisted movie. I don't know what the rating will be, but I suspect that the rating would be an R. I

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-49386368419835917032011-06-07T22:02:00.002-04:002011-06-07T22:20:41.620-04:00

No, not here: I'm always backlashing against Burns.Here:James Lundberg: "Because of you, my Civil War lecture is always packed—with students raised on your sentimental, romantic, deeply misleading portrait of the conflict."Ta-Nehisi Coates: "I think the biggest failing of the movie, is that, as Cynic once said, it never comes across a cute quote that it doesn't like."Actually, both seem annoyed

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-46654696276497189812011-06-06T23:39:00.000-04:002011-06-06T23:41:11.631-04:00

Nobody wants to play General Schimmelpfennig.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-90509655044844062792011-06-06T23:27:00.001-04:002011-06-06T23:30:36.757-04:00

Cheesy.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-62102071045245742172011-06-03T00:01:00.000-04:002011-06-03T00:11:12.049-04:00

Started posting on this topic in 2008. Looks like we will finish in 2012. Egads.Question: would you trust a jackass like this with an historical script on the complexity of Lincoln? (Brush past the intrusive ad.)Tommy Lee Jones - as Thaddeus Stevens? Stevens was a big part of the Lincoln presidency, don't you know?Daniel Day Lewis is apparently set to play Lincoln against Sally Field, who is

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-19803740609985337642011-06-02T22:46:00.003-04:002011-06-02T23:46:51.426-04:00

Optimism deserves its day and given the gloom and doom on this blog, I should take a moment to put things in perspective.In 1997, when I started the website Civil War Book News, we faced a river of sewage with each new publishing season producing at most one or two noteworthy titles. Publishers were in the backwash of a post-Ken Burns and Killer Angels influx of ignorant, transient bookbuyers who

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-1806360110391221142011-05-31T21:07:00.002-04:002011-05-31T21:13:05.965-04:00

Was the so-called Peninsula campaign McClellan's strategy? Or was the McDowell-Franklin team enjoying a last laugh by having McClellan execute its own, final strategy? Let's look at Snell, Reed, and Beatie to find out.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-89184313711990057002011-05-31T20:44:00.002-04:002011-05-31T20:48:02.249-04:00

I missed the stage show. I'll have to read the book.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-71414443904998199052011-05-28T15:16:00.006-04:002011-05-28T16:49:59.346-04:00

If you are a Centennialist author, rule number one is you stay the hell away from numbers except to round them up until they show great big globs of zeroes. (Once rounded, they can be used for any nefarious activity.) If questioned about your numbers, you answer “No one can know exactly how many men … so we must use estimates.”Exception: if you are super-scholarly, prize-winning, unbelievably

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-88147577051771182372011-05-25T06:40:00.000-04:002011-05-25T06:40:00.536-04:00

G.W. Smith's unique account of Joe Johnston's motive for an attack on Union forces has some odd backup ... from James Longstreet, no less. In The Seven Days, Cliff Dowdey portrays Johnston and Longstreet as liars who filed crooked battle reports to do Smith dirty, and in his memoirs, Longstreet shows hostility to Smith. He does make this interesting comment to introduce his discussion of

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-17943600117040376242011-05-24T14:20:00.003-04:002011-05-24T14:34:32.973-04:00

The mania for professionalism that stamped the post Civil War army of Grant, Sherman, Schofield, et al, has borne its ultimate fruit in a peacetime army today that will not recognize any situation that cannot be managed professionally at a peacetime pace. From a new book by Australian General Andrew Smith on the response to IEDs: The DoD’s initial response was organizational: the immediate

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-5352149645615309162011-05-24T14:12:00.002-04:002011-05-24T14:20:29.212-04:00

This Civil War historian's notorious love affair with round numbers may be part of a more general cultural failing.I was watching a CNN piece on Indira Gandhi that gave the casualties in the storming of the Golden Temple: pilgrims, 500 and commandos 300.The current wisdom in Civil War history - that it's absolutely pointless to try to arrive at specific numbers - is here carried to its absurd

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-3532702782239023312011-05-18T21:10:00.002-04:002011-05-18T21:21:32.545-04:00

Glenn LaFantasie, who was so right on the plagiarism of James McPherson, now ventures to say that the stars and bars were not then but have become lately "an icon of hate." I'm afraid that for this to be true, we would need to impute the same motive to all of the displayers. That would be an act of political psychosis, would it not?But I must ever keep a warm place in my heart for one who called

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-34120899836661329572011-05-11T21:44:00.000-04:002011-05-13T16:55:02.963-04:00

All foolishness aside, what we know about Johnston's decision to attack at Seven Pines or Fair Oaks comes from Longstreet, Johnston, or Davis. G.W. Smith has left us an account no one wants to read or recycle. It's a total outlier and I give it here in its entirety without comment. From Smith's Confederate War Papers. When we reached the vicinity of the Richmond and York River Railroad, at a

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-35305337606649211182011-05-09T22:05:00.004-04:002011-05-09T22:21:13.319-04:00

Well, we had our first casino night here at the blog and some people tried to take advantage. Some sharpies tried to bet on all of the Joe Johnston Fair Oaks explanations at once. When casino security confronted them, they said "None of these reasons are mutually exclusive. They could all be true. They could all be winners."Management had to intervene, explaining, "Not one source listed here gave

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-81847989737600803272011-05-08T20:31:00.003-04:002011-05-08T20:58:54.522-04:00

Welcome to the Civil War History Casino, ladies and gents. This house of chance is like none other you have ever seen. Our croupiers are prizewinners; our dealers are highly paid speakers; our pit bosses are best-selling authors.Today we have doubled the jackpot to be paid out on the Magic Randomizing Wheel of Explanations. The question you must answer is simple: "Why did Joe Johnston launch his

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-47944912152608580632011-05-08T00:53:00.001-04:002011-05-08T21:02:43.816-04:00

In Schools for Strategy, Colin S. Gray writes: In an idealized world, for good or ill, and probably mainly for the latter, the (typically) civilian policymaker says "go get them" ... and the top soldier salutes, says "yes sir!" and proceeds, unimpeded subsequently by political harassment, to exercise his professional skill as a soldier.He's distilling a lot of military pop history here, but isn't

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-19205228382032407762011-05-07T13:40:00.004-04:002011-05-08T21:04:26.399-04:00

I love sketches and diagrams but military maps make me very uneasy. If the mapmaker annotated the map or noted the logic and sources used to develop it, I would be happier. The mapmaker is entitled to opinions and interpretations but I am eager to know what they are. Sketches and diagrams are safer because they portray rough concepts.A military map represents an historical argument. I cannot take

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-85744591572498889532011-05-03T19:21:00.003-04:002011-05-03T19:24:08.847-04:00

Eric Foner has criticism for Gary Gallagher's new book.My two cents: when you are arguing over what "the North" was fighting for, you're on a level of generalization that takes you out of history and into metaphysics.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-15449568192946055222011-04-29T20:13:00.004-04:002011-04-29T22:21:06.739-04:00

Jefferson Davis faced what would become an American military cliche in future years: top generals requesting resources with no strategy in hand but brandishing a fistfull of dire predictions to motivate their president.Did Davis indicate a strategy of his own at this meeting? Look at some of his points:(1) Motivation: "...the whole country was demanding protection at his hands, and praying for

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-65058279562880203262011-04-29T20:03:00.002-04:002011-04-29T20:05:48.412-04:00

- cerainly every best-selling one - has a "precocious knack for hackery."

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-70427533983804889932011-04-28T21:17:00.003-04:002011-04-28T21:21:55.201-04:00

Paul Gottfried says: "...most of those who fought for Southern independence did not own slaves, while Northern commanders such as McClellan and Grant did."Some of us are still slaves to McClellan and Grant, I suppose.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-45979050493192467312011-04-28T21:05:00.003-04:002011-04-28T21:13:36.485-04:00

Good old Usenet flamewars have been taken up by the legacy media:Guelzo: Abe's Ticking ClockGottfried: Being Dishonest About AbeLetters to the EditorCanadian "smackdown"These are days when one is proud of the probity, restraint, good graces, and all-around civility inherent in blogging.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-17315530914871768962011-04-26T21:40:00.002-04:002011-04-26T22:23:24.062-04:00

Some reflections on the meeting with special reference to this post.A strange reticence - Johnston asked for a meeting with Davis to request forces to invade the North. Then, neither he nor Beauregard raised the subject with Davis the night before the meeting, nor did they raise it the next day, during the actual meeting. GW Smith, the junior general present (perhaps fatigued by shilly-shallying)

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-22257626945982478912011-04-21T19:47:00.000-04:002011-04-21T19:48:18.727-04:00

It looks more like a blog.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-92195609212631920572011-04-21T19:45:00.001-04:002011-04-21T19:46:59.252-04:00

... can be a member of the The Society of Civil War Historians.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-38191847854937948312011-04-21T13:01:00.002-04:002011-04-21T13:05:20.419-04:00

"The news and entertainment media love anniversaries. So it is strange that the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War has been so low key.""... a willingness on the part of the United States to admit the possibility that the [Civil] war was not the best response to Secession would be a healthy sign."The Civil War: an Eerie Silence.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-56134316153129756582011-04-19T20:13:00.004-04:002011-04-19T21:48:38.440-04:00

The text of Smith's memo can be reduced to stated propostitions and stated or implied counterpropositions. All material is from Smith's memo except text in talics, which is from Davis's The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, and text which is labeled as being from Smith's Confederate War Papers.(1) Proposition (Johnston): Meet "for the purpose of deciding whether the army could be

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-52904992586161529412011-04-19T12:21:00.003-04:002011-04-19T12:35:13.205-04:00

A nice piece of revisionism has been issued by UNC Press called The Won Cause. It's a study of the Union's veteran organization, the Grand Army of the Republic, with an emphasis on interracial activities. I counted 468 integrated posts in the appendix, including venues in Kentucky and Missouri. As one of the chapter titles says, these were associations where balck and white citizens mingled on a

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-34052089369099072552011-04-18T21:56:00.004-04:002011-04-18T22:48:22.542-04:00

It was a running joke in the early seventies to begin certain sentences with "In another drug related incident..." Well, it's a different decade but the news cliches nowadays point to "In another nonfiction publishing scandal..." The author of a hilariously hokey, preposterously bogus, nonsensically sentimental, spuriously uplifting nonfiction bestseller called Three Cups of Tea has been busted.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-80162195325693465552011-04-14T09:40:00.002-04:002011-04-14T09:55:23.837-04:00

We come now to the text of the memo. Smith explains the meeting behind the memo: Soon after the author joined the army he learned that Generals Johnston and Beauregard already favored an immediate offensive campaign, beyond the Potomac, provided an adequate force could be concentrated for that purpose: and he urged General Johnston to request President Davis to visit the headquarters of the army

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-2328050102433736012011-04-13T11:31:00.004-04:002011-04-13T11:51:59.359-04:00

On August 4, 861, in a letter to Beauregard, Jefferson Davis says "I think you are unjust to yourself in putting your failure to pursue the enemy to Washington to the account of short supplies of subsistence and transportation." He follows on August 1, "Some excitement has been created by your letter; the Quartermaster and the Commissary General both feel that they have been unjustly arraigned."

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-74574587819963097562011-04-13T08:05:00.003-04:002011-04-13T08:15:57.612-04:00

The Washington Post's Civil War 150 section yesterday was 22 pages long with four full pages of advertising, six half-page ads and scads of smaller ads. There's a business model in there somewhere.Aside from history features, the editorial content was travel/event centered without a single book review (despite lots of book ads).

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-64208987665357933812011-04-12T08:17:00.000-04:002011-04-12T08:17:00.049-04:00

Some more observations:(1) In the OR and in the McClellan Papers (LoC), there is no backchannel correspondence between McClellan on one side and Lincoln or the Cabinet on the other. GBM's scant official exchanges with Cameron hold little interest. His correspondence with Scott is actually accusatory; he wants guidance, he wants orders, and he wants federal funds. One has the impression that

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-4069482799746744882011-04-11T19:34:00.002-04:002011-04-11T20:16:03.763-04:00

The meeting of Jefferson Davis with Joe Johnston on the 26th of September, 1861, is another one of those steep gradient events that seriously overmatches the analytic engine of the modern Civil War historian. Some talespinners, recognizing themselves as underpowered, keep their narrative jalopies away from such high mountains. Others, committed to the doctrine that Jefferson Davis had no strategy

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-51496193250426973652011-04-08T00:08:00.001-04:002011-04-08T00:15:57.418-04:00

Some reflections on the Dennison-McClellan chronology.McClellan’s rise to the position of ranking major general in the Regular Army (behind Scott) occurs within 31 days: (1) GBM is offered MG, USV on April 14 (and on April 24, GBM offers to resign); (2) on May 3 his commission is foreshortened to 90 days by Lincoln’s assumption of new powers; at the same time he is made commander of the federal

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-2736105516518523502011-04-07T16:40:00.010-04:002011-04-07T18:07:47.343-04:00

The Dennison-McClellan partnership is unintelligible to many without a contextual timeline. Here, I have interleaved milestones in their rich collaboration with related events in the broader struggle between the governors and Lincoln. Dennison has his McClellan and New York's Gov. Morgan had his John Wool; as the governors initiate ever more military activity through McClellan and Wool, the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-45884691620921208882011-04-05T06:36:00.009-04:002011-04-05T07:07:57.494-04:00

At that point at which McClellan is summoned from Western Virginia to serve in the East, Winfield Scott is a walking inflammation, tender all over from the abuses suffered by the McDowell-Franklin bypass operation and by the brutal power plays that installed McDowell and compelled the advance towards Manassas Junction. These are not the only abuses Scott suffers, but they are emblematic. For

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-21390299342859396702011-04-04T18:00:00.004-04:002011-04-04T18:53:34.258-04:00

The closest thing to a military McDowell bio that we have, to the infinite shame of Civil War history, is the extended essay found in Whitelaw Reid's Ohio in the Civil War. This is a sourcebook to many (myself, obviously, and others) but it lacks detailed notes on sources; McDowell's kinship to Governor Dennison is stated as a given, for example, and some of the sources cited are unknown to us.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-16932194205287711042011-03-23T21:46:00.004-04:002011-03-23T22:30:42.392-04:00

And so, in 1861 the McDowell-Franklin skunkworks died from the natural cause of being integrated into the chain of command to execute orders lawfully issued by appointed superiors.Lincoln's revival of McDowell-Franklin in January 1862 did not recall to council two individual advisors but rather the old team to work as it had worked previously.Confronted with this pair in a high profile 1862

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-9383478797295579752011-03-22T18:07:00.004-04:002011-03-22T18:13:23.235-04:00

'Tis the season, I suppose, March 2011. The privatization of the Sesquicentennial proceeds apace, with Turner Classic Movies devoting April to ACW films. Meanwhile, Colonial Williamsburg has started tours I had assumed were long-standing. I shudder to think how that battle is being presented to the public, BTW.Meanwhile, Last Wednesday, U.S. Senators Jim Webb (D-VA) and Mary L. Landrieu (D-LA)

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-9460446717732734032011-03-22T17:47:00.004-04:002011-03-22T18:26:32.062-04:00

The public historians, who think no travesty is beyond the pale if even one child develops a passing interest in what they imagine to be history, have outdone themselves again. They are tweeting the Civil War, passing the anguish and heartbreak of real people through the frivolous medium of 140-character gossip technology.Don't be afraid of history kids! It's intuitively obvious to the most

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-17738309493804040122011-03-17T07:46:00.000-04:002011-03-17T07:48:50.212-04:00

"There are no mitigating circumstances for plagiarism."

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-63256754505786458732011-03-16T20:55:00.005-04:002011-03-18T00:08:40.960-04:00

Amidst the hatreds, the envy, the gossip, the vituperation, the self-pity, and the curdling contempt for fellow officers, one single light that shines through Phil Kearny's letters to his wife is William Franklin: his capacity; his potential; his intelligence; his raw talent. I have long used Kearny as my window into the Franklin phenomenon during the ACW.Grant, in 1864, made an issue of

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-11027805161164558602011-03-10T11:00:00.004-05:002011-03-10T13:31:25.404-05:00

At the very end of President Buchanan's term, Montgomery Meigs made a political effort to have William Franklin replaced by himself as engineer for the Capitol dome. Meigs succeeded and Franklin was moved to oversee Treasury Department construction. This completed a cycle in which Franklin had earlier replaced Meigs.Franklin's political lineage begins with his recommendation to West Point by

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-22547193791889000002011-03-09T15:01:00.003-05:002011-03-09T16:22:07.587-05:00

The McDowell-Franklin partnership is a major piece of Civil War history in which Civil War historians, rather predictably, have no interest. It is really too much to expect historians to analyze McDowell-Franklin when the field cannot produce even a single McDowell biography after 150 years.As simple as it is to understand on the surface, the dynamic behind McDowell-Franklin poses a threat to

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-78781656030455893622011-03-08T14:15:00.004-05:002011-03-08T15:32:13.790-05:00

We all well understand "ahistorical' and the need to avoid projecting the modern into past motivations, actions, and analysis. This has natural limits: in Civil War readers you either see those limits where they don't belong or no limits at all.How many readers who are politically self-conscious Democrats, for instance, read Civil War history with a personal bloodlust for absolute war and a

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-32499845181009579732011-03-08T14:14:00.003-05:002011-03-08T15:57:19.787-05:00

The professionalism institutionalized by Grant, Schofield, and Sherman postwar is now positioned to take its next step into the future. From the Navy Times: The U.S. military is too white and too male at the top and needs to change recruiting and promotion policies and lift its ban on women in combat, an independent report for Congress said Monday.Shades of Spoons Butler and Dan Sickles: Having

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-12644231086511151602011-03-03T11:38:00.002-05:002011-03-03T11:45:24.405-05:00

And total strangers discover that secret room in your house:Army of buyers anticipated at Shelby Foote's estate sale in Midtown MemphisPictures of stash here, with visitor guidance.(H/T to Russell Bonds)

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-60410204098122694662011-03-01T11:29:00.003-05:002011-03-01T13:12:55.972-05:00

Like most of you, I browse a book starting with the notes, evaluating sources. Donald Stoker's sources surprised me in The Grand Design. He's an industrious citer and that makes for a high level of reader discomfort as I'll explain shortly.Lately, we've been concerned with phony citations. Really bad practice involves reading a secondary source, strip mining the secondary source's primary

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-75690122675021223602011-02-24T04:57:00.000-05:002011-02-24T04:57:00.513-05:00

You were probably wondering how Joe Hooker became the all-knowing, all-seeing master of the battlefield that he was.Or perhaps not.Sorry to report that the National Archives has caught the spirit of public history/edutainment. This piece of nonsense is way too lighthearted for an archives blog and although it links to a source, the source is as preposterous as the story. The final touch, a nice

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-48478621626478503822011-02-23T03:28:00.001-05:002011-03-09T16:08:13.559-05:00

The improvised headgear of the Egyptian revolution (above) reminded me of our old series on McDowell's eskimo canoe. Seeing this Egyptian headgear is inspiring. McDowell's toppers, on the other hand, enraged people.First glimplses here (please reread for the Franklin-McDowell content which we'll explore shortly).Interesting speculation from Tim Reese here.Case closed on McD's hat?Topping off the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-65634151740430468192011-02-22T10:26:00.000-05:002011-02-22T10:30:25.887-05:00

Having gone through the top level of Jefferson Davis's strategy, we need to look at the second level.Joe Johnston can help us with that.The advanced reader is well aware of Davis's toleration of Johnston's withdrawals. Johnston is not the only general who gives ground in this war but will suffice to illuminate a proposition. With Davis: military necessity trumps potential political gain. Davis

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-43069210583746743182011-02-22T10:21:00.003-05:002011-02-22T10:25:40.049-05:00

How much Civil War "consumption" is driven by authority seeking? Audience member William Moore called Gallagher one of the best authorities on the Civil War.“He gives a very balanced position based on his long study and research,” Moore said. “He’s nationally known as an authority on the subject and he speaks with great authority and enthusiasm.”

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-42189490535568817642011-02-22T10:01:00.000-05:002011-02-22T10:34:11.253-05:00

The attempt to reduce Civil War music to the abysmal level of 21st Century tastes continues. In this report from the Camptown Races, there's no trace of the music enlisted men paid to enjoy, North or South.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-15385325858196059362011-02-13T18:16:00.003-05:002011-02-13T20:25:54.606-05:00

June 18, 1861, and Jefferson Davis writes his brother,Troops are daily arriving from the South and I hope before long to be able to change from the defensive to an offensive attitude. It will be thus only that we can hope to check the progress of the war.We'll return to that in a moment.Our comedians, the punchline writers of Civil War history say Davis had no strategy. In a new book, The Grand

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-78787420959715618442011-02-10T16:58:00.004-05:002011-02-10T17:02:54.982-05:00

A staple in Civil War reading is the author's attempt to rouse reader indignation against the professional ethic of this or that general.The historical fact not generally known is that the U.S. Army did not and does not have a stated professional ethos.Matthew Moten, who wrote a necessary book on the Delafield Commission here urges the Army to finally sit down and develop one.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-67480147877966362842011-02-10T14:26:00.001-05:002011-02-10T14:28:55.914-05:00

Come walk with intellectual giants. Help honor the memory.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-65639827979775191042011-02-10T13:18:00.002-05:002011-02-10T13:20:20.770-05:00

Better wrangling fodder than black Confederates...

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-53384837689472561832011-02-08T09:59:00.002-05:002011-02-08T10:01:59.763-05:00

Equestrian statue planned for Rosecrans. Meanwhile, his re-enactor looks more like George Thomas.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-18170679308781579592011-02-08T09:56:00.002-05:002011-02-08T09:59:05.796-05:00

As the USA lacks a national Sesquicentennial organization, Georgia lacks a state Sesquicentennial organization

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-84094456901123835412011-02-07T15:01:00.003-05:002011-02-07T23:20:42.306-05:00

Update: Added NO to the post title. Picked up the book in B&N tonight. It's a complete mess. Content is chronological, editorials are mixed in with reports, bewildering typography, no editing whatsoever. The dross is overwhelming.** Start original post **Holzer's unstoppable repackaging instincts led to the issue (in October) of contemporary NYT Civil War coverage in book form under his name.This

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-18721219463086249562011-02-04T11:27:00.003-05:002011-02-04T11:37:00.642-05:00

In this post, you saw what historians are linking to when they cite an Anaconda plan or strategy.In the first Anaconda artifact, Scott refers to an operation involving seaboard blockade and a Mississippi blockade made up of naval posts. He alludes cryptically to waterborne transport of armies without elaboration.In the second artifact, Scott he says the river and seabord blockade can be

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-64439718430669923522011-02-04T00:54:00.002-05:002011-02-04T00:54:00.318-05:00

This post lays out the scraps of information cited by historians in their references to an Anaconda Plan or strategy. When you see Anaconda plan or strategy footnoted, is this what you expect to see in the look-up? Or has the author fobbed off a token of his "respect" for you as a reader?[1] This first item is occasionally cited in conjunction with either of the next two. The letter on which this

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-52897291054547717272011-02-03T11:46:00.005-05:002011-02-03T11:51:57.249-05:00

A propos of our strategy discussion, you might find Jomini's definition interesting. Mahan, who postdates Scott's education (BTW) gave his students the short and sweet version of Jomini: "Strategy decides where to act." This well suits our lazy historians and readers and one finds this often. However, the full Jomini appears below in all its elaboration. From the Art of War: Strategy embraces the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-8453725942438401172011-02-03T11:00:00.003-05:002011-02-03T11:09:44.828-05:00

The "Anaconda plan" does not refer to a document, as we have seen in the previous post. Nor does it exist embodied in orders or other artifacts that take shape during a planning process.This "plan," whenever referred to, is just a concept, a couple of talking points. A military plan, written or unwritten, has operational and other elements that are missing here. To the newspapermen of the 19th

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-39126759972241767832011-02-02T20:25:00.002-05:002011-02-02T20:40:58.403-05:00

Let’s have some more fun with history. Please pull down any suitable ACW history you have and look up “Anaconda.” It tends to be indexed under Scott.Go to the first reference and follow the end note (or footnote). You’ll find one reference given – at most, two. Collection permitting, pull another work and repeat the experiment. This is the neat part: you’ll again have just one reference (at most,

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-19099499748513790982011-02-01T20:39:00.002-05:002011-02-01T20:43:37.712-05:00

The simplest matters in Civil War history are obscured. How was McClellan commissioned? How did Lee come to command the Army of the Potomac? When was Pope relieved of the Army of Virginia?There is a miasma surrounding so much in ACW history and at the same time such a high demand for authoritative narrative that the result is a kind of compressed representation of knowledge. To go back to

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-30300007760363663582011-01-31T22:12:00.003-05:002011-01-31T22:37:49.868-05:00

"As Smith discovered, being a boss is not the same as being a leader.""When faced with consequential decisions, most people would prefer to be more like Lee than Smith, but the reality for many can be just the opposite"."Davis was lucky [at Seven Pines] to have Lee close at hand (Lee was his advisor) but what would have happened if Lee had not been in the role he was in?"Is this the same Lee that

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-63992662302564223692011-01-28T08:24:00.003-05:002011-01-28T08:30:42.601-05:00

In 1896, GW Smith recounted two anecdotes from the Mexican War involving interactions with RE Lee. Offered for "what they're worth," I personally find them rich, especially in light of Lee's "hanging around" behavior at Seven Pines and Smith's interpersonal "tone."After the work upon the army gun battery, the mortar battery and the trenches had been fairly commenced, I was transferred to the

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-38297628997695454862011-01-27T09:09:00.003-05:002011-01-27T10:11:10.072-05:00

The current historiography depends heavily on depicting McClellan as a failed model corrected in the later war. In this historiography, Centennialism, the corrections are incremental, culminating in Grant's selection to top command. Centennialism then posits Grant's excellence in terms of his service to Lincoln; Grant's staying out of politics, Grant's alignment with Lincoln's military aims,

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-75990130810705266842011-01-27T08:53:00.002-05:002011-01-27T08:59:12.733-05:00

Harry Smeltzer notices that the book with Lowry's claim in it was endorsed by certain esteemed personages.Brooks Simpson notices that said personages are outraged that historians other than their blurbing selves failed to check Lowry. This is a post not to be missed.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5736054.post-16457457769348362732011-01-27T08:44:00.000-05:002011-01-27T08:45:30.310-05:00

Here's a link to their clearance sale.

Dimitrinoreply@blogger.com