A detailed account of the battle of Antietam that clarifies the epic struggle   Unfurl Those Colors! examines the operational fabric of leadership and command in the Army of the Potomac during ...one of the most critical campaigns and battles of the Civil War. The Battle of Antietam remains “the bloodiest single day of combat in American history” with over 5,000 killed, 20,000 wounded, and 3,000 missing. Many eminent Civil War historians consider it the turning point of the war. As a result of the perceived Federal success at Antietam, Abraham Lincoln was able to issue the Emancipation Proclamation to make the war about ending slavery and terminating any hope of European recognition for the South.   This book constitutes an operational study of the Army of the Potomac during this campaign and battle, carefully documenting the command decisions of army commander George B. McClellan and following the execution of those decisions through the corps level of command and down to the ordinary soldier in the Second Army Corps. It reappraises the leadership and decisions of Edwin V. Sumner during the battle of Antietam as the one federal corps commander who was steadfast in carrying out McClellan’s plan of battle and effectively directed the battle on the Federal right. It details as no previous account has the fighting of the Second Army Corps at Antietam to include Sedgwick’s division in the West Woods and French’s and Richardson’s divisions at Bloody Land.
This book explores the American use of atomic bombs and the role these weapons played in the defeat of the Japanese Empire in World War II. It focuses on President Harry S. Truman's decision-making ...regarding this most controversial of all his decisions. The book relies on notable archival research and the best and most recent scholarship on the subject to fashion an incisive overview that is fair and forceful in its judgments. This study addresses a subject that has been much debated among historians and it confronts head-on the highly disputed claim that the Truman administration practised 'atomic diplomacy'. The book goes beyond its central historical analysis to ask whether it was morally right for the United States to use these terrible weapons against Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It also provides a balanced evaluation of the relationship between atomic weapons and the origins of the Cold War.
This work is a narrative of Zachary Taylor’s Mexican War campaign, from the formation of his army in 1844 to his last battle at Buena Vista in 1847, with emphasis on the 163 men in his ...“Army of Occupation” who became Confederate or Union generals in the Civil War. It clarifies what being a Mexican War veteran meant in their cases, how they interacted with one another, how they performed their various duties, and how they reacted under fire. Referring to developments in Washington, D.C., and other theaters of the war, this book provides a comprehensive picture of the early years of the conflict based on army records and the letters and diaries of the participants.   Trailing Clouds of Glory is the first examination of the roles played in the Mexican War by the large number of men who served with Taylor and who would be prominent in the next war, both as volunteer and regular army officers, and it provides fresh information, even on such subjects as Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant. Particularly interesting for the student of the Civil War are largely unknown aspects of the Mexican War service of Daniel Harvey Hill, Braxton Bragg, and Thomas W. Sherman.
Winner of the 2019 Brigadier General James L. Collins Jr. Prize In To Win and Lose a Medieval Battle, Andrew Villalon and Donald Kagay provide a full treatment of one of the major battles of the ...Hundred Years War. The authors have investigated the background to Nájera, traced its immediate events, and laid out its effects on Iberia and the principal adversaries in the Hundred Years War.
“Hess’s account of the understudied Knoxville Campaign sheds new light on the generalship of James Longstreet and Ambrose Burnside, as well as such lesser players as Micah Jenkins ...and Orlando Poe. Both scholars and general readers should welcome it. The scholarship is sound, the research, superb, the writing, excellent.” —Steven E. Woodworth, author of Decision in the Heartland: The Civil War in the West In the fall and winter of 1863, Union General Ambrose Burnside and Confederate General James Longstreet vied for control of the city of Knoxville and with it the railroad that linked the Confederacy east and west. The generals and their men competed, too, for the hearts and minds of the people of East Tennessee. Often overshadowed by the fighting at Chickamauga and Chattanooga, this important campaign has never received a full scholarly treatment. In this landmark book, award-winning historian Earl J. Hess fills a gap in Civil War scholarship—a timely contribution that coincides with and commemorates the sesquicentennial of the Civil War      The East Tennessee campaign was an important part of the war in the West. It brought the conflict to Knoxville in a devastating way, forcing the Union defenders to endure two weeks of siege in worsening winter conditions. The besieging Confederates suffered equally from supply shortages, while the civilian population was caught in the middle and the town itself suffered widespread destruction. The campaign culminated in the famed attack on Fort Sanders early on the morning of November 29, 1863. The bloody repulse of Longstreet’s veterans that morning contributed significantly to the unraveling of Confederate hopes in the Western theater of operations.      Hess’s compelling account is filled with numerous maps and images that enhance the reader’s understanding of this vital campaign that tested the heart of East Tennessee. The author’s narrative and analysis will appeal to a broad audience, including general readers, seasoned scholars, and new students of Tennessee and Civil War history. The Knoxville Campaign will thoroughly reorient our view of the war as it played out in the mountains and valleys of East Tennessee. EARL J. HESS is Stewart W. McClelland Distinguished Professor in Humanities and an associate professor of history at Lincoln Memorial University. He is the author of nearly twenty books, including The Civil War in the West—Victory and Defeat from the Appalachians to the Mississippi and Lincoln Memorial University and the Shaping of Appalachia.
Multilingualism describes the fact of using several living languages, understanding them, and mastering their nuances. Languages apprenticeship is long, tedious, but rewarding. Worldwide, 60-75% of ...the population speaks at least two languages. To be monolingual is to be part of a minority. For the new generations of military leaders, speaking several languages is a huge advantage, socially, professionally and neurologically. After briefly reviewing some scientific data on the advantages of the bilingual brain, the paper discusses how bilingualism positively affects their cognitive development as future Army leaders. Indeed, the obligation to juggle between two languages, the mother tongue and the language learned, offers bilingual people better control of the executive functions of their brain. In other words, the faculties of attention, memory, reasoning developed by learning the language are reinforced. This is an advantage for the military leader, who can thus process each piece of information more quickly and adapt more effectively to the evolution of a situation in a theatre of operations, for example. Cognitive control skills, mental flexibility, the ability to perform tasks requiring change, monitoring and conflict control are thus easier for a bilingual army officer.
Historians have long analyzed the battles and the military strategies that brought the American Civil War to an end. Going beyond tactics and troop maneuvers, this book concentrates on the characters ...of the two opposing generals--Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant--showing how their different temperaments ultimately determined the course of the war. As author David Alan Johnson explains, Grant's dogged and fearless determination eventually gained the upper hand over Lee's arguably superior military brilliance.Delving into their separate upbringings, the book depicts Grant as a working-class man from Ohio and Lee as a Virginia aristocrat. Both men were strongly influenced by their fathers. Grant learned a lesson in determination as he watched his father overcome economic hardships to make a successful living as a tanner and leather goods dealer. By contrast, Lee did his best to become the polar opposite of his father, a man whose bankruptcy and imprisonment for unpaid debts brought disgrace upon the family. Lee cultivated a manner of unimpeachable respectability and patrician courtesy, which in the field of battle did not always translate into decisive orders. Underscoring the tragedy of this fratricidal conflict, the author recounts episodes from the earlier Mexican war (1846-1848), when Grant and Lee and many other officers who would later oppose each other were comrades in arms. This vivid narrative brings to life a crucial turning point in American history, showing how character and circumstances combined to have a decisive influence on the course of events.
French territorial ambitions and consequent military activity during the reign of Louis XIV ensured that a number of territories bordering on France were subject to military occupation for strategic ...reasons from the 1660s onwards. Drawing on extensive archival research, this study presents the occupation of two of these territories, Lorraine and Savoy, from a comparative perspective. It investigates the aims and intentions of the French monarchy in occupying these regions, the problems of administering them, and French relations with key local elite groups. Absolute monarchy on the frontiers makes a significant contribution to understanding this crucial era in the development of civil-military relations. It also places the occupations of Lorraine and Savoy within the framework of recent scholarship on early modern border societies and frontiers, and on the practice of 'absolutism' at the frontiers of the French kingdom. The book will appeal particularly to scholars and students of early modern France and Europe.
This account of Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia, in the words of those who experienced it, offers "a brilliant insight into men at war" (David G. Chandler, author of The Campaigns of ...Napoleon). Hundreds of thousands of men set out on that midsummer day of 1812. None could have imagined the terrors and hardships to come. They'd been lured all the way to Moscow without having achieved the decisive battle Napoleon sought-and by the time they reached the city, their numbers had already dwindled by more than a third. One of the greatest disasters in military history was in the making. The fruit of more than twenty years of research, this superbly crafted work skillfully blends the memoirs and diaries of more than a hundred eyewitnesses, all of whom took part in the Grand Army's doomed march on Moscow, to reveal the inside story of this landmark military campaign. The result is a uniquely authentic account in which the reader sees and experiences the campaign through the eyes of participants in enthralling day-by-day, sometimes hour-by-hour detail.
Lee & Grant Bowery, Major Charles R
2005., 2004
eBook
"Lee & Grant" analyzes the leadership skills of the two greatest generals of the Civil War. Both exhibited intelligence, problem-solving skills, and the ability to garner the respect of every person ...in their command. Today's leaders will find an incalculable asset in their legacy. It focuses on this one campaign, not only to present a riveting story, but also to highlight examples of their different leadership styles.
