Author: Albert Castel Publisher: ISBN: Category : History Languages : en Pages : 764
Book Description
Following a skirmish on June 28, 1864, a truce is called so the North can remove their dead and wounded. For two hours, Yankees and Rebels mingle, with some of the latter even assisting the former in their grisly work. Newspapers are exchanged. Northern coffee is swapped for Southern tobacco. Yanks crowd around two Rebel generals, soliciting and obtaining autographs.
Author: Earl J. Hess Publisher: UNC Press Books ISBN: 1469634201 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 344
Book Description
On July 20, 1864, the Civil War struggle for Atlanta reached a pivotal moment. As William T. Sherman's Union forces came ever nearer the city, the defending Confederate Army of Tennessee replaced its commanding general, removing Joseph E. Johnston and elevating John Bell Hood. This decision stunned and demoralized Confederate troops just when Hood was compelled to take the offensive against the approaching Federals. Attacking northward from Atlanta's defenses, Hood's men struck George H. Thomas's Army of the Cumberland just after it crossed Peach Tree Creek on July 20. Initially taken by surprise, the Federals fought back with spirit and nullified all the advantages the Confederates first enjoyed. As a result, the Federals achieved a remarkable defensive victory. Offering new and definitive interpretations of the battle's place within the Atlanta campaign, Earl J. Hess describes how several Confederate regiments and brigades made a pretense of advancing but then stopped partway to the objective and took cover for the rest of the afternoon on July 20. Hess shows that morale played an unusually important role in determining the outcome at Peach Tree Creek--a soured mood among the Confederates and overwhelming confidence among the Federals spelled disaster for one side and victory for the other.
Author: Stephen Davis Publisher: ISBN: 9780881463989 Category : Atlanta Campaign, 1864 Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Like Chicago from Mrs. O'Leary's cow, or San Francisco from the earthquake of 1906, Atlanta has earned distinction as one of the most burned cities in American history. During the Civil War, Atlanta was wrecked, but not by burning alone. Longtime Atlantan Stephen Davis tells the story of what the Yankees did to his city. General William T. Sherman's Union forces had invested the city by late July 1864. Northern artillerymen, on Sherman's direct orders, began shelling the interior of Atlanta on 20 July, knowing that civilians still lived there and continued despite their knowledge that women and children were being killed and wounded. Countless buildings were damaged by Northern missiles and the fires they caused. Davis provides the most extensive account of the Federal shelling of Atlanta, relying on contemporary newspaper accounts more than any previous scholar. The Yankees took Atlanta in early September by cutting its last railroad, which caused Confederate forces to evacuate and allowed Sherman's troops to march in the next day. The Federal army's two and a half-month occupation of the city is rarely covered in books on the Atlanta campaign. Davis makes a point that Sherman's "wrecking" continued during the occupation when Northern soldiers stripped houses and tore other structures down for wood to build their shanties and huts. Before setting out on his "march to the sea," Sherman directed his engineers to demolish the city's railroad complex and what remained of its industrial plant. He cautioned them not to use fire until the day before the army was to set out on its march. Yet fires began the night of 11 November--deliberate arson committed against orders by Northern soldiers. Davis details the "burning" of Atlanta, and studies those accounts that attempt to estimate the extent of destruction in the city.
Author: Earl J. Hess Publisher: UNC Press Books ISBN: 1469622424 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 289
Book Description
Fought on July 28, 1864, the Battle of Ezra Church was a dramatic engagement during the Civil War's Atlanta campaign. Confederate forces under John Bell Hood desperately fought to stop William T. Sherman's advancing armies as they tried to cut the last Confederate supply line into the city. Confederates under General Stephen D. Lee nearly overwhelmed the Union right flank, but Federals under General Oliver O. Howard decisively repelled every attack. After five hours of struggle, 5,000 Confederates lay dead and wounded, while only 632 Federals were lost. The result was another major step in Sherman's long effort to take Atlanta. Hess's compelling study is the first book-length account of the fighting at Ezra Church. Detailing Lee's tactical missteps and Howard's vigilant leadership, he challenges many common misconceptions about the battle. Richly narrated and drawn from an array of unpublished manuscripts and firsthand accounts, Hess's work sheds new light on the complexities and significance of this important engagement, both on and off the battlefield.
Author: Earl J. Hess Publisher: UNC Press Books ISBN: 1469602113 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 342
Book Description
While fighting his way toward Atlanta, William T. Sherman encountered his biggest roadblock at Kennesaw Mountain, where Joseph E. Johnston's Army of Tennessee held a heavily fortified position. The opposing armies confronted each other from June 19 to July 3, 1864. Hess explains how this battle, with its combination of maneuver and combat, severely tried the patience and endurance of the common soldier and why Johnston's strategy might have been the Confederates' best chance to halt the Federal drive toward Atlanta.
Author: Russell S. Bonds Publisher: Westholme Publishing ISBN: Category : History Languages : en Pages : 552
Book Description
Draws on diaries, unpublished letters, and other archival sources to trace the events of the Civil War campaign that sealed the fate of the Confederacy and was instrumental in securing Abraham Lincoln's reelection.
Author: Ulysses S. Grant Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform ISBN: 9781519428028 Category : Languages : en Pages : 34
Book Description
In the 19th century, one of the surest ways to rise to prominence in American society was to be a war hero, like Andrew Jackson and William Henry Harrison. But few would have predicted such a destiny for Hiram Ulysses Grant, who had been a career soldier with little experience in combat and a failed businessman when the Civil War broke out in 1861. However, while all eyes were fixed on the Eastern theater at places like Manassas, Richmond, the Shenandoah Valley and Antietam, Grant went about a steady rise up the ranks through a series of successes in the West. His victory at Fort Donelson, in which his terms to the doomed Confederate garrison earned him the nickname "Unconditional Surrender" Grant, could be considered the first major Union victory of the war, and Grant's fame and rank only grew after that at battlefields like Shiloh and Vicksburg. Along the way, Grant nearly fell prey to military politics and the belief that he was at fault for the near defeat at Shiloh, but President Lincoln famously defended him, remarking, "I can't spare this man. He fights." Lincoln's steadfastness ensured that Grant's victories out West continued to pile up, and after Vicksburg and Chattanooga, Grant had effectively ensured Union control of the states of Kentucky and Tennessee, as well as the entire Mississippi River. At the beginning of 1864, Lincoln put him in charge of all federal armies, and he led the Army of the Potomac against Robert E. Lee in the Overland campaign, the siege of Petersburg, and famously, the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox. Although Grant was instrumental in winning the war and eventually parlayed his fame into two terms in the White House, his legacy and accomplishments are still the subjects of heavy debate today. His presidency is remembered mostly due to rampant fraud within his Administration, although he was never personally accused of wrongdoing, and even his victories in the Civil War have been countered by charges that he was a butcher. Like the other American Legends, much of Grant's personal life has been eclipsed by the momentous battles and events in which he participated, from Fort Donelson to the White House.
Author: Daniel J. Vermilya Publisher: Civil War ISBN: 9781626193888 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
Revisit one of the most important and bloodiest days of the Civil War, the Confederate battle at Kennesaw Mountain in Georgia, in this exciting view of the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain in the summer of 1864. In the summer of 1864, Georgia was the scene of one of the most important campaigns of the Civil War. William Tecumseh Sherman's push southward toward Atlanta threatened the heart of the Confederacy, and Joseph E. Johnston and the Army of Tennessee were the Confederacy's best hope to defend it. In June, Johnston managed to grind Sherman's advance to a halt northwest of Atlanta at Kennesaw Mountain. After weeks of maneuvering, on June 27, Sherman launched a bold attack on Johnston's lines. The Confederate victory was one of the bloodiest days of the entire campaign. And while Sherman's assaults had a frightful cost, Union forces learned important lessons at Kennesaw Mountain that enabled the fall of Atlanta several months later.
Author: David Allison Publisher: ISBN: 9781977761903 Category : Languages : en Pages : 372
Book Description
The battle fought during the American Civil War at Decatur, Georgia, on the Friday afternoon of July 22, 1864, was a small affair, what General William T. Sherman might have called an afternoon dash, but one which killed and mangled only several hundred men. The Battle of Decatur was foredoomed to oblivion as a sideshow to the great and famous Battle of Atlanta. That epic pageant, fought simultaneously that hot summer afternoon six miles to the west of Decatur and involving tens of thousands of combatants, is portrayed vividly in the Atlanta Cyclorama and numerous books. Amidst the later historic drama of the death struggle for Atlanta in the summer of 1864, the Battle of Decatur was seemingly forgotten almost before the gun smoke cleared and the dead were buried. Among the many published accounts of the Battle of Atlanta, the Battle of Decatur is often given only a brief mention or even omitted altogether. The tale has elements of a great story: A smaller force attacked by a much larger force. Tremendous human courage and tragedy. A bayonet charge. AMedal of Honor won. The Battle of Decatur is linked to one of the great horrors of the Civil War, Georgia's Andersonville prison. Most of the Federals captured by the Confederates at Decatur were sent to that hell-hole, and many met their deaths there. The battle is also linked to the greatest maritime disaster in American history, the Sultana explosion, in whicha sidewheel steam ship carrying freed Federal prisoners of war back to their homes blew up on the Mississippi River, claiming more lives thanthe sinking of the Titanic. And most don't know the battle's connection to modern American pop culture: American Idol star Kelly Clarkson'sgreat-great-great grandfather and uncle fought in the battle. One survived, the other died.Other participants in the Battle of Decatur went on to lead notable post-war lives and to become nationally prominent figures who shapedlate 19th century American political, business and military events. Among the Federals, Colonel (later General) John W. Sprague, who commandedthe Federal forces during the battle, later helped settle the American northwest as a founder of the city of Tacoma, Washington. Jeremiah Rusk, second in command of one of the Federal regiments in the battle, later became governor of Wisconsin and the first-ever U.S. secretary ofagriculture. That regiment's commanding officer, Milton Montgomery, founded what's now the oldest law firm in Omaha, Nebraska. Other participantsbecame members of Congress or state politicians. One became a close business associate of the great steel magnate Andrew Carnegie.Among the Confederates, General Joseph Wheeler after the war helped to reconcile the North and South as a member of Congress and played arole in one of the U.S. Army's first overseas invasions in Cuba. Decatur resident Mary A.H. Gay, who was in the town at the time of the battle,later wrote a book based on what she saw that inspired Margaret Mitchell's creation of the character Scarlett O'Hara in "Gone With TheWind," one of the top-selling novels of all time.That is the impetus for this book, the first book-length treatment of the Battle of Decatur, its participants and the aftermath it had on them.
Author: Albert Castel
Author: Earl J. Hess
Author: Stephen Davis
Author: Earl J. Hess
Author: Earl J. Hess
Author: Russell S. Bonds
Author: Ulysses S. Grant
Author: John C. Inscoe
Author: Daniel J. Vermilya
Author: David Allison