This book is based on five-hundred letters, six diaries and the regimental surgeons day book. All new primary resources for the researcher. It is illustrated with 142 plates of photos of the men, maps, and sketches as well as some modern photography. This regiment spent 10 months guarding the Kentucky Central Railroad building blockhouses and was engaged in suppression of Confederate recruitment, spying and communications. They moved into East Tennessee and six months of 1/4 to 1/2 rations and their first battle at Mossy Creek. They then started into the Atlanta campaign loosing heavily at Resaca, Kennesaw and Utoy Creek. They took part in the campaign in Tennessee against Hood, fighting at Columbia, Spring Hill and holding a hitherto unrecorded critical flanking position at Franklin. They fought at Nashville and the pursuit of Hood. They then were transported to Cape Fear North Carolina. Assaulted Ft. Anderson and linked up with Sherman for the final movements resulting in the surrender of Johnson's Forces.
For scope, drama, and importance, the Atlanta Campaign was second only to Ulysses S. Grant’s Overland Campaign in Virginia. Despite its criticality and massive array of primary source material, it has lingered in the shadows of other campaigns and has yet to receive the treatment it deserves. Powell’s The Atlanta Campaign, Volume 1: Dalton to Cassville, May 1–19, 1864, the first in a proposed five-volume treatment, ends that oversight. Once Grant decided to go east and lead the Federal armies against Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, he chose William T. Sherman to do the same in Georgia against Joseph E. Johnston and his ill-starred Army of Tennessee. Sherman’s base was Chattanooga; Johnston’s was Atlanta. The grueling campaign opened on May 1, 1864. While Grant and Lee grappled with one another like wrestlers, Sherman and Johnston parried and feinted like fencers. Johnston eschewed the offensive while hoping to lure Sherman into headlong assaults against fortified lines. Sherman disliked the uncertainty of battle and preferred maneuvering. When Johnston dug in, Sherman sought his flanks and turned the Confederates out of seemingly impregnable positions in a campaign noted Civil War historian Richard M. McMurry dubbed “the Red Clay Minuet.” Contrary to popular belief Sherman did not set out to capture Atlanta. His orders were “to move against Johnston’s army, to break it up and to get into the interior of the enemy’s country . . . inflicting all the damage you can against their war resources.” No Civil War army could survive long without its logistical base, and Atlanta was vital to the larger Confederate war effort. As Johnston retreated, Southern fears for the city grew. As Sherman advanced, Northern expectations increased. This first installment of The Atlanta Campaign relies on a mountain of primary source material and extensive experience with the terrain to examine the battles of Dalton, Resaca, Rome Crossroads, Adairsville, and Cassville—the first phase of the long and momentous campaign. While none of these engagements matched the bloodshed of the Wilderness or Spotsylvania, each witnessed periods of intense fighting and key decision-making. The largest fight, Resaca, produced more than 8,000 killed, wounded, and missing in just two days. In between these actions the armies skirmished daily in a campaign its participants would recall as the “100 days’ fight.” Like Powell’s The Chickamauga Campaign trilogy, this multi-volume study breaks new ground and promises to be this generation’s definitive treatment of one of the most important and fascinating confrontations of the entire Civil War.
A Shouting of Orders conveys the history of the 99th Ohio Volunteer Infantry, an American Civil War unit formed from the counties of northwest Ohio surrounding Lima. The regiment, one among nearly 200 formed in the Buckeye State, has a history rich in personalities and experiences. A Shouting of Orders is the culmination of nearly 10 years of research and features previously unpublished primary source documents from key members of the regiment, including the lieutenant colonel and a company captain. McCray also heavily relied on the regimental papers kept with the National Archives, as well as contemporary newspaper reports.
Organized at Indianapolis in December 1861, the 47th Indiana Volunteer Infantry's Civil War service spanned the Mississippi Valley and the Gulf South. From Louisville to New Orleans and on to Mobile, General James R. Slack and the 47th Indiana took the war to the inland waterways and southern bayous, fighting in many of the Civil War's most famous campaigns, including Vicksburg, Red River and Mobile. This chronicle of the 47th Indiana follows the regiment's odyssey through the words of its officers and men. Sources include Chaplain Samuel Sawyer's account of their exploits in the Indianapolis Daily Journal, soldiers' accounts in Indiana newspapers, stories of war and intrigue from newspapermen of the "Bohemian Brigade," and General Slack's own story in letters to his wife, Ann, including his postwar command on the Rio Grande. Numerous photographs, previously unpublished battle and area maps, and a full regimental roster complete this detailed account.
