"The eleven essays in this volume re-examine common assumptions about the campaign, its major figures, and its significance. Taking advantage of the most recent scholarship and a wide range of primary sources, contributors examine strategy and tactics, the performances of key commanders on each side, the campaign's political repercussions, and the experiences of civilians caught in the path of the armies. The authors do not always agree with one another, but, taken together, their essays highlight important connections between the home front and the battlefield, as well as ways in which military affairs, civilian experience, and politics played off one another during the campaign."--BOOK JACKET.
Jubal A. Early?s disastrous battles in the Shenandoah Valley ultimately resulted in his ignominious dismissal. But Early?s lesser-known summer campaign of 1864, between his raid on Washington and Phil Sheridan?s renowned fall campaign, had a significant impact on the political and military landscape of the time. By focusing on military tactics and battle history in uncovering the facts and events of these little-understood battles, Scott C. Patchan offers a new perspective on Early?s contributions to the Confederate war effort?and to Union battle plans and politicking. ø Patchan details the previously unexplored battles at Rutherford?s Farm and Kernstown (a pinnacle of Confederate operations in the Shenandoah Valley) and examines the campaign?s influence on President Lincoln?s reelection efforts. He also provides insights into the personalities, careers, and roles in Shenandoah of Confederate general John C. Breckinridge, Union general George Crook, and Union colonel James A. Mulligan, with his ?fighting Irish? brigade from Chicago. Finally, Patchan reconsiders the ever-colorful and controversial Early himself, whose importance in the Confederate military pantheon this book at last makes clear.
Virginia's Shenandoah Valley in 1864 was the scene of one of the most crucial campaigns of the Civil War. The outcome of the fighting there would have consequences that stretched far outside the valley to help decide the fate of the nation. In 1864 the Union Army's new commander, Ulysses Grant, created the Union's first cohesive strategy for conquering the Confederacy. One of his key objectives was to control the Shenandoah Valley. The valley shielded the Confederacy, served as the bread basket for Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, and provided remounts for Confederate cavalry. When an initial invasion in spring 1864 failed in the face of a skillful counter-attack by General Jubal Early, Grant turned to his cavalry commander, Brigadier-General Philip Sheridan, to drive the Confederacy from the valley. On August 7, 1864, "Little Phil" assumed command of the Army of the Shenandoah, as the new command was styled. Over the next 90 days two armies--the Union forces led by Sheridan and the Confederate troops commanded by Early--maneuvered across the Shenandoah Valley in a storied campaign of move and countermove, where unexpected attacks were met by equally unexpected ripostes. The stakes in the battles were not just the fate of one disputed agricultural valley in the United States. Rather, its implications would be felt throughout a nation torn by Civil War. Victory or defeat in the Shenandoah could affect the outcome of the Presidential election to be held in November 1864. Confederate loss of the Valley would cripple the Army of Northern Virginia. Sheridan's eventual victory helped ensure Lincoln's re-election and removed the Confederate threat, hastening the eventual end to the Civil War.
Shamefully neglected in most Civil War histories, the crucial Shenandoah Valley campaign of 1864 is at last re-created and analyzed in this fascinating book. "Will stand as the definitive account of the final struggle".--The Civil War Book Exchange and Collector's Newspaper. 36 photos.
A significant part of the Civil War was fought in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, especially in 1864. Books and articles have been written about the fighting that took place there, but they generally cover only a small period of time and focus on a particular battle or campaign. This work covers the entire year of 1864 so that readers can clearly see how one event led to another in the Shenandoah Valley and turned once-peaceful garden spots into gory battlefields. It tells the stories of the great leaders, ordinary men, innocent civilians, and armies large and small taking part in battles at New Market, Chambersburg, Winchester, Fisher's Hill and Cedar Creek, but it primarily tells the stories of the soldiers, Union and Confederate, who were willing to risk their lives for their beliefs. The author has made extensive use of memoirs, letters and reports written by the soldiers of both sides who fought in the Shenandoah Valley in 1864.
The product of a symposium held in 1989, this book of essays provides an introduction to the cardinal aspects of an important American Civil War campaign. The authors disagree on the relative importance of certain operations or leaders in the valley.
An “essential addition to serious students’ libraries” detailing the historic military offensive that helped sway the outcome of the American Civil War (Civil War News). In the late summer of 1864, Union General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant set one absolutely unconditional goal: to sweep Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley “clean and clear.” His man for the job: Maj. Gen. “Little Phil” Sheridan—a temperamental Irishman who’d proven himself just the kind of scrapper Grant loved. The valley had already played a major part in the war for the Confederacy as both the location of major early victories against Union attacks, and as the route used by the Army of Northern Virginia for its invasion of the North, culminating in the battle of Gettysburg. But when Sheridan returned to the Valley in 1864, the stakes heightened dramatically. For the North, the fragile momentum its war effort had gained by the capture of Atlanta would quickly evaporate. For Abraham Lincoln, defeat in the Valley could mean defeat in the upcoming election. And for the South, its very sovereignty lay on the line. Here, historians Davis and Greenwalt “weave an excellent summary of the campaign that will serve to introduce those new to the Civil War to the events of that ‘Bloody Autumn’ and will serve as a ready refresher for veteran stompers who are heading out to visit those storied fields of conflict” (Scott C. Patchan, author of The Last Battle of Winchester).
The Shenandoah Valley Campaign, March November 1864, by Raymond K. Bluhm Jr., covers Union and Confederate military operations in the Shenandoah Valley region of southwestern Virginia, and in Maryland and Washington, D.C., during the last full year of the conflict. Bluhm describes the Union advance in the Shenandoah Valley in May 1864 that led to the Federal defeat at the Battle of New Market, Maj. Gen. David Hunter's destructive campaign later that spring culminating in his retreat from Lynchburg, and Maj. Gen. Jubal Early's subsequent Confederate offensive against the U.S. capital, resulting in the Battle of Monocacy in July. Also covered is Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan's tenure in command of Union forces in the Valley and his two key victories at Winchester and Cedar Creek, in which rebel forces under Early were defeated, giving Union forces control over the region by November 1864."
An “exciting and informative” account of the Civil War battle that opened the 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign, with illustrations included (Lone Star Book Review). Charles Knight’s Valley Thunder is the first full-length account in decades to examine the combat at New Market on May 15, 1864 that opened the pivotal Shenandoah Valley Campaign. Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, who set in motion the wide-ranging operation to subjugate the South in 1864, intended to attack on multiple fronts so the Confederacy could no longer “take advantage of interior lines.” A key to success in the Eastern Theater was control of the Shenandoah Valley, an agriculturally abundant region that helped feed Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. Grant tasked Maj. Gen. Franz Sigel, a German immigrant with a mixed fighting record, and a motley collection of units numbering some 10,000 men to clear the Valley and threaten Lee’s left flank. Opposing Sigel was Maj. Gen. (and former US Vice President) John C. Breckinridge, who assembled a scratch command to repulse the Federals. Included in his 4,500-man army were Virginia Military Institute cadets under the direction of Lt. Col. Scott Ship, who’d marched eighty miles in four days to fight Sigel. When the armies faced off at New Market, Breckinridge told the cadets, “Gentlemen, I trust I will not need your services today; but if I do, I know you will do your duty.” The sharp fighting seesawed back and forth during a drenching rainstorm, and wasn’t concluded until the cadets were inserted into the battle line to repulse a Federal attack and launch one of their own. The Union forces were driven from the Valley, but would return, reinforced and under new leadership, within a month. Before being repulsed, they would march over the field at New Market and capture Staunton, burn VMI in Lexington (partly in retaliation for the cadets’ participation at New Market), and very nearly capture Lynchburg. Operations in the Valley on a much larger scale that summer would permanently sweep the Confederates from the “Bread Basket of the Confederacy.” Valley Thunder is based on years of primary research and a firsthand appreciation of the battlefield terrain. Knight’s objective approach includes a detailed examination of the complex prelude leading up to the battle, and his entertaining prose introduces soldiers, civilians, and politicians who found themselves swept up in one of the war’s most gripping engagements.
