The Coal River Valley in the Civil War: West Virginia Mountains, 1861

Michael B. Graham Ph.D

The History Press, 2014, 208 pp., $19.99

ISBN: 978-1-62619-660-5

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                The stories of the border states throughout the American Civil War is often one of tragedy due to family separations greater than many other states.  In this story of the Coal River Valley in the Civil War, Michael Graham states that a work on West Virginia in the Civil War would be too great to handle in one volume and focuses just on the Coal River Valley.  In his work, he presents many points about the valley including the demographics, the industry and the military at the onset of the war including the major battles which occurred.  While some of the battles may have been small, they were quite effective to the causes of the war on both sides.

                Michael B. Graham, Ph.D, is an adjunct professor of history, security and global studies at the American Military University.  He is also the senior Vice President for management and is the Chief Financial Officer at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington D.C.  A graduate from the Air War College and an attendee of the Naval War College along with Marine Corps Command and General Staff College, he is the author of many other works.  Some of those works include Liberating a Continent: The European Theater and Fall of the Rising Sun: The Pacific Theater.  He has written many other books all on the subject of military history.

                Much like Maryland, the people of West Virginia were greatly divided among their loyalties, some to the Union and some to the Confederacy.  When the time came for them to secede from Virginia in 1863, the state pushed for admittance to the Union.  But the events which occurred in 1861 were quite important to the causes of the war and in this work, Graham writes a flowing narrative which is easy to follow and gives the reader a better idea of what was going on in the West Virginian Mountains in 1861.  Opening his work with a prelude, he gives a coherent outline about what was to come throughout the work starting with the Boone Court House.  Graham’s account of the Boone Court House is quite in depth and well researched to the point that there is no question as to what happened on those fields.  Some of the other conflicts which happened during the first year of the war in the mountains were the Coal River, Pond Fork, Bald Knob, Forks of Coal, Kanawha Gap and Raleigh to name a few.  Throughout these accounts, the research is impeccable and well done supplemented with excellent pictures and maps.

                I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of West Virginia during the American Civil War.  In his introduction, Graham states that he wanted to write a book about the state during the war and I hope that one day he does fulfill that idea.  As for right now, this work stands as a tribute to a campaign of battles which are rarely talked about but have a great deal to do with the causes of both sides during the first pivotal year of the war.  The story of the Border States is often overlooked, but here, Graham gives us a look into what really happened there.  Highly recommended.

The St. Albans Raid: Confederate Arrack on Vermont

Michelle Arnosky Sherburne

The History Press, 2014, 189 pp., $199.99

ISBN: 978-1-62619-629-2

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                In the annals of the Battle of Gettysburg, there is always talk about the High Water Mark.  While the area of the monument is somewhat contended, there are even those that state the monument should be farther north in Pennsylvania somewhere around Carlisle.  The events which occurred in St. Albans are known, but not well known enough for all to admit.  In this work, Michelle Arnosky Sherburne gives us a window into the conflict which occurred in northern Vermont which brings forth the thought as to what the actual High Water Mark is in the history of the Confederacy.  In this work, Sherburne brings us a study into the actuality through fine research and sweeping narrative.

                Michelle Arnosky Sherburne has worked in the newspaper business since she graduated high school and was originally from Pennsylvania.  Ever since the 1990s, she pursued freelance writing and began researching the history of Vermont mainly on the effects of the Underground Railroad for about two decades.  She has also authored Abolition and the Underground Railroad in Vermont and the co-editor of A Vermont Hill Town in the Civil War: Peacham’s Story.  She still works in the newspaper industry and tours around the state of Vermont giving historical presentations and lectures in the schoolroom.

                When we usually think of the American Civil War, Vermont is the last thing when it comes to a battlefield.  However, in the fall of 1864, the town of St. Albans was part of an attack from raiders.  In this narrative, which reads somewhat like a thriller novel, Sherburne splits the raid into three main stages: Setting the Stage, the Raid itself, and the Trials of the Raiders in Canada.  Throughout the first part of the story, Sherburne gives us a description not only of the raiders themselves, but of the town and the people residing.  She also describes some of the weapons the raiders were using including Greek Fire.  She also describes the Confederate Secret Service not only in this incident, but in other aspects of the war.  As I stated before, much of the second section on the raid read like a thriller novel.  Some of the events which occurred were quite horrifying not because of the action, but because this event is not heard in Civil War history as much as it should.  The second part of the raid which was just as thrilling was the chase of the raiders which eventually led to their arrest.  After the arrest of the raiders, the third section details the arrests and trials which the raiders went through.

                I highly recommend The St. Albans Raid to anyone who is interested into the more unknown aspects of the war.  This war touched everyone even when the action of the battlefield was far away from the state of Virginia.  This work shows that even the terrible reality of war could reach a state so northern as Vermont.  I praise Sherburne for bringing this subject more to the light of the public.  There are some who already know about the raid, but for those who find this to be new information, this book is highly recommended.

The Peninsula Campaign and the Necessity of Emancipation: African Americans and the Fight for Freedom

Glenn David Brasher

The University of North Carolina Press, 2014, 296 pp., $27.95

ISBN: 978-1-4696-1750-3

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                There has been a recent interest into the summer and early fall of 1862 regarding the military and emancipation.  Glenn David Brasher gives new insight into the involvement of African Americans and the Peninsula Campaign which aids Abraham Lincoln and his decision to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.  While readers would assume that this work centers around the fighting of the Peninsula Campaign, most of the work analyzes the work which the African Americans provided for the cause and the great monuments to their work.  Here in this work, Glenn David Brasher truly gives us something different and something to think about.

                Glenn David Brasher is an instructor of history at the University of Alabama.  He is a native of Birmingham, Alabama and has received his Ph.D. from the same university.  For eight years he was a seasonal field guide at the Richmond National Battlefield and had his specialty in the Peninsula Campaign.  He has also taught at the Virginia Commonwealth University and contributes regularly to the Civil War Monitor and the New York Times “Disunion.”  In 2008, he was a finalist for the Southern Historical Associations C. Vann Woodward Award and is the 2013 recipient of the Wiley-Silver Award from the Center for Civil War Research at the University of Mississippi.

                Upon the first look at this book, readers may feel as though it is an analysis on the Peninsula Campaign and while there are some things about the campaign in the work, the focus is quite different.  The book is separated through the months ranging from April of 1861 all the way to July of 1862.  Throughout the text, Brasher proves that there were efforts of the African American population which were overshadowed by the “Hero Making” of Union officers.  The press often took notice more of the hero making than the works of the African Americans in the campaign.  It is also in this work where there are quite a few pictures which show the relations between the Union soldier and the freed slave.  In the realm of military intelligence, there were quite a few officers in the Union army which trusted the words of freed or escaped slaves over that of their own intelligence gatherers.  It was at this point in the war when the Pinkerton agency began to falter with their intelligence and the words of the African Americans were more reliable than them.  In my opinion, this was more important to the war effort than the constructing which they were doing to aid the army.  While the participation of the African Americans were important, he also analyzes the morale of the Union soldiers during the Peninsula Campaign.  In his chapter on July of 1862, he remarks the many times which not only the soldier morale was down, but the officer morale was low as well.  This was an army which was supposed to bring Richmond to its knees and in the eyes of many of the officers was a decent plan.  But as he states with resounding evidence, the morale was bad.  Another interesting part in this study is the implementation of the abolitionists during the campaign and their reactions to the failures which had come about.  Some, such as Henry Ward Beecher, were angry that emancipation had not yet come and blamed the campaigns failure on the nation’s refusal to liberate slaves.    

                This book is quite thought provoking in many areas in a good way.  Due to the participation of African Americans during the Peninsula Campaign, there was a push for emancipation from abolition leaders, many of whom were in the political circle.  In usual campaign analyses, there is just a military outlook, but here, we get all ends of the spectrum: military, social, political and abolition.  I highly recommend this book to anyone with interest in the politics of the abolitionist movement during the Civil War and how they were morphed by the military actions of the eastern armies.  Highly Recommended.

In the Trenches at Petersburg: Field Fortifications and Confederate Defeat

Earl J. Hess

The University of North Carolina Press, 2009, 403 pp., $28.00

ISBN: 978-1-4696-0995-9

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                In the Trenches at Petersburg is the conclusion to Earl J. Hess’ trilogy on Civil War engineering in the eastern theater.  Among the Sesquicentennial of the Siege of Petersburg, interest has peaked in to the type of warfare going on during those endless months of the siege.  The type of warfare going on during the Petersburg Campaign, however, was much different than the rest of the war.  Napoleonic tactics had taken a turn towards modern warfare a year earlier.   Here, Hess analyzes the trench warfare going on during the campaign and does it with magnificent style.

                Earl J. Hess is an associate professor of history at Lincoln Memorial University and has authored other works such as The Civil War in the West: Victory and Defeat from the Appalachians to the Mississippi and Pickett’s Charge – The Last Attack at Gettysburg.  His book on Pickett’s Charge was the winner of the 2001 James I. Robertson Jr. Prize from the Civil War Library and Research Center.  The first in the series on fortifications was Field Armies and Fortifications in the Civil War: The Eastern Campaign and the center work of the series is Trench Warfare Under Grant and Lee: Field Fortifications in the Overland Campaign.

                In an analysis of military history, many people tend to think of World War One when concerning the idea of trench warfare, but Hess has proven with his previous work and this work that trench war was alive during the Civil War.  With the incredible amount of attention which Hess has given to the previous works on this series, he begins the study with a look into the engineers which participated.  As he moves through the work, he goes month by month through the campaign and even goes into certain battles when dealing with engineering.  For example, Hess devotes an entire chapter to the Battle of the Crater and the engineering which took place along with the battle itself.  He analyzes both the Federal and Confederate attack and the aftermath including the ideas about where to go from there.  In the aftermath of the battle, the Confederate force was victorious but had to deal with the much more difficult task of cleaning the works of dead bodies and other minutia from the engagement.  This is something generally overlooked in the studies on the Battle of the Crater.  Another part of the analysis which was quite interesting was the talk of the evolution of trench warfare as they were fighting the war.  Hess talks about an English military board during the Crimean War that utilized electricity as a more effective means in the mines than a powder train.  It is these types of statements which prove that Hess is the master of Civil War Engineering.  Hess also aides his arguments and analyses with pictures and maps which show the horrors of what happened to the city of Petersburg and the land surrounding it.  In his conclusion, he states that these trenches are what made the preservation of the battlefield quite difficult over the years not just due to what happened to the land, but the passing of the land between owners.

                My first conclusion will be made on the parameters of this book.  On its own, this work on the trenches of Petersburg is quite excellent and should be hailed as the doctrine of trench warfare during the Petersburg Campaign.  It is highly recommended to anyone interested in the military strategy and tactics of the Civil War.  My second conclusion is made on the series.  I was sad to see this series end since I have enjoyed the topic so much since I was introduced to it by Mr. Hess.  As each volume finished, I realized that he had touched on a subject not many historians have talked about and he should be praised for that effort.  Hess has given us a series of books on the engineering during the war and has not been handled in such a way before.  This series is highly recommended and should be on the shelf of any serious Civil War historian.  Highly Recommended.