Tip the Wink

A Chain of Thunder by Jeff Shaara, Ballantine Books 2013, volume 2 of The Civil War Western Theater, historical novel (fictionalized)

Continuing with Shaara’s Civil War books, which I read in ebook format. Last week I reviewed A Blaze of Glory, about the battle of Shiloh. This time, it’s Grant’s campaign against Confederate General John Pemberton, leading to the South’s loss of the citadel of Vicksburg.

As the war in the West turns badly for the South, the Union knows the one great barrier to their control of the Mississippi River, considered critically important, lies at the Confederate bastion of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Protected by high embankments, and a formidable presence of Confederate artillery, the Confederate forces there under the command of John Pemberton, are confident that Vicksburg is a citadel that cannot fall. But Federal commander Ulysses Grant believes otherwise.

So Grant launches an overland campaign that avoids a direct frontal assault on the town from the river, and instead, maneuvers his army downstream, crossing from Louisiana into Mississippi where the Confederates are too weak to make an effective stand. Instead of pushing directly at Vicksburg, Grant employs an audacious strategy, slicing quickly through the Mississippi countryside toward the capital city of Jackson.

Pemberton’s superior, General Joseph Johnston arrives in Jackson and sees Pemberton’s situation in Vicksburg as hopeless. Thus he holds his own forces back from the fight, allowing Grant the freedom to focus all his energies on Vicksburg itself. Johnston’s reluctance to engage Grant, and thus offer relief to Vicksburg, is one of the most controversial decisions of the war.

The story is told primarily through the voices of Union General William T. Sherman, and, returning from the first volume (A Blaze of Glory), the young private from Wisconsin, Fritz Bauer. On the Southern side, the story is told through the eyes of Pemberton himself, as well as a young civilian woman in the town, Lucy Spence, who serves her cause the only way she can, by volunteering for nursing duties in the makeshift hospitals,

Like the first novel, this book is excellent. Next week I’ll be going on to the third book.

A Blaze of Glory by Jeff Shaara, Ballantine Books 2012, the Civil War in the West (Book 1), Paperback, 480 pages

I’ve had a passing interest in the American Civil War. I learned what was taught in school – the west coast perspective – and I  read “The Red Badge of Courage” but that was about it.

However in 1990 I watched with great interest Ken Burn’s The Civil War enjoying the insights and presentation, and learned a lot from it. A few years later I borrowed it from the library and re-watched it.

Then I read Bruce Catton’s Centennial History of the Civil War, which covers the causes of the war, and the battles of Bull Run through the final surrender.

I liked the books, and later I wanted more. I came across The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara, about the Gettysburg battle, and liked it a lot. Then my friend Dave Lewis suggested I try the books by Jeff Shaara, Michael’s son, and I got them in ebook format.

I’ve just finished reading the first of four in his Western Theater Tetralogy: A Blaze of Glory about the Battle of Shiloh. Like The Killer Angels, the book is written from the viewpoints of several people involved, on both sides of the conflict, both famous and a few characters added to give the story a more personal flavor. One of these is a foot soldier, carrying a single shot musket, who is on the front lines of this cannon-musket-bayonet battle. It was a bloody one, and our character was on his belly in the famous peach orchard fight.

This book is very well done. I’ll be going on to the second book, which is about the battle and siege of Vicksburg  next week.