A fully illustrated account of the Vicksburg Campaign, including modern color photography and covering the river war, inland battles, seige operations, and more.By the end of March 1863, Major General Ulysses S. Grant was at a crossroads in his military career. His bold attempts in the late fall 1862 and winter of 1862/63 had all come up fall short of his objective: get his army on high ground north and east of Vicksburg and capture the last major obstacle on the M...

A Civil War historian recounts the first battle between Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee—a bloody and horrifying conflict in the Wilderness of Virginia.Known simply as the Wilderness, soldiers called the seventy square miles of dense Virginian forest one of the "waste places of nature" and "a region of gloom." Yet here, in the spring of 1864, the Civil War escalated to a new level of horror.Ulysses S. Grant, commanding all Federal armies, opened the Overlan...

“The man to whom the country is most indebted for the great measure of independence is Mr. John Adams. . . . I call him the Atlas of American independence.”So attested one of the delegates to the Second Continental Congress, moved to support independence in July 1776 after months of angst, indecision, dithering, and fear. Thomas Jefferson called Adams “our colossus on the floor,” arguing with power, passion, and persuasive force of reason why America needed to take the extraordinar...

"A comprehensive, eminently readable, lavishly illustrated, and historically accurate account" of this important yet overlooked Civil War battle ( Civil War News).Jackson, Mississippi, was the third Confederate state capital to fall to Union forces. When Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant captured the important rail junction in May 1863, however, he did so almost as an afterthought. Drawing on dozens of primary sources, contextualized by the latest scholarship on G...

Fallen Leaders: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War recounts the fall of some of the most famous, infamous, and underappreciated commanders from both the North and South. The Civil War took as many as 720,000 lives and maimed hundreds of thousands more. The fallen included outstanding leaders on both sides, from a U.S. president all the way down the ranks to beloved regimental commanders. Abraham Lincoln, Stonewall Jackson, and John Reynolds re...

The stakes for George Gordon Meade could not have been higher.After his stunning victory at Gettysburg in July of 1863, the Union commander spent the following months trying to bring the Army of Northern Virginia to battle once more and finish the job. The Confederate army, robbed of much of its offensive strength, nevertheless parried Meade’s moves time after time. Although the armies remained in constant contact during those long months of cavalry clashes, quick maneuvers, and su...

The first book-length study of two overlooked engagements that helped turned the tide of a pivotal Civil War battle.By May of 1863, the stone wall at the base of Marye's Heights above Fredericksburg, Virginia, loomed large over the Army of the Potomac, haunting its men with memories of slaughter from their crushing defeat there the previous December. They would assault it again with a very different result the following spring. This time the Union troops wrested th...

"An outstanding read for anyone interested in the Civil War and Gettysburg in particular . . . innovative and thoughtful ideas on seemingly well-covered events." — The NYMAS ReviewThe largest land battle on the North American continent has maintained an unshakable grip on the American imagination. Building on momentum from a string of victories that stretched back into the summer of 1862, Robert E. Lee launched his Confederate Army of Northern Virginia on ...

In the fall of 1862, after a leadership shake-up initiated by Lincoln, Gen. Ambrose Burnside assumed command of the Army of the Potomac and developed an aggressive plan to attack the Confederate capital of Richmond. However, in order to reach Richmond, Burnside had to march through Fredericksburg, where Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia was well entrenched. After crossing the Rappahannock River under enemy fire, Burnside and his troops engaged Lee’s army within the city, then ...

"Gives the reader an excellent readable narrative of the first day of battle . . . [and] an incredible driving tour which closes each chapter." —Matthew Bartlett, Gettysburg ChronicleDo not bring on a general engagement, Confederate General Robert E. Lee warned his commanders. The Army of Northern Virginia, slicing its way through south-central Pennsylvania, was too spread out, too vulnerable, for a full-scale engagement with its old nemesis, the Army of th...

This Civil War history and guide offers a vivid chronicle of this dramatic yet misunderstood battle, plus invaluable information for battlefield visitors.The battle of Fredericksburg is usually remembered as the most lopsided Union defeat of the Civil War. It is sometimes called "Burnside's folly," after Union commander Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside who led the Army of the Potomac to ruin along the banks of the Rappahannock River. Confederates, fortified behind a stone...

A detailed study of the brutal and pivotal battle at Spotsylvania Court House, May 8–21, 1864. May 1864. The Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia spent three days in brutal close-quarter combat in the Wilderness that left the tangled thickets aflame. No one could have imagined a more infernal battlefield—until the armies moved down the road to Spotsylvania Court House. Even the march itself was unprecedented. For three years the armies had fought battles and disengaged aft...