The Union Generals Speak is the first annotated edition of the 1864 congressional investigation into Major General George Gordon Meade's conduct during the Gettysburg campaign. The transcripts alone, which present eyewitness accounts from sixteen participant officers at Gettysburg, offer a wealth of information about the what and the why of one of the most pivotal battles in American history; but it is the addition of contextual comments and background material by Bill Hyde that unleashes this virtually untapped resource for readers. Laden with ulterior motives, prejudices, faulty recollection, and outright lies, the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War's report is a minefield of inaccuracies. Hyde's comprehensive analysis, informed by recent scholarship, transforms it into an accessible, rewarding aid for students of the Gettysburg chapter in the Civil War. In the course of the volume, Hyde gives thorough examination to the origins and purpose of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, the political climate and military thinking in Washington at the time of the Meade hearings, and the hidden agendas of the witnesses and seven committee members. He maintains that the JCCW's dissatisfaction with Meade went much deeper than disapproval of the general's hesitancy to pursue and cripple Lee's Army of Northern Virginia on July 4, 1863—a failure that disappointed every northern citizen from Lincoln to the ordinary soldier. The bipartisan body of mostly radical Republicans who favored a ruthless defeat of the South aimed, Hyde shows, to restore power to the committee's favorite, Major General Joseph Hooker, whom Meade had succeeded as commander of the Army of the Potomac only three days before Gettysburg. The unfolding of the Gettysburg campaign, the career of General Meade, and the North's highly politicized method of warmaking all receive new illumination in The Union General's Speak. Hyde's balanced critique of this important primary source reminds us that though Meade is remembered now mainly for his role in defeating the Confederates at Gettysburg, the JCCW hearings confirmed that he was not the leader to win the war.

The outcomes of campaigns in the Civil War often depended on top generals having the right corps commanders in the right place at the right time. Mutual trust and respect between generals and their corps commanders, though vital to military success, was all too rare: Corps commanders were often forced to exercise considerable discretion in the execution of orders from their generals, and bitter public arguments over commanders' performances in battle followed hard on the heels of many major engagements. Controversies that arose during the war around the decisions of corps and army commanders-such as Daniel Sickles's disregard of George Meade's orders at the Battle of Gettysburg-continue to provoke vigorous debate among students of the Civil War. Corps Commanders in Blue offers eight case studies that illuminate the critical roles the Union corps commanders played in shaping the war's course and outcome. The contributors examine, and in many cases challenge, widespread assumptions about these men while considering the array of internal and external forces that shaped their efforts on and off the battlefield. Providing insight into the military conduct of the Civil War, Corps Commanders in Blue fills a significant gap in the historiography of the war by offering compelling examinations of the challenges of corps command in particular campaigns, the men who exercised that command, and the array of factors that shaped their efforts, for good or for ill.

Ulysses S. Grant leads this list of ten generals who helped win the Civil War for the North. Others are: Ambrose Burnside, Henry Halleck, Winfield Scott Hancock, Joseph Hooker, George McClellan, George Meade, Philip Sheridan, William Sherman and George Thomas. Their childhoods, education, and military training are given along with their roles in the Civil War.

With April 12, 2011, set to mark the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War at Fort Sumter, the time is ripe for a new assessment of the conflict’s most influential and controversial military leaders. Generals South, Generals North highlights twenty-four such commanders—twelve each from the Confederacy and the Union. Best-selling author and military historian Alan Axelrod presents a biography of each, narrates the major engagements in which each fought (emphasizing tactical leadership and outcome produced), and explores each man’s ever-controversial reputation. His consequent rankings are based on both historical and modern-day sources. Each profile is accompanied by callout quotations, photographs of the general, additional illustrations such as battle depictions, and a map depicting either a major engagement or the general’s movements throughout the war. The result is an ideal quick reference for Civil War buffs and a beautiful addition to the library of general readers that is sure to start as many arguments as it settles.

In the decades that followed the American Civil War Artist James E. Kelly (1855-1933) conducted in-depth interviews with 40 union Generals in an effort to portray them in their greatest moment of glory.

This is a compilation of the medical histories of 425 Confederate generals. It does not analyze the effects of an individual's medical problems on a battle or the war, but provides information about factors that may have contributed to the wound, injury, or illness, and the outcome.

Contains seven case studies evaluating Confederate and Union generals who might be considered "capable failures": officers of high pre-war reputation, some with distinguished records in the Civil War. Explores the various reasons these men suffered defeat such as flaws of character, errors of judgment, lack of preparation, or circumstances beyond their control. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

In the first comprehensive biography of President Lincoln's chief war advisor from 1862-1864, a prize-winning historian recreates the life of a man of enormous achievement who bungled his most important mission. Marszalek unearths the seeds of Halleck's fatal wartime indecisiveness in personality traits and health problems.

An award-winning biography of one of the Confederacy’s most colorful and controversial generals. Winner of the 2013 Nathan Bedford Forrest History Book Award for Southern History Nominated for the 2014 Virginia Book Award for Nonfiction Despite a life full of drama, politics, and adventure, little has been written about William “Extra Billy” Smith—aside from a rather biased account by his brother-in-law back in the nineteenth century. As the oldest and one of the most controversial Confederate generals on the field at Gettysburg, Smith was also one of the most charismatic characters of the Civil War and the antebellum Old South. Known nationally as “Extra Billy” because of his prewar penchant for finding loopholes in government postal contracts to gain extra money for his stagecoach lines, Smith served as Virginia’s governor during both the war with Mexico and the Civil War; served five terms in the US Congress; and was one of Virginia’s leading spokesmen for slavery and states’ rights. Extra Billy’s extra-long speeches and wry sense of humor were legendary among his peers. A lawyer during the heady Gold Rush days, he made a fortune in California—and, as with his income earned from stagecoaches, quickly lost it. Despite his advanced age, Smith took to the field and fought well at First Manassas, was wounded at Seven Pines and again at Sharpsburg, and marched with Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia into Pennsylvania. There, on the first day at Gettysburg, Smith’s frantic messages about a possible Union flanking attack remain a matter of controversy to this day. Did his aging eyes see distant fence-lines that he interpreted as approaching enemy soldiers—mere phantoms of his imagination? Or did his prompt action stave off a looming Confederate disaster? This biography draws upon a wide array of newspapers, diaries, letters, and other firsthand accounts to paint a portrait of one of the South’s most interesting leaders, complete with original maps and photos.

Although much is known about the political stance of the military at large during the Civil War, the political party affiliations of individual soldiers have received little attention. Drawing on archival sources from twenty-five generals and 250 volunteer officers and enlisted men, John Matsui offers the first major study to examine the ways in which individual politics were as important as military considerations to battlefield outcomes and how the experience of war could alter soldiers’ political views. The conservative war aims pursued by Abraham Lincoln’s generals (and to some extent, the president himself) in the first year of the American Civil War focused on the preservation of the Union and the restoration of the antebellum status quo. This approach was particularly evident in the prevailing policies and attitudes toward Confederacy-supporting Southern civilians and slavery. But this changed in Virginia during the summer of 1862 with the formation of the Army of Virginia. If the Army of the Potomac (the major Union force in Virginia) was dominated by generals who concurred with the ideology of the Democratic Party, the Army of Virginia (though likewise a Union force) was its political opposite, from its senior generals to the common soldiers. The majority of officers and soldiers in the Army of Virginia saw slavery and pro-Confederate civilians as crucial components of the rebel war effort and blamed them for prolonging the war. The frustrating occupation experiences of the Army of Virginia radicalized them further, making them a vanguard against Southern rebellion and slavery within the Union army as a whole and paving the way for Abraham Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation.