The Earth Reeled And Trees Trembled

This is the first published comprehensive survey of naval action on the Mississippi River and its tributaries for the years 1863-1865. Following introductory reviews of the rivers and of the U.S. Navy's Mississippi Squadron, chronological Federal naval participation in various raids and larger campaigns is highlighted, as well as counterinsurgency, economical support and control, and logistical protection. The book includes details on units, locations and activities that have been previously underreported or ignored. Examples include the birth and function of the Mississippi Squadron's 11th District, the role of U.S. Army gunboats, and the war on the Upper Cumberland and Upper Tennessee Rivers. The last chapter details the coming of the peace in 1865 and the decommissioning of the U.S. river navy and the sale of its gunboats.

The Arkansas River Valley is one of the most fertile regions in the South. During the Civil War, the river also served as a vital artery for moving troops and supplies. In 1863 the battle to wrest control of the valley was, in effect, a battle for the state itself. In spite of its importance, however, this campaign is often overshadowed by the siege of Vicksburg. Now Mark K. Christ offers the first detailed military assessment of parallel events in Arkansas, describing their consequences for both Union and Confederate powers. Christ analyzes the campaign from military and political perspectives to show how events in 1863 affected the war on a larger scale. His lively narrative incorporates eyewitness accounts to tell how new Union strategy in the Trans-Mississippi theater enabled the capture of Little Rock, taking the state out of Confederate control for the rest of the war. He draws on rarely used primary sources to describe key engagements at the tactical level—particularly the battles at Arkansas Post, Helena, and Pine Bluff, which cumulatively marked a major turning point in the Trans-Mississippi. In addition to soldiers’ letters and diaries, Christ weaves civilian voices into the story—especially those of women who had to deal with their altered fortunes—and so fleshes out the human dimensions of the struggle. Extensively researched and compellingly told, Christ’s account demonstrates the war’s impact on Arkansas and fills a void in Civil War studies.

A testament to the valor and determination of a common soldier On September 17, 1861, twenty-two-year-old Jacob Haas enlisted in the Sheboygan Tigers, a company of German immigrants that became Company A of the Ninth Wisconsin Infantry Regiment. Over the next three years, Haas and his comrades marched thousands of miles and saw service in Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, and the Indian Territory, including pitched battles at Newtonia, Missouri, and Jenkins’ Ferry, Arkansas. Haas describes the war from the perspective of a private soldier and an immigrant as he marches through scorching summers and brutally cold winters to fight in some of the most savage combat in the west. His diary shows us an extraordinary story of the valor and determination of a volunteer soldier. Though his health was ruined by war, Haas voiced no regrets for the price he paid to fight for his adopted country.

Until relatively recently, conventional wisdom held that the Trans-Mississippi Theater was a backwater of the American Civil War. Scholarship in recent decades has corrected this oversight, and a growing number of historians agree that the events west of the Mississippi River proved integral to the outcome of the war. Nevertheless, generals in the Trans-Mississippi have received little attention compared to their eastern counterparts, and many remain mere footnotes to Civil War history. This welcome volume features cutting-edge analyses of eight Southern generals in this most neglected theater—Thomas Hindman, Theophilus Holmes, Edmund Kirby Smith, Mosby Monroe Parsons, John Marmaduke, Thomas James Churchill, Thomas Green, and Joseph Orville Shelby—providing an enlightening new perspective on the Confederate high command. Although the Trans-Mississippi has long been considered a dumping ground for failed generals from other regions, the essays presented here demolish that myth, showing instead that, with a few notable exceptions, Confederate commanders west of the Mississippi were homegrown, not imported, and compared well with their more celebrated peers elsewhere. With its virtually nonexistent infrastructure, wildly unpredictable weather, and few opportunities for scavenging, the Trans-Mississippi proved a challenge for commanders on both sides of the conflict. As the contributors to this volume demonstrate, only the most creative minds could operate successfully in such an unforgiving environment. While some of these generals have been the subjects of larger studies, others, including Generals Holmes, Parsons, and Churchill, receive their first serious scholarly attention in these pages. Clearly demonstrating the independence of the Trans-Mississippi and the nuances of the military struggle there, while placing both the generals and the theater in the wider scope of the war, these eight essays offer valuable new insight into Confederate military leadership and the ever-vexing questions of how and why the South lost this most defining of American conflicts.

Examines the impact that guerrilla warfare had on the Civil War, discussing how Confederate guerrillas' increasing use of plunder and violence led to a decline of support for them among Southerners and was a factor in the final defeat of the South.

Though its most famous battles were waged in the East at Antietam, Gettysburg, and throughout Virginia, the Civil War was clearly a conflict that raged across a continent. From cotton-rich Texas and the fields of Kansas through Indian Territory and into the high desert of New Mexico, the Trans-Mississippi Theater was site of major clashes from the war's earliest days through the surrenders of Confederate generals Edmund Kirby Smith and Stand Waite in June 1865. In this comprehensive military history of the war west of the Mississippi River, Thomas W. Cutrer shows that the theater's distance from events in the East does not diminish its importance to the unfolding of the larger struggle.

This expansive, multivolume reference work provides a broad, multidisciplinary examination of the Civil War period ranging from pre-Civil War developments and catalysts such as the Mexican-American War to the rebuilding of the war-torn nation during Reconstruction. The Civil War was undoubtedly the most important and seminal event in 19th-century American history. Students who understand the Civil War have a better grasp of the central dilemmas in the American historical narrative: states rights versus federalism, freedom versus slavery, the role of the military establishment, the extent of presidential powers, and individual rights versus collective rights. Many of these dilemmas continue to shape modern society and politics. This comprehensive work facilitates both detailed reading and quick referencing for readers from the high school level to senior scholars in the field. The exhaustive coverage of this encyclopedia includes all significant battles and skirmishes; important figures, both civilian and military; weapons; government relations with Native Americans; and a plethora of social, political, cultural, military, and economic developments. The entries also address the many events that led to the conflict, the international diplomacy of the war, the rise of the Republican Party and the growing crisis and stalemate in American politics, slavery and its impact on the nation as a whole, the secession crisis, the emergence of the "total war" concept, and the complex challenges of the aftermath of the conflict.