Through widespread and relentless surprise attacks and ambushes,
Confederate guerrillas drove Union soldiers and their leaders to
desperation. Confederate cavalrymen engaged in hit-and-run tactics;
autonomous partisan rangers preyed on Federal railroads, telegraph
lines, and supply wagons; and civilian bushwhackers waylaid Union
pickets. Together, all of these actions persuaded the Union to wage
an increasingly punitive war.
Clay Mountcastle presents a new look at the complex nature of
guerrilla warfare in the Civil War and the Union Army's calculated
response to it. He examines guerrilla attacks and Federal responses
in a number of operational theaters to show how the problem grew
throughout the South and ultimately convinced the Union to adopt
retaliatory measures that challenged the sensibilities of even the
most hardened soldiers.
In revealing the impact that Confederate guerrilla activity had
on the Union's prosecution of the war, Mountcastle reveals how the
character of the war was shaped every bit as much by the troops on
the ground as by their Union leaders. He draws on primary sources
that vividly convey their reaction to the guerrilla problem and
their justification for punitive action-with guerrillas described
by one angry soldier as "thieves and murderers by occupation,
rebels by pretense, soldiers only in name, and cowards by nature."
Showing how much of the impetus for retaliation originated from the
bottom up, starting in the western theater in 1861, he describes
how it became the most influential factor in convincing Union
generals, especially Grant and Sherman, that the war needed to be
extended to include civilians and their property. The result was a
level of destructiveness that has been downplayed by other
scholars-despite the evidence of executions and incidents of entire
towns being burned to the ground.
By 1864, punitive action had evolved into such a powerful and
decisive force that it produced what has been called "a warfare of
frightfulness." And although guerrilla activity deviled the Union
until the end, the Union's response ultimately proved a significant
factor in persuading leaders like General Lee to call a halt to
such actions and, ultimately, to surrender. Mountcastle's book
offers the most revealing look yet at this incompletely understood
dimension of the Civil War and also raises provocative questions
about the relationship between guerrilla and conventional warfare
in any conflict.
General
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