Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War [Hardcover]

Warren Ripley (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Promontory Press (1973)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0883940035
• ISBN-13: 978-0883940037
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,518,243 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book on CW artillery, but poorly organized., September 11, 1999

By 

Robert E. Duchesneau - See all my reviews

This review is from: Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War (Hardcover)

Centered around his massive personal collection of photos and measurements of surviving Civil War artillery, Warren Ripley attempted to create a definitive work on the subject. However, it suffers from poor organization and a disjointed narrative. If the stories of historic and unusual cannon were placed in a separate chapter, the book would be easier to follow. The mass of data should be repeated in tabular form in an appendix, instead of being solely displayed under each individual cannon's picture. This book is good for the Civil War artillery enthusiast, but Olmsted's book is better for field artillery and Stark's book is better for heavy artillery.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Useful reference book, June 19, 2004

By 

lordhoot "lordhoot" (Anchorage, Alaska USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War (Hardcover)

I found Warren Ripley book to be quite useful in some areas, not so useful in others. I agreed with the previous reviewer that the book wasn't very well organized. The amount of information in this book proves to be quite impressive but it hard to get to at time. Still, I found it to be a very useful reference book and since it covered all type of artillery and their ammo, its an useful single volume to have. What I found so useful personally, was to identifed many of individual cannon types which I photographed during my many trips to the Civil War sites. I have taken hundreds of photographs of cannons and this book proves to identifed all of them. Ironically, finding the photo in the book to match the mystery cannon photo of my own, with the information already there under the book photo proves to be quite useful.

Depending on your usage, this book may worth the price.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The most comprehensive guide to ACW artillery, February 22, 2007

By 

Red Harvest (Georgia, USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Artillery and Ammunition of the Civil War (Hardcover)

I have never seen this book on a bookshelf at any civil war site bookstore. Morningside titles are often like that, and it is unfortunate. This is really an excellent guide for those who have graduated past the introductory artillery summaries and want to delve deeply into all aspects of civil war artillery. This work, even in this updated version, is slightly dated now--but not so much as to lose its value.

It is difficult to convey how much information is crammed into this book. Technically it has 382 pages, but this is misleading since these are full size sheets, two columns per page. It feels more like a 600-700 page work. There are a plethora of well-captioned black and white photographs and drawings throughout. All of this information contributes to a justifiable criticism: in trying to do everything its organization gives the impression of being disheveled and overstuffed. It really would have benefited from summary outlines and a more granular approach to the chapters--but oh does it reward the studious and patient.

This book tries to do it all. It covers mortars, field, siege, seacoast, and naval artillery in all sizes. The development, history, specifications, as well as anecdotes of tactical employment are reviewed for each type of piece. Field, siege, seacoast and naval carriages are reviewed in a depth I've not seen in any other work. The "Art of the Artilleryman" section filled in some details of drill and employment of various tools and implements that I had not known about despite reading many other works--this is especially true since it has a sample heavy artillery drill. The separate chapters about smoothbore and rifled projectiles provide a wealth of information.

At the end of the book are some statistical data summaries of information for each chapter (ranges and specifications of pieces, etc.)

I highly recommend this book, and suggest those interested in ACW artillery get it while it is still available. There are some newer individual works that go into greater depth on various aspects of ACW artillery, but nothing else approaching the comprehensive nature of this title.