Customer Reviews

The Battle of Glorieta: Union Victory in the West (Texas A&m University Military History Series , No 61)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I really enjoyed Alberts' well researched account of the climactic battle that doomed Southern ambitions in New Mexico and Confederate ambitions in the West. The book is well written and easy to read. Alberts is very familiar with the battlefields and uses maps to show troop positions and movements in the battles in Glorieta Pass. The book includes a good introduction of the campaign and troop movements to the area as well as the aftermath and southern retreat to Southern New Mexico. An Order of Battle and extensive end notes are helpfull and he even gives brief accounts of the fates of the major players in the campaign.

Well-written story of the 1862 campaign in New Mexico, with emphasis the battle of Glorieta Pass. Excellent tactical maps in sufficient numbers. Nice Texas A&M edition. Small Union and Confederate armies operating in a wilderness at the end of very tenuous logistical communications. John Chivington, later a villain at Sand Creek, performs honorably here, and is instrumental in the Union victory. Author makes a convincing case that Glorieta was the "Gettysburg of the West". A "small" battle compared to Chickamauga or Antietam, but not if you were in it!

This book comes highly recommended by my friends in the New Mexico Civil War Commemerative Congresss who worked with Don Alberts on some of his research and field work in the 1980's and the preservation of the battlefield in the 1990's.

I think that this is a more detailed and percise book than the John Taylor version, but it lacks much of the pizzaz for a new or cursory reader on the subject. For where I am today on the matter, I found it to be more benificial as Don Alberts takes the time to analyise some of the more finite details of the battles. Don Alberts spends a good deal of time addressing the personalities of the Colorado Officers for instance, and itemizing some of the issues there. He also goes into a good discussion on the Confederate retreat, and Col. Canaby's wife's role in the Army hospital. I think that his afterward is more informative in this case as well.

The author should be praised for the sheer volume of detail (worth two stars). This book is filled with it. Detail, detail, and more detail. Problem is, it rambles along with little coherence. Sometimes the text shot-guns out several details in a row with no preceivable connection between them. And then more will follow, and more, and more. It becomes bogged down in the minutia, without painting a clear picture of the scene. Perhaps the author simply has trouble laying out a good visual scene for the reader. If you can get past that, the book is fantastic. It really is well-researched, and worth the two stars I gave it.

Go discussion of the non main stream battle of the War Between the State well research.

Jim Lynch