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Review
"If you like your history seasoned with a touch of irony and a dash of humor, then Clint Johnson's Civil War Blunders is the ticket." -- Magazine, Baton Rouge
From the Back Cover
There was little funny about a war in which 620,000 humans died. But it was finding humor amid devastation that kept Civil War soldiers marching toward the enemy. Union or Confederate, those in command proved adept at making mistakes. Many leaders were drunkards, couldn't speak English, didn't know a cannon's breech from its muzzle. Among the gallery of heroes were - Colonel Edward Baker, who told his Federals to follow the plume of his hat if they wanted to find the war_and sent them over a cliff in a panicked retreat - General Felix Zollicoffer, who wore a white raincoat so opposing Federals could see him_but not his eyeglasses so he could see them - Lieutenant Commander Thomas Selfridge of the Union navy, who "found two torpedoes and removed them by placing his vessel over them" - Colonel Alfred Rhett, a captured Southern blue blood whose fancy boots proved too small for every Union officer who coveted them - rum-drinking James Ledlie and dance-instructing Edward Ferrero, generals who kept each other company in a Union bombproof while their men faced slaughter From Fort Sumter to Appomattox, Civil War Blunders traces the war according to its amusing, often deadly miscues. Lurking behind every significant action, as readers will discover, was someone with a red face.
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More About the Author
Born in Florida before it was ruined by Disney; back when you could find cypress bayheads, cows, cow catchers, and orange groves. A native of The South with a 350 year family history in the region, Clint Johnson (the one in North Carolina)specializes in American history, particularly Southern history.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Compendium of Screw-Ups,
By Scott Swindle (Iraq) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Civil War Blunders: Amusing Incidents of the War (Paperback)
This is a collection of vignettes, each usually about 4 or 5 pages in length, concerning mistakes made (usually by Generals) during the U.S. Civil War. Some of these are fairly well-known, such as the Battle of the Crater, when hundreds of Union troops marched into a huge crater created when engineers blew up an ammo dump, only to have Confederate soldiers simply stand on the rim of the crater and fire down on them at point-blank range; while others are stories previously unknown to me. I was unaware that President Lincoln appointed a number of generals from foreign countries, particularly Germany. There were some German generals in the Northern Army who spoke no English. There also seemed to be plenty of drunken generals, according to this book. There seemed to be a special level of incompetence in this war; I guess the drunkards and incompetents were balanced out by the Lees and Grants.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Overall, a very interesting book.,
By A Customer
This review is from: Civil War Blunders: Amusing Incidents of the War (Paperback)
This book was a very interesting one to read. I read it cover to cover in just three days. Some of the stories were hard for me to understand why they were blunders, but many were funny. Some left me shaking my head in awe as to how some things happened. If you want to read the best stories first, read about the men who faught the enemy naked because they were caught off guard. If you're a Civil War buff, you'll find this book interesting.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A fantastic book of little mistakes by Civil War Generals,
By Patrick Kulas (Racine, Wisconsin, US) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Civil War Blunders: Amusing Incidents of the War (Paperback)
This is an excellent book with 3 and 4 page stories of Civil War Blunders. Read a chapter here or later. I lent this book to a neighbor who had Cancer of the brain, and was embarrassed to ask his wife for the book after he passed away this Spring. I had a sigh of relief when I found it for .99 cents on Amazon. It was in mint condition, and I would have bought more for gifts if I had known that. Wonderful stories for presentations to Civil War groups or Senior citizen and Living History talks! Very Thankful, P. Kulas Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War
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