Customer Reviews

He Hath Loosed the Fateful Lightning: The Battle of Ox Hill (Chantilly), September 1, 1862

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Paul Taylor has done a tremendous job in presenting this over looked but extremely important battle that too often gets caught up as a one or two paragraph afterthought of the Second Manassas Campaign.
Taylor offers a good narrative in explaining the significance of the action here.Prior to reading this book I knew very little about General Issac Stevens decisivness and bravery that day,and how his actions probably saved Pope further destruction. I particularly liked that he tells you the modern highway designations of the ninetenth century roads. This helps the reader understand and follow the scope of the action as sadly,as the Author points out, the Battlefield has been obliterated by Urban Sprawl and is no longer recognizable. He has also added some rare photo's throughout.

In this book, Taylor describes the small but fierce Battle of Ox Hill (Chantilly), which occurred only two days after the Second Battle of Manassas, and the results and consequences of the battle. Taylor's book is one of three books that have covered the battle of Ox Hill in the past five years. The others include David Welker's Tempest at Ox Hill: The Battle of Chantilly and Charles V. Mauro's The Battle of Chantilly (Ox Hill: A Monumental Storm). At first I was a little hesitant about buying this one because White Mane Books published it. White Mane has been known in the past to publish books that used questionable or non-existent research. In any event, I decided to give this one a chance based on its own merits. Taylor describes the Second Manassas Campaign prior to Chantilly in an introductory chapter, and then moves on to cover August 30-September 2 in the rest of the book, with an emphasis on the actual tactical maneuvers during the Battle of Ox Hill on September 1. The book is rather short at only 179 pages. There are 8 maps, with a good mix of strategic and tactical maps. However, the maps do not go into the level of detail I usually prefer. All in all, this was a fairly standard account of the battle. I believe a more definitive account can probably be written.

This was a solid but not spectacular account of the Battle of Ox Hill. I would by no means call this the definitive study on Chantilly. The length of the book alone prevents that. However, the battle, the events leading up to it, and the aftermath are clearly described in an engaging way. I don't agree with all of the author's opinions, but his three years of research and his bibliography show that those opinions were based on a careful study of many available resources. Anyone interested in the Second Manassas Campaign or Phil Kearny & Isaac Stevens will enjoy this book. I recommend it, but this is not the final word on the battle. 179 pp., 8 maps.

Researched and written by Civil War expert Paul Taylor, He Hath Loosed The Fateful Lightning is a dramatic study of the September 1, 1862 Battle of Ox Hill during the American Civil War. Set during a violent storm with lightning and thunder so loud it overwhelmed the noise of canons firing, this unplanned conflict between North and South in a Virginia plantation called "Chantilly" would extract a terrible toll from both sides. A meticulous, exhaustively researched, blow-by-blow recounting and reconstruction, He Hath Loosed The Fateful Lightning is an impressive and enthusiastically recommended addition to any personal, academic, or community library Civil War Studies collection.