Customer Reviews

The Lightning Mule Brigade: Abel Streight's 1863 Raid into Alabama

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

 

 

At the same time that Benjamin Grierson was making his remarkable raid through Mississippi and on to Baton Rouge, another raid took place in the opposite direction. Poorly equiped and badly scouted, Colonel Abel Sleight's raid across northern Alabama could have been successful with better scouting and being better equipt.

Robert Willett has written an interesting story based on eyewitness accounts and regimental histories. This work, which is well cited, is the only in depth work on this raid. Perhaps the most unfortunate aspect of this work is that it will not gain the attention it deserves since it was not published by an academic press or written by an academic scholar. So much the loss.

Okay, first of all let me start by stating that I was born and for the most part raised in Gadsden, Alabama. Abel Streight & Nathan Bedford Forrest practically stomped through my back yard while riding toward Rome, GA. What's odd about this is that most people from that area are only aware of Emma Sansom and her role. She was the brave 16-year-old girl who kept Forrest and his Calvary on the heels of Streight and his Mule Brigade. Most of us grew up seeing that statue of Emma Sansom right on the edge of the Coosa River Bridge at the end of Broad Street. This mislead me for years to believe it was the Coosa she helped Forrest cross - it was actually Black Creek that she helped him cross. As a teenager, I would go hunting and see "John Wisdom Trail" signs on old rural roads. For some reason... I never thought to ask, "Who is John Wisdom?" Of course all this was before the Internet. Now I know that John Wisdom is the "Paul Revere of the South" and rode farther, faster and longer than Paul Revere actually did. These are just a few of the interesting elements of Streight's Raid. A Google search sparked my curiosity and led me to this book. This is the only comprehensive work on Streight's Raid. Simply put, this story sells itself. Streight was a righteous and decent man who believed in his cause. Forrest was noble and brilliant... who also believed in his cause. I have read far too few books on the Civil War to offer a serious book review, but I will give you a few thoughts.

I feel as though it was a fair representation of both Union and Confederate point of views. The acute attention to detail and first hand accounts were beneficial to the storyline. I am not an avid reader of military battles, so this next comment should be taken with a grain of salt. I found some portions of the book to be a little confusing. On more than one occasion, I had to back up a page and read it again. Someone more educated in regard to the Civil War might have zipped through these sections with ease. This is the only reason I subtracted a star from the review. I strongly suggest this book to anyone who is a "Civil War Buff". If this were a movie, no one would believe it was non-fiction.

Robert L. Willett conducted his own raid into previously uninhabited territory, and for this I commend him. There were no major battles fought in Alabama during the Civil War. Maybe it is for this reason that Streight's Raid is rarely written about. Maybe it's because the outcome of Streight's Raid somewhat glorifies Nathan Bedford Forrest. It may be too taboo in today's politically correct environment to glorify the founder of the Ku Klux Klan - whose military tactics were admired and studied by Nazi General Erwin Rommel. The significance of Forrest's "victory" is strongly debated. Could this be the most overlooked raid of the Civil War? Not anymore...

I'm a great history student on Nathan Bedford Forrest myself. When I heard about this book, "The Lightning Mule Brigade" I immediately had to have it because I knew that NBF was involved in deterring Streight's Raid into Alabama. Bob Willett has done an outstanding job at pulling all the reference resources together into a great book about the raid. It has a lots of factual accounts that make for excellent reading about Forrest and Streight alike.

I bought this book after I learned that Abel Streight was a distant cousin. I had a hard time putting the book down since it is the kind of history I love, which is a story well told. I read this book before I waded through the history of the Vicksburg campaign, and the pieces fell in line. It was clear how Streight's feint into the deep south required the South to pull resources away from the defense of Vicksburg at a critical time.

While the use of mules seemed comical, in terms of the ultimate effect of a military feint it definitely got the South's attention. What is most amazing is how deep into the South Streight's forces got, considering the noisy and inept way the invasion progressed. Considering all that went on in the Civil War during this raid into Alabama, this is relatively speaking a light-hearted episode.

This is the type of book that provides a glimpse of what the Civil War must have been like on an operational level, especially with respect to the impact of situational contingencies and the unintended consequences of planning. This approach is refreshing given the current state of development in Civil War history since when carefully read, it enables readers to draw their own conclusions about strategy, tactics, and leadership, independent, to the extent it is possible, of the vast legacy of interpretation and reputation surrounding campaigns and individuals.

The aspect of Streight's Raid I found most interesting is an apparent disconnect between its strategic context and its operational goal. At the strategic level, the operation was intended to divert Confederate cavalry from interfering with Grant's crossing the Mississipi below Vicksburg, as has been described by Ed Bearrs. Operationally, however, it used Streight's desire for independent command and his belief that he could exploit Unionist sympathies in northern Alabama in service of a one-way mission (no plan for a return to Union-controlled territory evidently existed) to cut a railroad line in Rome, Georgia. The raid turned out to be a strategic success but an operational failure. Did Streight realize this?

The maps are good for a book this size. A few typos were noticed.