Customer Reviews

My Brave Boys: To War with Colonel Cross and the Fighting Fifth

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"From the beginning, the story of the Fifth was not merely a war story, but mainly a human story," write Mike Pride and Mark Travis in their superb new book about the exploits of New Hampshire's legendary "Fighting Fifth" Regiment in the Civil War. In fact, it is the humsn dimension of their narrative that so distingishes it among Civil War accounts. Their extensive research into town and state archives, period news accounts, memoirs, and little-known letters takes them well beyond a catalogue of dates and skirmishes. Piecing together their sources to construct the unfolding events of the Fifth's experience, the authors give us rich insights into the personalities and thoughts of Colonel Cross and his men, showing us what war actually felt like to its participants from battle to battle, and from day to day. Not that war-making is this book's only subject. Some of its most affecting passages are from the letters written by soldiers to the wives and families they have left behind. In one striking chapter, the authors relate the surprising pronouncements the men of the Fifth made against the very blacks they were fighting to emancipate. While there is plenty to satisfy the student of the Civil War in the Fifth's story, told here for the first time, you don't have to be a Civil War buff to enjoy this volume. I'm not one myself; yet the fully developed characters and dramatic descriptions of events on the battlefield had me turning pages entranced. It's a wonderful book.

With "My Brave Boys," authors Mike Pride and Mark Travis have set a new standard for throwing compelling illumination on a slice of the American Civil War. There've been sweeping works on the subject, military analyses, biographies and all the rest But the real untold story has been the war's impact on small communities, states and the men from them. Until now. Pride and Travis have turned their considerable journalistic skills -- both work at the Concord(NH) Monitor -- toward history, putting what amounts to a local news story in broader context. The result is highly readable, meticulously reported book. "My Brave Boys" should appeal to historical researchers, students of the Civil War and those with a more casual interest who just like a good yarn well-told. The media impact on the war and the men fighting it as told through New Hampshire newspaper editorials and accounts is an intriguing sidelight. We who grew up with Vietnam coming into our living rooms each night may appreciate more the ways in which war is brought home. For Americans, the Civil War was the first conflict to be so graphically displayed in word and picture to the general audience -- via newspapers and magazines such as Harper's Weekly. The authors have not ducked tough issues, such as the rampant racism and ethnic bias of the times. No sugar-coating of history here. The story of the 5th New Hampshire is haunting and so very human. It is a story of tragedy and triumph. And strikes a chord that continues to echo in our collective memory yet today.

"May a grateful country do the Fifth New Hampshire Regiment of Volunteers justice-written history never can." - Major Otis Waite, New Hampshire in the Great Rebellion, 1886. Mike Pride & Mark Travis have done the Fifth New Hampshire proud. The authors take you from the small New Hampshire towns these men came from to the battlefields of Virginia, Maryland & Pennsylvania. They discuss in depth the relationships, good or bad, that the Fifth's commander,Col. Edward Cross,had with his subordinate officers and with his command. These two authors through their extensive research of the officers' and enlisted men's diaries,letters home and Col. Cross's own wartime journal tell of a very compelling human tragedy. You will get to know some of these men and Col. Cross. The Fifth New Hampshire Regiment of Volunteers suffered more deaths from combat than any other regiment in the Union Army. They were in the 2nd Corps (Hancock's Corp) of the Army of the Potomac. When the Fifth left Concord, NH in October of 1861 they were over 1000 men strong, after Gettysburg in July, 1863 they numbered less than 100 men. This book is the story of Cross and his men. Mike Pride and Mark Travis have told this story well. They have done New Hampshire proud.

I've read what seems like a ton of books on the Civil War. It seems that there must be nothing left to learn, but of course that's not true, there's more. Two newspapermen from Concord, New Hampshire, are the latest entrants in the Civil War history competition, and their book, My Brave Boys: To War with Colonel Cross & the Fighting Fifth, is one of the best Civil War regimental histories ever written. It's amazingly well researched, wonderfully authentic, and well-enough written I was sorry it ended.

The Colonel Cross of the title was Edward E. Cross, a newspaperman from New Hampshire who had worked on newspapers in Ohio and Arizona before the war started. He was an American party member (the "Know-Nothings") and something of a bigot, but very strong-minded on the subject of the preservation of the Union. When the Civil War began, he immediately returned to New Hampshire, and through political connections was given command of the state's Fifth regiment. He immediately recruited as many experienced soldiers as he could, turned them into drillmasters, and began to transform his crowd of farmers and townsmen into soldiers.

The training paid off. In its first fight, the regiment acted as if it were composed of veterans, and the authors make it clear that it didn't lose this composure until long after Cross' death at Gettysburg, when it was weakened by draftees (from other states even!) who didn't want to fight, and weren't properly trained. The heart of the book follows the regiment through its baptism of fire in the Seven Days, the Second Bull Run campaign, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg, where as I said, Cross was killed. The narrative keeps you apprised of the course of the battle well enough that you understand the context of the regiment's actions and the opinions of the participants, without bogging down, and the battles themselves are recreated here as well as it's ever been done. The authors have, through contacts they have in the state, found several people who have collections of letters from participants to relatives back home. These give the narrative an immediacy and authenticity that might otherwise have been lacking.

Lastly, the maps are gorgeous. This is the sort of thing that's difficult to do in a book like this, and often you're presented with a blurry recreation of something from the era, overburdened with detail and almost illegible. The authors made a happy choice in allowing Charlotte Thibault, who's apparently the newsroom illustrator at the paper they both work at, to draw the maps. She's done a marvelous job: they convey the situation in the battles, and the Fifth's position and actions in the fighting, while being clear and easy to understand.

Pride and Travis have produced one of the best books on the Civil War in a good while. It'll be interesting to see if they have anything else up their sleeves.

I'll tell you what, this is the best book I have read in a long time. If you like history, if you enjoy reading about our nations fighting men, this is for you. You WON"T be disappointed!

It seems to me that this book does not /quite/ reach the level of a great regimental history (what about the "reborn" fifth regimental history?). It seems to be much closer to a biography of Cross primarily, and a regimental history second. I have a copy of Child's 1893 regimental history, and it has far more detailed information about the regiment, and a pretty good overview about Cross as well.

My Brave Boys is readable, and seems quite solidly based, but reading the other reviews left me a bit befuddled - I didn't come away thinking it was as great a book as others seem to find. Your mileage may vary...

Every Civil War soldier had his story. But rarely are so many soldier stories pieced together so well. Mike Pride and Mark Travis have woven together the most compelling stories told by several members of the Fifth New Hampshire using a wonderful catalog of anecdotes, letters, articles and documentation. While My Brave Boys recounts the Fifth's tragic story, it introduces readers to the men from New Hampshire -- including rough-cut Col. Cross -- whose character and courage made the Fighting Fifth so battle ready. Pride and Travis are newspapermen, so the regiment's story is researched well and told with such compelling voices that even non-Civil War buffs will be lured in. Of the regimental histories I've read, this is one of the best because it's a cross-section of both military history and 19th century life -- in New Hampshire and on the battlefield. Pride and Travis should be commended on this achievement. Cross and his men were truly part of a Civil War story that needed to be told.

I had to laugh during the authors' intro when he gave a story in regard to the man that was doing a bio on Col.Cross. Suddenly this author realized that in fact Cross represented about everything this prospective author despised. As if Col. Cross(devil blast him),had just destroyed this particular authors' Civil War Fantasy Camp.Boys in blue,freeing the slaves to overjoyous, tearful,thankful mobs of blacks and white abolitionists.A smiling Lincoln with a "Go Union" pennant.Mom.God and apple pie for the the North!!
This book greatly lets down candy cotton unionists. Cross comes across as a very unadimirable yet real person. Some of his antics in regard to troop discipline would make Patton blush?As you read the book you have to wonder if maybe Cross wasn't taken down by fragging and the heroic tale of his death in the Wheatfield made up to appease someones'conscience. The 5th New Hampshire comes across in the book as "Hard Core" Army and they couldn't have cared less if they met the superficial standards for the "Billy Yank" action figure of a certain political persuasion of which I'm unsure of. Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition for these type soldiers.The author gives alot of human interest stories in regard to some of the individual soldiers of the fifth.
These men fought primarily because they believed in the "union" of the states and they saw the southern states as in rebellion.Once again the slavery issue takes a back seat(or even no seat) although the fighting fifth was in no way in sympathy with the "peculiar institution".The book reminds me of a "nuts and bolts" version of the Red Badge of Courage.Mechanics,farmers,students,old and young with a love for family and country all changed by the experience of war,willing to do all that's necessary to end it.