Customer Reviews

Narrative of Military Operations During the Civil War: During the Civil War (Da Capo Paperback)

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

 

 

General Johnston does not receive the attention he should from historians of the civil war, partly because Jefferson Davis attempted to slander his entire career from losing supplies at Mannassas, to not breaking the seige at Vicksburg, and even questioned his willingness to fight at Atlanta. Where he was relieved of command by Davis who appointed Hood who virtually deystroyed the army of Tennessee in fruitless attacks on superior union forces that bordered on suicide. Johnston defends himself againt these charges thru the entire book, he lays out several battle plans which where never carried out, such as his plan for the Penninsula campaign vs McClellan in 1862, he also goes into detail about his Atlanta campaign againt Sherman where perhaps one of the greatest defensive movements ever was witnessed, using his 40,000 or so poorly armed,and clothed men slowed a army of 110,000 men for well over a month while inflicting roughly 40,000 casulties, after reading about this it seems that if left in command at Atlanta he would have worn Sherman down when he tried to assualt the works built around Atlanta and then Johnston would have attacked and perhaps deystroyed his army since it was over 100 miles from its base and would have had great difficulty returning if defeated. Then perhaps he could have turned North and united with Lee in defense of Richmond of course that can never be known for sure but history could have been very different at least for 1865. Napoleon said "The logical conclusion to defensive warfare is defeat" but after listening to some of Johnston's logic and ideas I'm not so sure, worthy of any civil war library.

I enjoyed the reading so much, I purchased a copy of the original