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A Savage Conflict: The Decisive Role of Guerrillas in the American Civil War (Civil War America)

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John Mosby, William Quantrill and Bloody Bill Anderson encompass most of our knowledge about guerrillas. The sack of Lawrence and understanding Missouri had a very active guerrilla war completes the picture. If you read a lot of Civil War history, you can discuss the problems caused by deserters and the battles between Unionists and Confederates in the CSA. Pushed, you might talk about guerrillas firing on shipping in the Mississippi River. Really pushed, you might mention North Carolina and/or East Tennessee as "hot spots" of guerrilla activity. After that, we have gone through our knowledge on the subject. After reading this book, you will be able to talk intelligently about this subject across the nation for the entire war.
For one book to pack so much information, be readable and have good historic sources is an accomplishment. This book manages to exceed all expectations by providing a summary with the right level of detail, in an intelligent readable format. The history hangs on a frame covering six to twelve month periods of the war in chronological order. Each part follows the development of the guerrilla war with a section of the nation during this period. The major sections are Kansas/Missouri/Arkansas, Kentucky/Tennessee, West Virginia/Virginia, Mississippi/Alabama and the Carolinas. Texas, Florida and Louisiana appear when they have something to contribute. The author adds sections, as they become part of the story. In Spring-Summer 1861, Kansas/Missouri/Arkansas, Kentucky/Tennessee, West Virginia/Virginia are the major story. This includes problems of guerrillas spilling into Iowa & Illinois from Missouri and into Ohio from Kentucky. As the war progresses, areas are added. By 1864, the entire South is aflame; the problems have escalated into endless theft and murder that has destroyed law in much of the Confederacy.
This is not just a history of military operations. The author details the Confederacy's early view of "partisan rangers" and the appeal of this service to individuals. From this foundation, we get a solid history of the CSA military and legal actions to establish and control these units. At the same time, the USA struggles to establish polices to deal with guerrillas, maintain the goodwill of the people and protect supply lines. Throw into this mix advancing armies, ill will, avarice and revenge for a witches brew creating endless problems. While logical and almost inevitable this is not a pretty story. As the CSA changes positions and loses territory the guerrilla bands change. Less control creates more foraging, more deserters and internal warfare. This changes the local people's attitudes. Union frustration and a hardening of reprisal policies add to their misery.
This is a comprehensive survey, well written and very readable. A full set of real footnotes, with a good mix of original and contemporary sources, appear as endnotes. These endnotes have page references, at the bottom of the page, making it easy to find the footnote you are looking for. An index, Bibliography, good regional maps and illustrations from Harpers complete this excellent book. This is a valuable addition to your library. While not covering the major armies or battles, this is a needed view of the war that is seldom seen.

Few books have been written about the guerrilla fighting which was a major part of the Civil War. Most Southern civilians did not experience the war by witnessing a major battle or seeing the passage of a major army; but a huge number of these civilians did experience the work of guerrillas--both Confederate and Union--and the attempts of the U.S. army's Provost Marshal troops to suppress the Confederate guerrillas.

While there are studies of the guerrilla war in specific localities, such as "With Blood and Fire" about Middle Tennessee or books about Champ Ferguson in the Tennessee mountains or John Mosby of Virginia, this is the first contemporary book to deal with the sweep of the guerrilla war across the South.

The strength of the book is the area it covers. The weakness of the book is the area it covers. A strength because the sweep of the work introduces the reader to the extent and effect of the guerrillas; a weakness because little can be said about specific locations and leaders. This book can do an excellent job of opening eyes to a neglected part of Civil War studies and in encouraging other authors to investigate and publish about the guerrilla war in detail in specific locations.

This is an excellent, scholarly book on the partisan warfare during the American Civil War. Author Sutherland contends that the Southern partisans or guerrillas ultimately exerted a negative effect of the Southern ability and resolve to wage war and thue helped bring about the South's defeat. Well, maybe, but after reading the book I tended to agree with the author.

The Confederate guerrilla bands included units with some legitimate military status like Mosby's Rangers, citizen bushwackers, and outright criminal bands using the war as justification for their activities. The problem was that their activities steadily provoked harsher and harsher Federal responses, mostly against civilians and their property. Towards the end of the war, this created a war-weariness in the South as the suffering passed the point of civilian endurance. When the main Confederate armies surrendered, there was simply no will to go on when one's farm was destroyed and there was little prospect for economic recovery.

The author vividly points out the breakdown in Confederate authorities and their ability to keep order, peace and security in Confederate territory as the war progressed. Citizens were reduced to defending themselves against Federals and Confederate partisans, taking the law into their own hands out of necessity. With impotent civil authorities, it was every man for himself, and the citizenry ultimately blamed the Confederate and state governments for their predicament. Everything became extremely localized, and sending men away to fight the Yankees was not an option with raiders and troublemakers on the prowl near one's own home. Desertions also increased in the main Confederate armies as soldiers returned home to defend their families and homes.

Some states were worse than others, but the whole Confederate Trans-Mississippi Department was effectively paralyzed and Northern Texas, Northern Arkansas and Missouri were no mans' land. Tennessee was overrun and devastated, and the Appalachians from Northern Alabama through Eastern Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia were brutal battlegrounds between murdering, burning and robbing bands of both sides. In fact, the author's detail recounting of all this brutality sometimes made for depressing reading.

The author discussed most of the principal bands of Confederate partisans as well as some on the Federal side like the Red Legs. After the was was over most surrendered, but some simply disappeared. No doubt many met ignominious ends in the Western states under assumed names.

All in all, this book is extremely valuable in depicting a war that is often overlooked. The author's thesis appears fully justified, once again proving that a soldier will not fight well hundreds of miles from home when he knows his family and home are subject to brutal predators and there is no one providing protection. In a sense, democracy became too local, and the Confederacy died as a result. Security is first and foremost the government's responsibility, and a government that cannot provide it is soon abandoned by its citizenry. Our current government should keep this lesson in mind, -- particularly as long as the 2nd Amendment continues in force.

I recommend this book most heartily to all those interested in the American Civil War.

A SAVAGE CONFLICT: THE DECISIVE ROLE OF GUERRILLAS IN THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR
Daniel E. Sutherland
University of North Carolina, 2009
Hardback, $35.00, 435 Pages, Illustrations, Maps, Notes, Bibliography


Irregular, or guerrilla, operations played a prominent role in several theaters of the War Between the States. Although they were most conspicuous in Missouri and Kansas, guerrillas operated in virtually every Southern state, from the mountains of East Tennessee and Western North Carolina to the swamps of Florida and Louisiana. The number of Union and Confederate guerrillas and quasi-guerrillas reached perhaps as high as 25,000. In retrospect, their actions had little effect on the campaigns of the regular armies, but they certainly contributed to a brutalization of the war-devastating as they did portions of the South and bringing terror and misery to large numbers of noncombatants. Two of the principal areas of guerrilla operations were the Missouri-Kansas region and Virginia. Guerrilla activities in the former region were an extension of the violence that had erupted there in the 1850s, when Missouri Border Ruffians and Kansas Jayhawkers terrorized the region. At the outbreak of the War Between the States, Missouri Governor Claiborne Jackson advocated secession and the attachment of his state to the infant Confederacy. These actions prompted Kansas Jayhawkers to invade Missouri to protect their state's eastern border. Senator James Lane, along with other Border War veterans such as Charles Jennison and James Montgomery, led Jayhawker bands that roamed throughout wetern Missouri, committing depredations against both secessionists and neutral civilians alike. These actions certainly contributed to the vicious guerrilla fighting that would plague Missouri and Kansas in the following years, eventually reaching "a scale and ferocity unequalled anywhere else." By the end of 1861, Union General Henry Halleck had issued an order declaring as outlaws all Confederate guerrillas and authorizing their immediate execution. The guerrillas quickly adopted a no-quarter policy in return. Confederate guerrillas included Colonel M. Jeff Thompson, William Clarke Quantrill, George Todd, Dave Poole, Coleman and Robert Younger, Jesse and Frank James, Arch Clements, and William "Bloody Bill" Anderson. Confederate guerrilla and partisan leaders also rose to prominence in the region east of the Mississippi River. Perhaps the best known was John Singleton Mosby, who operated from 1863 to 1865 in Union-occupied Northern Virginia in the area between the Blue Ridge and the Bull Run Mountains. His 43rd Virginia Partisan Ranger Battalion mounted small raids and ambushes throughout North Central Virginia, focusing much of their attention on the Union-controlled railroads of the region. During their campaigns of 1863 to 1865, Mosby's men burned bridges and cut telegraph lines in such profusion that they forced Union officials to detail significant numbers of troops to guard their lines of supply and communication. Kentucky was another area of bitter guerrilla warfare, and the flamboyant John Hunt Morgan became the state's most famous partisan leader. Morgan was certainly more of a legitimate military figure than Quantrill, Anderson, or other Western guerrillas, but his favorite type of warfare was guerrilla-style raids behind enemy lines. Some level of guerrilla activity occurred in virtually every Confederate state. In Florida, pro-Union or anti-Confederate guerrillas operated in the southern part of the peninsula, in the western panhandle, and in along the north central Gulf coast, where Confederate control was weak. Confederate deserter William Strickland was perhaps Florida's most notorious Union guerrilla. From 1863 until 1865, Captain John J. Dickison of the 2nd Florida Confederate Cavalry engaged in operations comparable to those of Mosby, though on a smaller scale. In command of a single regular company, often reinforced with a number of state militia, Dickison defended the interior of Florida against Union incursions while also mounting a number of small-scale raids into union-held portions of the state. He earned the sobriquet of Florida's Civil War Swamp Fox. Other guerrilla activity took place in northern Georgia and Alabama, as well as in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, where sizable Unionist minorities organized themselves into quasi-military organizations to protect their families and homes. Louisiana was beset with both pro-Union and pro-Confederate guerrillas, as was Arkansas to the north. In north Texas, Unionists formed armed bands to resist conscription, forcing Confederate officials to mount retaliatory raids against them. Sutherland's A SAVAGE CONFLICT: THE DECISIVE ROLE OF GUERRILLAS IN THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR is a much-needed and important addition to the literature on a very misunderstood-yet significant-facet of the War Between the States. Highly recommended reading.


Lt. Colonel Robert A. Lynn, Florida Guard
Orlando, Florida

Provides a clear, concise, vision of an overlooked aspect of most wars but in the context of the War of Rebellion it is particularly insightful for American citizens who love the union.

....the extent of guerilla ops during the civil war. Oh sure, i knew about Mosby and a couple others but the reality is almost difficult to comprehend. Sadly,the unvarnised brutality marks a dirty section of our history but it is what it is. Mainly what it is, is it's importance in truly understanding the 'civil' in the civil war. Seemingly, almost every county in every state that was a zone of operations during the war had multiple partisan bands---on both sides! Buy this book if you want a fuller understanding of the War Between the States. It was so good my Pomeranian puppy ate a little bit of the top corner of the cover; did'nt do much damage but for a guy who takes care of books it hurt. I was so mad at him we took a nap together....

A SAVAGE CONFLICT is the Society for Military History 2010 Book Award Winner for United States Military History.

First off, in no way does the author establish his thesis that guerrilla warfare was "critical to understanding the course and outcome of the war." There's no indication that these irregulars were anything more than an annoyance to the Union war effort. Secondly, the book itself is a rambling narrative that jumps from place to place without any clear purpose or direction. The most ink seems to be spent on Missouri, which was hardly a major theater of operation in the Civil War. It was surprising that no statistics are given. If irregular warfare was so import then show me some numbers. How many estimated irregulars were there? How many military casualties did they inflict. How much material did they destroy? How many Union troops were diverted from the fronts to deal with them? None of these questions are answered. The author has not demonstrated that irregular warfare was anything more than a sad and annoying sideshow to the larger events of the Civil War.

Unless you have a focused interest in this topic, this book will probably be a waste of your time and money. While I understand that there may be a lack of original sources, this is not well-done history.

Not recommended.