Customer Reviews

Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862

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In the 1960's O. Edward Cunningham completed his Ph.D. at Louisiana State University with "Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862". While unpublished, this paper did not gather dust lying forgotten in a desk drawer. Shiloh experts, park rangers, professional and amateur historians knew about this rich source of information. For years, they have consulted it and developed their ideas from it. While not a secret, the public did not have easy access to the manuscript and many never knew it existed.

Forty years after being submitted Dr. Cunningham's manuscript is available to the public. This is not a dated, stuffy dissertation that only historians will be able to read. The writing is crisp, informative and stands with the best of battle histories. His style is as easy to read as Sears, Wittenberg or Woodworth. His views on the battle were ahead of the times and are just now finding acceptance. To complement his writing, Gary Joiner & Timothy Smith do an outstanding job editing the book. Both are accomplished historians with extensive knowledge of the subject. Their editing extends and explains Dr. Cummingham's work without changing his ideas. This results in a much stronger, more accurate book that combines the strength of the three men into a single informative volume. The editor's are very careful to document their changes and to supply reasons for them. In addition, they point out the differences in Cunningham's ideas and the standard battle story. Sword's "Shiloh, Bloody April", Daniel's "Shiloh the Battle that Changed the Civil War" and McDonough "Shiloh - In Hell before Night" were all written after this book. The editor's document the differences between these books in an extensive set of special footnotes. This effort provides the reader with a series of references and reminders while following this version of the battle.

This is more than a battle history. The battle of Shiloh is the major part of the book but is not treated as an isolated event. We see Shiloh as part of a logical sequence beginning with Grant's attacks on the river forts and ending with the evacuation of Corinth. Politics, national, local and military influence the story. While they are not covered in detail, we have enough to understand the part they play. The book's examination of the two armies is something that I have not seen elsewhere. The standard "green armies" paragraphs are dropped and replaced with detailed evaluations. This section contains a series of word portraits of the major commanders with comments on their good and bad points. Coupled with a close examination of the training, equipment and experience of the men in ranks this produces some startling comparisons of the two armies. Having read the Shiloh books mentioned, I do not recall anything of this detail about the armies.

A second unique item is the time spent on how the Union camp at Pittsburg Landing comes into being, giving the reader an understanding of site selection and the haphazard nature of the camp. The author avoids the "dig or drill" question, concentrating on what happened and not trying to assign blame.

The heart of the book is the Battle of Shiloh. Over 250 pages cover the approach, the fighting and the aftermath. How different is the history of the battle in this book? Dr. Cunningham was very careful in documenting what he wrote. He counted fewer attacks on the Hornet's Nest, less cannon on Ruggles' line and a slower battler than we are used to. In addition, he moves some of the emphasis to the West side of the field where Sherman and McClernand fight. This produces a more balanced view of the battle and a shift away from Prentiss in The Hornet's Nest as the focal point of the first day. Additionally, the Confederates have a much harder time of it. The bad weather, the long march, lack of food, poor weapons and loss of command & control take a greater toll and slow them more. This with the fighting on the western side of the field makes the Hornet's Nest more logical, understandable and less of the central theme. The question could Grant's last line be broken and did Buell save Grant, are dealt with in an intelligent and evenhanded manner. The editors do an outstand job of placing the other books about Shiloh in the overall answer to these questions.

Action during the night and the second day's fighting are well covered. The emphasis is on what is happening, not on what history feels should have happened. This is a refreshing change and avoids much of the blame game some authors are determined to play. After reading the detailed treatment of the first day, you will have a better appreciation for why things happened as they did. The coverage of the retreat and pursuit is sufficient to convey what happened. Halleck's advance on Corinth and the Confederate response complete the history.

Footnotes are on the page where I feel they should be. The author's and the editor's footnotes are easy to identify. The editor's footnotes cover any changes they made to the original book and provide information about the author's views and the current ideas on Shiloh. Appendices cover the organization of the two armies, casualties and a photo tour of Shiloh. The photo tour is 22 pictures from the park with a map locating them n the field. A bibliography and index complete the book.

This is a Savas Beatie publication meaning a high quality book with maps, maps and more maps. They seem to be the only publishing house that understands military history cannot be done with out maps. The list of maps is three pages long, meaning that the reader is never far from one. At critical points in the battle, the maps are about seven pages apart. Maps add value expand our understanding of the battle, make it easier to follow the fighting and increased our enjoyment of the book.

Battle histories are not generally easy reads; by their very nature they are a detailed account of a specific battle. Some are more detailed than others. By and large battle histories are not, and should not be "quick reads." They do tend to be somewhat dry and tedious reading. Not so with O. Edward Cunningham's "Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862."

Written as a doctoral dissertation in the 1960's Cunningham's manuscript remained unpublished for nearly forty years, though it has not been forgotten. The manuscript, a copy of which was housed in the library of the Shiloh National Military Park, has been consulted by armature and professional historians alike. Now thanks to the efforts of editors, Timothy B. Smith and Gary D. Joiner, the manuscript has at long last been published by Savas Beatie Publishing Company.

Cunningham's writing is a joy to read, his narrative flows with ease, and as editors Smith and Joiner, only needed to step in to update new information which has come to light during the 40 years since Cunningham wrote his dissertation or to clarify points here and there where Cunningham's narrative needed a little help... needless to say those times were few and far between.

For a forty year old manuscript, Dr. Cunningham's work seems surprisingly fresh and vibrant; the writing does not date itself. The book contains many new ideas, and different approaches to interpreting and understanding this first, major, catastrophic battle of the American Civil War. For instance, Cunningham deemphasizes the importance of the fight at The Hornet's Nest while shifting the spotlight to the fighting at the crossroads on the west side of the field.

Not only is Dr. Cunningham's narrative, a history of the Battle of Shiloh, but also the whole western campaign from the Confederate Army's invasion of Kentucky & Grant's twin victories and Forts Henry & Donnellson to Shiloh, Corinth and beyond.

Mr. Joiner has drawn over 30 maps to assist the reader in following the action, and there many period photographs and even a photographic tour of the battlefield as it exists to day. Cunningham's notes are true footnotes, located at the bottom of the page, allowing you to quickly look down to see where his information came from without having to thumb to the back of the book which scores an A+ in my grade book.

Being a Savas Beatie publication, "Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862" is a quality volume, printed in a nice easy to read font, on acid free paper, and the artwork on the dust jacket is just gorgeous. This book was a great read and I am proud to list this among the titles in my collection.

"Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862" is the previously unpublished 1966 doctoral thesis of O. Edward Cunningham with an editorial touch up by Dr's Joiner and Smith. Dr. Cunningham was a doctoral student at the Louisiana State University of the late T. Harry Williams, author of the vastly influential work "Lincoln and His Generals". The editors are both authors of books on the Civil War in the West with Dr. Smith writing the well received "Champion Hill - Decisive Battle for Vicksburg"

The Battle of Shiloh was one of the most critical battles in American History. Some of the biggest figures of the Civil War - Grant, Sherman, Johnston, Bragg, Beauregard, Buell - they all fought there. As Grant would write in his memoirs, before Shiloh, Americans on both sides of the Mason Dixon line believed that the war could still be a short limited affair. Shiloh shattered that illusion. The two day battle saw some of the fiercest fighting of the war in which over 23,000 men were taken casualty.

Dr. Cunningham's work is a detailed history of the battle of Shiloh. The focus of the work is on the Divisions, Brigades, Regiments and the men that fought in them. . It covers in excellent detail which brigades, fought for which piece of ground, when they were fighting and what happened. In fact, the book is so crammed with details that at times it risks losing the forest for the trees with all the Colonel This of the 23rd Volunteer Infantry and Captain That of Company C, 10th Southern Infantry. Close but not quite. The work presents a clear and cogent picture of how the battle unfolded.

This is not a command study as Larry Daniel's more recent "Shiloh - The Battle That Changed the Civil War" is. While the decisions of Grant, Beauregard and Johnston are covered, they are not examined in detail. In many respects the Army Commanders are the supporting actors in this story. Once the battle was joined, Grant and Johnston were secondary to the fate of their armies. In fact, much of the Confederate Army was unaware of Johnston's death until after the battle was over. This is not to say that they are totally ignored in the work, only that they are not its emphasis.

Like all Campaign Histories, this one spends the first third of the work placing the Armies in context. The opening phases of the war, the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson, the Confederate concentration at Corinth, and the Union movement to Pittsburg Landing are all covered. What is not covered in any critical depth is Beauregard's plan for the battle and its impact on the outcome of the battle. For that you will need to read Daniel's book.

I very much enjoyed this work. Unlike so many recent books on Military History, this one came with 32 maps of the battle. Additionally the end of the book their is a photo tour of the battlefield today. Unfortunately, the maps lack any road or creek names. It would have been nice when Dr. Cunningham is discussing McClernand's position along the Purdy Road, that the Purdy Road would be indicated on the map that accompanies the text. Some times I felt like Lew Wallace, wondering which road I should follow. As for the photos I think a better use for them would be to have put the photos alongside within the chapter that discussed the battle for that particular location. The book also comes with photos of all the Generals that participated in the battle. The pictures are all taken from the "Generals in Blue" and "Generals in Grey" works. As a real fan of portraits, I would have wished that we could have had more original pictures other than the mug shots we have all seen a million times before.

Dr. Cunningham's work is much enhanced by the editing of Joiner and Smith. They have altered the original text to clean up minor historical errors, such as removing Dr. Cunningham's assertion that Grant's men erected field fortifications in the final Union defensive position. All corrections are properly footnoted at the bottom of each page. I have never read a book that has had such wonderful footnotes. They provide additional insights and a running commentary on the book. There were times when I would find myself turning the page just to see what juicy little tidbit would be there. I think in the future I will make the effort to read the footnotes just in case I am missing something.

"Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862" for all that it is 40 years old, and a doctoral dissertation at that, does not have a dated or arcane feel to it. It very much reminds me of the works by Peter Cozzens. Shiloh is a battle that deserves multiple serious works on it. There is room in every Civil War library for the major books on this battle. Those of Larry Daniel, Wiley Sword, James McDonough, and now Dr. Cunningham. I know my library would not be complete without it.

I would highly recommend this book. Being a novice at Civil War history this one opened my eyes on this little reported or storied second large battle of the War of the Rebellion. One can find many parallels on events of present day. Such as what happened to the major players (generals) after the battle. Had leaders listened to the likes of the newspaper reporters of the day (substitute NY Times for NY Herald) reporter who had an agenda (where have we seen that one?) or traitorous politicians with their own self serving agendas, the war would have turned out MUCH differently than it did! Grant and a few others would have been back benched for good along with much of the Confederate generals as well.

The personal stories even though they are a sentence long on virtually each one make the battle more personalized than any before that I have read. I really felt like I was there smelling the gun-smoke and feeling the cold rain, muddy conditions, and gut wrenching hunger for proper food on both sides!


If I had one negative comment it would be the use of Maps. The book needs better, more detailed maps in legend reference to feet-miles and naming of creeks and roads. This battlefield is MUCH smaller than I ever expected (using the internet and discussions with people who have actually been there)

Yes I recommend the book and will keep my copy as a reference for the future discussions on Shiloh.

Probably the new standard for Shiloh. With the new maps, it will give the reader a feeling and presence of the field. With T. Harry Williams fingerprints on this material, it was well researched and well documented.

We've been waiting for this release for a while now...it only took a few decades! This lost history provides a unique balance to this classic fight that will enable all students of Shiloh to get a fresh perspective on the course of this important Civil War battle. Reading it will make you want to visit the battlefield again even if you have been before, just to see what you missed before reading this book.

Fans of Sherman will especially want this special history of one of his earliest and best fights. This book is an easy read, and well compliments the several other fine books on this battle...you won't be dissappointed.

Clair Conzelman

The genesis of this book was the 1966 doctoral thesis of the author, a student at LSU of Civil War historian, T. Harry Williams. Cunningham died in 1997. He did not publish his thesis, although he authored an account of the Port Hudson campaign of 1862-63. A manuscript of the thesis had been available to Park Rangers at the Shiloh Battleground Park who declared it the best account of the battle to date. Accordingly, the thesis was edited by two Civil War historians, Joiner and Smith, and published as this volume.
I found the book engaging, but difficult to read. Cunningham never met a detail he didn't like, so the reader, unless careful, may see only the trees and cannot visualize the forest. As Joseph II cautioned Mozart about "too many notes", someone should have warned Cunningham (or his editors) about too many "Lt Jones, A Company, 10th Arkansas", Col Hiram Brown, 3rd brigade, second division, Army of the Ohio" etc, etc. etc. (I've often thought that writers of battle histories should use different fonts when naming opposing units). Nevertheless, with work, the reader can understand how the battle unfolded. Unfortunately, the maps, although plentiful throughout the book, have the disconcerting and frustrating characteristic of frequently not naming the roads, streams, buildings, etc. that were mentioned in the text. So when one is looking where the Umpteenth Kentucky rallied near the Shiloh church, the relevant map shows neither the church nor the Umpteenth.
As to the "big" issues associated with the battle--Was Grant surprised by Johnston's attack, did Beauregard blow the battle by retreating too early, and others, Cunningham and his editors are even handed. Wisely, they did not want to jump into what may already be another Caspian Sea of ink. Although the 1862 campaign includes the prologue of Forts Henry and Donelson, and the coda of Halleck's crawl to Corinth, the emphasis is on the few days of Shiloh. Book comes with a good collection of photographs of principal players, Orders of Battle, and bibliography. Footnotes are at the bottom of each page where they belong.

"Shiloh" by O. Edward Cunningham is a real gem. Cunningham died a few years ago without publishing this book (it was his dissertation in the 1960s), editors Gary Joiner and Timothy Smith thought that the general public would enjoy Cunningham's work - I am very glad they decided to publish it. Cunningham (with key additions by the editors) was a great writer. Although an academic, Cunningham writes without the boring and tedious style of many in this field. The writing flows and the characters come back to life.

Since I have not read much about this battle, the introduction by Joiner and Smith is excellent for those who are not familiar with the historiography of the Battle of Shiloh. They succinctly compare the various books that have been written on the battle. They praise, rightly so, Cunningham's views that are just now being accepted.

I appreciate the detail that Cunningham goes into when describing the training for both armies (almost non-existent for some of the units) and the various firearms that were used by both armies. On that note about the detail, at the end of the book is an itemized listing of the units involved in the battle and the casualties they took. Looking at the lists, you can better understand how much punishment the units that were in the thick of the fighting endured.

Cunningham spends a good deal of time giving brief synopses of each of the major commanders present at the battle. For example, I never knew that Confederate General Albert S. Johnston was so highly regarded by his contemporaries and historians. In addition, although Union General William Sherman became one of the best generals on the Union side later in the war, he cut his teeth at the Battle of Shiloh and made several mistakes that could have cost the Union a major defeat.

Cunningham discusses the battle in the context of the entire campaign leading up to Shiloh. As mentioned above, the campaign begins with the assaults on Forts Henry and Donelson in Tennessee and ends with the Confederate evacuation of Corinth, Mississippi. Some of the Union units engaged at Shiloh were bloodied in the initial battles of the campaign.

Finally, I need to mention the abundant use of maps throughout the book. As many of you know, a good history of a battle is subpar if it does not include maps of the progression of a battle. The book includes an abundant amount of maps so that you can closely follow the battle on the maps.

I live in Arizona and my family is from far western Kentucky, just north of the Tennessee line. My great-great-great-great-grandfather and three of his four sons were in the 3rd Kentucky Mounted Infantry. The old man lost his life at Shiloh. One of his sons (after whom I am named) was taken prisoner and was shipped to a Camp Douglas, a Union POW camp at Sandusky, Ohio, where he died. The remaining two ended up being merged with Nathan Bedford Forrest's Mounted Infantry. One of the two had lost an arm at Shiloh, but stayed on until he was captured just a few weeks before the war's end. The final son served until the end.

I've never been to Shiloh and I'm going back to visit my 76-year-old father, who still lives in western Kentucky, and on that trip I'm making the two-hour drive south to spend a day wandering and driving around Shiloh battlefield, down to Corinth, etc.

I wanted a book that wasn't about tactics, but was comprehensive enough so I could understand what had happened at the various places I am going to visit. This book is the first publication of a classic, well-known (among Shiloh afficianados) LSU doctoral dissertation that has languished on microfilm for 40 years. Those who study the battle knew of its existence. Finally, after forty years, the 1966 dissertation has been published.

Two Shiloh scholars have edited very gently, changing misspelled words, correcting a couple of obvious errors, and leaving footnotes when they made any changes. As far as dissertations go, this is very well written and researched. It is not dry academia verbiage. As the authors say, it's not coming to print after 40 years and doesn't read like something dated 40 years, but instead it was 40 years ahead of its time!

I especially like how the western campaign by Grant after Forts Henry and Donelson fell is discussed. It sets the stage for the climactic confrontation at Shiloh. Then, instead of ending after covering the battle, it also follows the aftermath, as the Confederates fell south to Corinth to try and regroup.

It is very well written. I have an M.A. degree, in teaching, and if I taught history at the college level and taught a course on the Civil War, this would definitely be required reading. It presages the battles back east (Gettysburg, etc.) that were to follow, and makes a case that once the west had fallen, it was inevitable that the Confederacy would never rise to a level where it had a chance of winning the war.

The book is readable, informative, and filled with useful details, maps, photos. It's exactly what I was looking for, and I'd highly recommend it for someone who wants to know about Shiloh, but isn't interested in various theories and conjecture about who did what, and what Johnston's death meant to the Confederacy, etc.

Thumb's up! It's just too bad it took 40 years for this dissertation to have appeared as a book! But -- better late than never!

Although I guess I am rather late in discovering this book, I would like to add a few comments. First I agree with essentially all of what James Durney wrote in his very fine review. Secondly, the authors and publisher deserve a vote of thanks for rescuing this academic PhD dissertation from the dust bins of academia and making it available to the public with updates and corrections. For those that believe there's nothing of value produced before the Presidency of John Kennedy, this work from 1966 proves the opposite. In fact, the modern propensity to add journalistic edge to writing or to interpret history through the author's opinions to "guide" the public, often renders historical works almost unless in recent years. This work has none of that. It is very even-handed, does not affix blame, and is true scholarship.

The writing may be excessively detailed in some places for those who wish to be entertained on every page, but such is the nature of history. There are many trees in the Shiloh forest, and if the reader doesn't want to read about all of them he could read Shelby Foote's treatment of Shiloh in the first volume of "The Civil War." Foote tells an interesting story in 18 pages for popular consumption, and he never allows facts or scholarship to slow him down. He resolutely states concerning the casualties at Shiloh; "Shiloh's totaled 23,741, and most of them were Grant's." Contrast that to Cunningham's discussion of the casualties in this work and one can see the difference between scholarship and journalism (or historical fiction, for that matter.)

My only criticism concerns the maps. They are many and detailed, but often landmarks mentioned in the text cannot be found on the maps. In addition, the maps lack the detail of the narrative, and I, for one, would like to see maps showing regimental positions where possible. I assume the maps were created not by the original author but by illustrators retained by the publisher. Although Savas Beatie is the premier publisher of Civil War and Revolutionary War history books today, this is one areas where they can still improve. As an example, see some of the maps in "The Battle of Bentonville" by Mark Bradley, published by Savas Woodbury in 1996, and another book I have recommended to Civil War readers.

I recommend this book without reservation. It is scholarly, even-handed and comprehensive. What more can a reader ask?