Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign (U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles) [Paperback]

Leonard Fullenkamp (Editor), Jay Luvaas (Editor), Stephen Bowman (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1998 | Series: U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles

In the same week that Union forces triumphed at Gettysburg, they also captured the river fortress at Vicksburg, Mississippi. Although much less memorialized than Gettysburg, the fall of Vicksburg was every bit as crucial to the Union cause.

Pitting Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman against John Pemberton and Joseph Johnston, the victorious Vicksburg Campaign helped revive a war-weary North, gave it absolute control of the Mississippi River, severed the western Confederacy from the East, and further constricted the South's ability to wage war as the Union drove ever deeper into its heartland. It also gave Grant--the campaign's chief architect--a dramatic venue for demonstrating his maturing skills and intelligence as a strategist and field commander.

Unlike other volumes in the U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles series, this one examines an entire campaign, looking at many interlinked battles and joint Army-Navy operations as they played out over seven months and thousands of square miles of rivers, streams, swamps, lakes, forests, hills, and plains surrounding Vicksburg. In addition to detailed coverage of the actual Siege of Vicksburg, the book also chronicles the battles at Jackson, Port Gibson, Raymond, Champions Hill, and Big Black Ridge.

Eyewitness accounts by battle participants make these guides an invaluable resource for travelers and nontravelers who want a greater understanding of five of the most devastating yet influential years in our nation's history. Explicit directions to points of interest and maps--illustrating the action and showing the detail of troop position, roads, rivers, elevations, and tree lines as they were 130 years ago--help bring the battles to life. In the field, these guides can be used to recreate each battle's setting and proportions, giving the reader a sense of the tension and fear each soldier must have felt as he faced his enemy.

This book is part of the U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles series.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

"These guides are the most thorough, detailed, and accurate books of their kind. Indeed, they are unique. I have used them to lead guided tours of several battlefields, with great success."--James M. McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom: The Era of the Civil War

"I most highly recommend this important and valuable series of guidebooks."--Herman Hattaway, coauthor of How the North Won the Civil War and Why the South Lost the Civil War

"These guides bridge the gap between sound military history and battlefield touring literature. They can be enjoyed without ever leaving the easy chair or they can become indispensable companions on tramps over the scenes of the greatest engagements of the Civil War."--William C. Davis, author of Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour and former editor of Civil War Times Illustrated

About the Author

Col. Leonard Fullenkamp teaches in the Department of National Security and Strategy at the U.S. Army War College.

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: University Press of Kansas (November 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0700609237
• ISBN-13: 978-0700609239
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #645,062 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Designed for the serious student, April 9, 2008

By 

James W. Durney (Tampa Bay area) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign (U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles) (Paperback)

The Vicksburg guide moved this series from a single battle to a campaign encompassing several battles and a full siege. This is a larger book and somewhat less detailed than the single battlefield guidebooks. The title of the book reflects this saying it is a guide to the Vicksburg Campaign not the battle of Vicksburg. The tour of the siege lines is within the National Park BUT much of the other battlefields are privately owned and this is reflected in the book. Until more money for battlefield preservation is available, many of these important fields are at risk. The park driving tour will not cover what is in this book and professional guides may not be willing to drive the miles needed to cover the campaign. Once again, this is not a detailed history but an excellent guidebook. The best history is Timothy B. Smith's book on the battle of Champion Hill.
The series format is directions to a point on the field, orientation, a general lesson on what happened in your view, followed by first person accounts of the action. These guides are designed using the general staff training concept of a Staff Ride. This is when a class is taken to a historic location, discuss what happened and see how the terrain influences the event. Staff Rides are designed to be intensive "on the ground" training coupled with physical observation in the hopes students will gain experience for later use.
I am not saying this to frighten you away from this guide but to tell you this is not a walk about and look at the monuments type of guide. This guide will have several pages devoted to the action at this point. It may contain a critique of the local commander's actions with possible alternates.
My experience is that reading the book prior to my visit works best. This allows me more time observing the field and less time reading the book. Of the tour options, a professional guide is usually the best but most expensive choice. The park driving tour is the best choice for a quick trip through the field to get the kids passport stamp. This book is the best choice for a serious student of the battle looking for a detailed explanation.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fine guide to the battlefields of the Vicksburg campaign, November 10, 2008

By 

Steven A. Peterson (Hershey, PA (Born in Kewanee, IL)) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign (U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles) (Paperback)

Vicksburg was one of the three times when General U. S. Grant essentially took an entire army out of the Civil War (Forts Henry/Donelson and Appomattox as the other two). This work covers his initial effort to subdue Vicksburg, which turned into a debacle as a result of his supply center being destroyed by a bold Confederate cavalry attack to his series of "experiments" to try to avoid attacking Vicksburg frontally to the ulitimately successful movement.

This is a book in a series developed by the Army War College on key Civil War battles. These volumes are structured around the following aspects: provide context on a battle; list stops for those actually traversing the battlefield to understand the geography of the conflict; expose the reader to evaluations of various aspects of the battles in the words of commanders themselves from their official reports; lay out the "order of battle" (a listing of all units taking part in the battle).

The book begins with an introduction that places the Vicksburg campaign in perspective. Then, comments from commanders on the situation at the outset of the campaign. Especially interesting: the comments of the chief engineer of the Confederate forces, who describes the process of creating defensive positions; Grant's comments as he tried to go overland to attack Vicksburg, only to be thwarted by a Confederate cavalry raid on his supply depot (one of Confederate General Van Dorn's few good days on the battlefield during his tenure as a commanding officer). Then, there is an examination of some of Grant's experiments, such as trying to leave Vicksburg high and dry by digging a canal to divert the Mississippi River; the naval experiments to take backwaters to get Union troops on dry land behind Vicksburg's high ridges rising above the River; etc. None succeeded.

Then, the masterpiece. Grant sidesteps the defenses of Vicksburg, heads down the Mississippi, crosses the river and gets on dry ground on the same side of the River as Vicksburg. The descriptions of key moments in two crucial fights, at Champion Hill and Big Black, are useful. Then, the siege itself.

After the description by participants of the events of the campaign, a "Driving Tour of the Vicksburg Campaign" follows, with stops throughout, so that the visitor can see key places and visualize what had happened.

Another well done volume in this series. The use of commanders' own perceptions of the battles is always a bit dicey (they are not apt to describe their failures in any detail), but this does inject a fine element into the book's narrative. All in all, if you want to see the battle from the eyes of those involved or get a sense of the geography of the battle or even visit the site with this resource in hand, you would probably find this a worthwhile work.