July 1, 2020
Here I am in my library. Another month has flown (sure it has) by. I have a new highlight for my week: I now look forward to trash day. I make a bet with myself on whether or not they will pick it up this week, and I make a side bet with myself on what time they will pick it up. Yes, things are really raucous at the Calvert household. Because I am now tired of talking to my wife (This is just between you and me no one tells “she who must be obeyed” a thing.) I look forward to the unsolicited sales calls. I have found myself trying to have conversations and I am very disappointed when they hang up on me. What a world and what a time we live in.
Seriously, I have had a lot more time to read. I have gone back and read a few favorites and looked forward to having new books delivered. The old favorites are ones like Shiloh-in Hell before Night by James McDonough. The author tells the story of the battle from the participants” viewpoint. He still tries to debunk the old stories of: Was Grant surprised? Did the death of Johnston spell doom for the Confederates? Another favorite is Extreme Civil War, Guerilla Warfare, Environment, and Race on the Trans-Mississippi Frontier by Matthew Stith. The author writes about “the complex racial, environmental, and military dimensions that fueled brutal guerilla warfare” in the Trans-Mississippi theater of the Civil War. Stith brings a new understanding about why warfare in our area was so brutal.
Among the new books are The Union Assaults at Vicksburg, Grant Attacks Pemberton, May 17-22, 1863 by Timothy Smith. This subject seems to be rather focused. However, Smith provides a day by day and sometimes minute by minute account of Grant’s attempt to capture Vicksburg. This may be the first attempt to break down, into very understandable passages, the thoughts of the attacker and the attacked. Anyone interested in Vicksburg would do well to read this volume.
Next up is An Environmental History of the Civil War by Judkin Browning and Timothy Silver. A professor of military history and a student of environmental history come together to present that “the Civil War was not just a military conflict but also a moment of profound transformation in Americans’ relationship to the natural world.” Chapter titles include sickness, weather, food, animals, death and disability and terrain. The authors present a study of how these things affect the natural world then and now. I have never taken the time to think about it, but can you imagine what an army of 100,000 men, most of them with some sort of dysentery, would leave behind. Don’t even go there with the number of animals travelling with that army.
The last on my list and the one that just came today Commonwealth of Compromise, Civil War Commemoration in Missouri by Amy Laurel Fluker. Taken from the liner notes: “In the aftermath of the Civil War, white Unionists, African Americans, and former Confederates developed competing memories about its causes and consequences. In the border state of Missouri, debates about the war and its meaning proved particularly contentious.” I hope this book presented through the actual participants’ words will help me to understand a little bit about the world today. If I can understand the history, I hope I can have a better understanding of then and now.
Well, that’s what is on my book shelves. Keep reading. Keep striving to understand the past. Maybe just maybe we can begin to understand our today.
The Round Table board is working hard to start up our monthly meetings. Be assured that when it is safe and only when it is safe, we will meet. Stay safe and stay well. Miss you all.
Mike Calvert, President
Civil War Round Table of Western Missouri