Transforming Under Fire The Atlanta Campaign Of 1864 Illustrated Edition

Includes Civil War Map and Illustrations Pack - 224 battle plans, campaign maps and detailed analyses of actions spanning the entire period of hostilities. Many historians give William Sherman total credit for the success of the Atlanta Campaign, when in fact it was the success of the Federal team as an institution. Conversely, many blame Joseph Johnston for the Confederate loss in that campaign, when in fact he was only one cog in the Confederate war machine. It was beyond Johnston ‘s ability to adapt if President Jefferson Davis and the rest of the Confederate team failed in fulfilling their duties. More importantly, the Federal team adapted during the middle of the war. In short they were able to transform the way they fought the war. The Confederates in the west were never able to do the same.

Many historians give William T. Sherman total credit for the success of the Atlanta Campaign, when in fact it was the success of the Federal team as an institution. Conversely, many blame Joseph Johnston for the Confederate loss in that campaign, when in fact he was only one cog in the Confederate war machine. It was beyond Johnston's ability to adapt if President Jefferson Davis and the rest of the Confederate team failed in fulfilling their duties. More importantly, the Federal team adapted during the middle of the war. In short they were able to transform the way they fought war. The Confederates in the west were never able to do the same. The paradigm of the day was to turn a meeting engagement into a major battle of anywhere from one to three days in length. In a few rare occasions, for example when an enemy retreated into prepared positions, they were cut off and surrounded. If they still refused to surrender then a siege was called for. The Vicksburg Campaign fit this category. Grant maneuvered around the defenses and into the Confederate rear. He then marched toward Vicksburg until he made contact, at Champion Hill, where he fought a major battle. He then invested Vicksburg itself after the Confederates retreated into its defenses. The Atlanta Campaign broke that paradigm. From then on the entire campaign resembled a siege. Now, however, both sides had relatively long Lines of Communication. In other words the battlefield resembled that of today in non-linear non-contiguous warfare. Both sides attempted to raid these LOCs, and both failed to effect the outcome. Had more effort been attempted to break these supply routes the campaign might have looked much different.

Many historians give William T. Sherman total credit for the success of the Atlanta Campaign, when in fact it was the success of the Federal team as an institution. Conversely, many blame Joseph Johnston for the Confederate loss in that campaign, when in fact he was only one cog in the Confederate war machine. It was beyond Johnston's ability to adapt if President Jefferson Davis and the rest of the Confederate team failed in fulfilling their duties. More importantly, the Federal team adapted during the middle of the war. In short they were able to transform the way they fought war. The Confederates in the west were never able to do the same. The paradigm of the day was to turn a meeting engagement into a major battle of anywhere from one to three days in length. In a few rare occasions, for example when an enemy retreated into prepared positions, they were cut off and surrounded. If they still refused to surrender then a siege was called for. The Vicksburg Campaign fit this category. Grant maneuvered around the defenses and into the Confederate rear. He then marched toward Vicksburg until he made contact, at Champion Hill, where he fought a major battle. He then invested Vicksburg itself after the Confederates retreated into its defenses. The Atlanta Campaign broke that paradigm. From then on the entire campaign resembled a siege. Now, however, both sides had relatively long Lines of Communication. In other words the battlefield resembled that of today in non-linear non-contiguous warfare. Both sides attempted to raid these LOCs, and both failed to effect the outcome. Had more effort been attempted to break these supply routes the campaign might have looked much different.

A fully illustrated narrative of the Atlanta campaign complete with maps, illustrations, and diagrams. The campaign for Atlanta was pivotal to the outcome of the American Civil War. Roughly 190,000 men waged war across northern Georgia in a struggle that lasted 133 days. Today a national park at Kennesaw commemorates this titanic fight, and there are a surprising number of physical reminders still extant across the state. The struggle for Atlanta divides naturally into two stages. The first half of the campaign, from May to mid-July, can be defined as a war of maneuver, called by one historian the “Red Clay Minuet.” Under Joseph E. Johnston the Confederate Army of Tennessee repeatedly invited battle from strong defensive positions. Under William T. Sherman, the combined Federal armies of the Cumberland, the Tennessee, and the Ohio repeatedly avoided attacking those positions; Sherman preferring to outflank them instead. Though there were a number of sharp, bloody engagements during this phase of the campaign, the combats were limited. Only the battles of Resaca and Kennesaw Mountain could be considered general engagements. Johnston’s repeated retreats and the commensurate loss of terrain finally forced Confederate President Jefferson Davis to replace him with a more aggressive commander—John B. Hood. This work will portray the first half of the Atlanta Campaign in text and images, using both historic sketches and photographs, as well as post-war and modern images. Extant trenches, rifle pits, redoubts, shoupades, and other works, as well as the battlefields, will be covered, as well as surviving historic structures and the monuments and cemeteries that commemorate the campaign.

A fully illustrated narrative of the Atlanta campaign complete with maps, illustrations, and diagrams. General John Bell Hood’s tenure commanding the Confederate Army of Tennessee stood in marked contrast to that of his predecessor Joseph E. Johnston. Where Johnston was forced to conduct a war of maneuver, parrying William T. Sherman’s repeated flanking attempts, he rarely risked offensive blows. The initiative remained almost entirely with the Federals. When Johnston did stand to accept battle, with only a few exceptions, he received enemy assaults behind fortified lines. However, weeks of retreating undermined morale. With Hood in charge, offense became the order of the day. Hood fought the two largest and bloodiest battles of the entire campaign within the space of two days: attacking at Peachtree Creek on July 20, and again at the Battle of Atlanta on July 22. A third attack at Ezra Church on July 28 was launched by Stephen D. Lee, on his own initiative. The results of all three battles, however, were the same—bloody failures for the Confederates. Thereafter, Hood adopted a more defensive strategy, choosing to preserve what combat power his army retained. The second volume on the Atlanta campaign portrays the final months of the struggle for Atlanta, from mid-July to September, including what remains to be seen of the battles around the city: Peachtree Creek, Atlanta, Decatur, and Ezra Church. The siege will cover historic views of Atlanta, operations east of the city, and the city’s capture. The cavalry chapter focuses on the Union cavalry raids south of Atlanta which ended in disaster. Finally, the fighting at Jonesboro will bring the series to a close.

Following a skirmish on June 28, 1864, a truce is called so the North can remove their dead and wounded. For two hours, Yankees and Rebels mingle, with some of the latter even assisting the former in their grisly work. Newspapers are exchanged. Northern coffee is swapped for Southern tobacco. Yanks crowd around two Rebel generals, soliciting and obtaining autographs. As they part, a Confederate calls to a Yankee, "I hope to miss you, Yank, if I happen to shoot in your direction." "May I, never hit you Johnny if we fight again," comes the reply. The reprieve is short. A couple of months, dozens of battles, and more than 30,000 casualties later, the North takes Atlanta. One of the most dramatic and decisive episodes of the Civil War, the Atlanta Campaign was a military operation carried out on a grand scale across a spectacular landscape that pitted some of the war's best (and worst) general against each other. In Decision in the West, Albert Castel provides the first detailed history of the Campaign published since Jacob D. Cox's version appeared in 1882. Unlike Cox, who was a general in Sherman's army, Castel provides an objective perspective and a comprehensive account based on primary and secondary sources that have become available in the past 110 years. Castel gives a full and balanced treatment to the operations of both the Union and Confederate armies from the perspective of the common soldiers as well as the top generals. He offers new accounts and analyses of many of the major events of the campaign, and, in the process, corrects many long-standing myths, misconceptions, and mistakes. In particular, he challenges the standard view of Sherman's performance. Written in present tense to give a sense of immediacy and greater realism, Decision in the West demonstrates more definitively than any previous book how the capture of Atlanta by Sherman's army occurred and why it assured Northern victory in the Civil War.

Draws on diaries, unpublished letters, and other archival sources to trace the events of the Civil War campaign that sealed the fate of the Confederacy and was instrumental in securing Abraham Lincoln's reelection.

An illustrated compilation of first-person narratives from 265 Union and Confederate soldiers detailing the four-month-long Atlanta Campaign (1864) in Georgia during the Civil War.