The Iroquois in the Civil War: From Battlefield to Reservation (review)

?6?civil war history because of officer casualties. There is a more extended and sympathetic account of the accidental wounding, treatment, and death of Stonewall Jackson. Although this book is dedicated to the memory of several members of the author's family who served in the Confederate army, Furgurson has presented his material in an even-handed and nonpartisan manner. He, as other military historians, views Chancellorsville as demonstrating the military genius of Lee and as revealing Hooker as a self-promoting braggart who always blamed others for his failings, and who during the course of the battle made "at least one major mistake a day" (336). Placed throughout the volume are eighteen maps which assist the reader in understanding the course of the battle and the role of the different military units involved. There are also sixteen pages of illustrations, including pictures of various generals and battle scenes. At the conclusion of the narrative there is a fifteen-page appendix, which is divided into two parts. One is an outline of the various components and the commanders of the Army of the Potomac and of the Army of Northern Virginia. Part two of the appendix is a tabulation ofthe casualties suffered by each segment ofthe different armies. Following the appendix are twelve pages of notes, consisting largely of primary sources. This fine study concludes with a thirteen-page bibliography and an extended index. It will probably endure, for many years, as the standard treatment of Chancellorsville. W. Harrison Daniel University of Richmond The Iroquois in the Civil War: From Battlefield to Reservation. By Laurence M. Hauptman. (Syracuse, N.Y: Syracuse University Press, 1993. Pp. xiii, 214. $29.95) The casual student of Civil War history might describe the role of Native Americans in the conflict as limited to that of Brig. Gen. Stand Watie, the Cherokee leader who fought for the Confederacy. Those somewhat more knowledgeable about the war might also include Ely S. Parker, the Seneca who, as General Grant's military secretary, transcribed the articles of surrender , witnessed their presentation to Robert E. Lee at Appomattox, and ended the war wearing a brigadier general's star. However, if pressed for more information about the Civil War contribution of Native Americans, even some Civil War scholars might be at a loss. Laurence Hauptman's contribution to the history of the Iroquois in the Civil War is a major step toward ending the lack of substantial scholarship on this topic. For instance, the reader of Hauptman's book is surprised to learn that it was not Ely Parker, who never led Iroquois troops in battle, but Lt. Cornelius C. Cusick, a Tuscarora, who was the most significant Iroquois combat commander during the Civil War. The Indians under Cusick's command so excelled in action in North Carolina that Cusick received a regular army commission after the war. He served more than a quarter century on the BOOK reviews??? trans-Mississippi frontier and retired at the rank of captain, not the easiest feat in the shrunken ranks of the postbellum army. Hauptman's history of the military role of the Iroquois also quite naturally relates the achievements of the better-known Ely Parker. He then follows the chapter on Grant's staff officer with one on William Jones, a Seneca who served in the Union navy. Upon returning from a three-and-a-half-year whaling voyage, Jones enlisted in time to take part in the Federal navy's bombardment and amphibious attack on Fort Fisher. This immense Confederate bastion built to protect the approach to Wilmington, North Carolina, did its job so well that it held out until January 1865. Jones kept a diary of the combined land and sea offensive that finally took the fort and closed the last major port open to the Confederates. The Iroquois sailor was severely wounded when his ship was hit by the fort's artillery fire. Although awarded an invalid pension, Jones spent much of the time prior to his untimely death in 1882 defending his need for the pension. His surviving wife and daughter retained his pension, but Jones's experience demonstrates the frustrations and hardships that often plagued Civil War...