Panting for Glory: The Mississippi Rifles in the Mexican War by Richard Bruce Winders (review)

Students of the U.S.-Mexican War have, in recent years, enjoyed an embarrassment of riches, including Amy S. Greenberg's A Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S. Invasion of Mexico(New York, 2013), Brian DeLay's War of a Thousand Deserts: Indian Raids and the U.S.-Mexican War(New Haven, 2008), and Paul Foos's A Short, Offhand Killing Affair: Soldiers and Social Conflict during the Mexican-American War(Chapel Hill, 2002), along with many other works touching on individual battles, campaigns, and facets of the war (including immigration, religion, and the expansion of the United States). In this volume, Richard Bruce Winders bolsters one other genre of scholarship on the conflict, the regimental history, in this case covering the First and Second Mississippi Rifles.

However, calling this book a regimental history does not tell the whole story because Winders not only provides a narrative of the enlistment, campaigning, and struggles of the two units, but also effectively situates their experiences within the broader political and social context of the antebellum era, discussing various political, social, and cultural factors that motivated and affected the Mississippi volunteers. He divides the book into two parts, narrating first the service of the First Mississippi Rifles and then that of the Second Mississippi. The First Mississippi, under the command of the future senator, U.S. secretary of war, and Confederate president Jefferson Davis, gained fame for its performance at the battles of Monterrey and Buena Vista. This war record earned the unit a laudatory reception upon their return home in 1847 and also boosted the career of Colonel Davis and many of his officers. The First Mississippi was also the first U.S. infantry regiment equipped entirely with rifles. Their successful use of these weapons on the battlefield played a significant role in the subsequent equipping of most U.S. troops with rifles (partly because of Davis's later service as secretary of war), a development with devastating consequences for the armies of the Civil War.

The Second Mississippi, hoping to emulate the First Mississippi, mustered into service in December 1846. However, its soldiers were destined to spend their entire term of service suffering from inactivity, heat, and disease in camps in northern Mexico, never tasting the military glory enjoyed by their fellow Mississippians. Winders uses the contrast between the celebration of the First Mississippi and the frustration of the Second as a key theme, illustrating the tremendous importance placed by antebellum American men on martial honor and glory.

Winders makes excellent use of the available letters, memoirs, military papers, and newspaper accounts relating to the two regiments. He also demonstrates a superb command of the published primary accounts of the war and effectively situates this story within the established military historiography. However, this study would have benefited from some additional research. Since Winders rightly spends significant time on the First Mississippi's service at Monterrey and Buena Vista, a greater consideration of the extensive manuscript sources dealing with the two battles would have fleshed out the story. Winders consults published accounts of the battle, along with (obviously) Mississippi sources, but he seems to ignore primary accounts from other volunteer regiments, such as those from Ohio, Tennessee, Illinois, and Indiana. Since, at key moments, the Mississippians fought alongside soldiers from these states and even depended on and supported them, accounts from these other volunteers would have provided important perspective on the actions of Davis and his men. Despite this issue, however, Panting for Glory: The Mississippi Rifles in the Mexican Warprovides great service to students of the conflict, giving a ground-level view of both battle and garrison life. One hopes other scholars will take up the baton and provide similar quality work examining other regiments or state contingents, enhancing our understanding of...