A Fighter from Way Back: The Mexican War Diary of Lt. Daniel Harvey Hill, 4th Artillery, USA (review)

Any group of people can be likened in personality to a bowl of mixed fruit. If such a bowl contained Confederate generals, Harvey Hill would be the sour lemon.

The South Carolina-born, West Point-trained soldier was one of the most aggressive fighters in the Civil War. Yet dyspepsia, an aching back, and a negative, sarcastic personality made Hill unappealing to most of his compatriots. He never hesitated to voice his strong opinions. All army surgeons, he sneered in 1861, ought to be hanged. Hill dismissed the entire mounted wing of the army by declaring that he had never seen a dead Confederate wearing spurs. When a musician submitted a request for furlough, "Old Rawhide" scribbled at the bottom of the page: "Disapproved—shooters before tooters."

Only one biography has been done of the irascible Harvey Hill. Another, with more understanding of the subject, is badly needed. Meanwhile, the publication of the Carolinian's journal of service in the Mexican War is a new, valuable, and highly revealing chronicle of the man who was the nemesis of Robert E. Lee and Braxton Bragg as well as the brother-in-law of "Stonewall" Jackson.

Hill graduated from the Military Academy four years before the war with Mexico began. He left for his first military action with eagerness and enthusiasm. Yet Hill was an unhappy camper for most of the struggle. As the editors of the diary note: "He tried to be fair in what he recorded, but in this endeavor he often failed. Objectivity was beyond Harvey Hill. He deplored coarseness, ignorance, and the primitive" (p. xiii). He also hated Democrats, military mismanagement by practically every superior officer he encountered, and volunteers (rather than professional soldiers).

Leading generals became favorite targets for Hill's anger. He referred to "the imbecility and want of firmness of our President" (p. 170), James Knox Polk, whom Hill dismissed as "a contemptible puppy" (p. 138). Because of Winfield Scott's jealousy of other officers' reputations, the general-in-chief was "in many respects a very small man" (p. 145). General David Twiggs "will never expose himself to any danger if he can avoid it, preferring rather to disgrace himself and command" (p. 71). Hill saved his greatest wrath for politician-general Gideon J. Pillow. After the battle of Padierna, Hill wrote: "Certainly of all the absurd things that the ass Pillow has ever done, this was the most silly. Human stupidity can go no farther than this" (p. 111).

Hill's carping in the Civil War is well-known. What we learn here is that it began fifteen years earlier and was fine-tuned even at that time. His diary of the Mexican War is full, widely ranging, and always a delight. Both the war and the man assume a broader image.

Coeditors Hughes and Johnson have done an excellent job. Maps are sprinkled throughout the text, endnotes are full, and the index is thorough. The result is a path-breaking personal chronicle by a man who truly merits more attention.