Confederate Rage, Yankee Wrath: No Quarter in the Civil War (review)

350Southwestern Historical QuarterlyJanuary risk of numerous Indian raids. In his mind a draft served only to weaken die state's defenses. Oldham made some observations into what he called die "demoralization and lawlessness" and rampant desertion on his tour of die Soudi that particularly stood out (p. 85) . He argued that "men enough had deserted, if diey had had die courage and had simultaneously returned to their commands, to have driven every Yankee soldier in the Department out of it in twenty days" (p. 85). Despite his criticisms Oldham staunchly remained unapologetic and a Southerner to die end. The book in its current rendition—Rise and Fall oftL· Confederacy: TL· Memoir ofSenator Williamson S. Oldham, CSA—was edited by Clayton E. Jewett. Part of the work originally appeared in From Richmond to Texas by Wilfred Buck Yearns.Jewett pooled Oldham's written memoirs, housed at the Center for American History in Austin, Texas, and added other sources including WaroftL·Rebellion: OfficialRecords of tL· Union and Confederate Armies to flesh out Oldham's tale. A critical historian may quickly assume diatJewett, who lives and works in Austin, approached die task of editing the papers of Oldham by simply sprinkling in some additional source material. This work, however, went beyond a simple editing of the memoirs and the use ofsources diat most historians of the Civil War are very familiar with.Jewett did a wonderful job of restoring Oldham's work while maintaining the integrity of his original words. Jewett provides a lengthy and comprehensive introduction and extensive explanatory footnotes. A note of greater concern, and one that Jewett points to as well, is that a skeptical historian would question the value of a memoir ofa relatively minor politician from Texas weighed against those memoirs and academic treatments ofmajor military leaders and batdes. It is this fallacy that Jewett, and truly Oldham even at that time, sought to rectify, and it is here where the work truly shines. Austin Peay State UniversityAntonio Thompson Confederate Rage, Yankee Wrath: No Quarter in tL· Civil War. By George S. Burkhardt. (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2007. Pp. 352. Illustrations, maps, notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 9780809327430. $37.95, cloth.) In recent years historians have paid considerable attention to the execution of black Union troops attempting to surrender during die American Civil War. Confederate soldiers, enraged by the Emancipation Proclamation and Lincoln's decision to arm African Americans in the fight to preserve the Union, frequendy refused to take black troops as prisoners of war. The best known of these affairs took place at Fort Pillow, Tennessee, in April 1864 when Confederate troops commanded by Nathan Bedford Forrest refused quarter to surrendering black soldiers and massacred several hundred of them. As George S. Burkhardt, former publisher ofthe California CorningDaily Observer and a longtime student of the Civil War, points out in this volume, the affair at Fort Pillow was not the first, nor the last such instance involving execution of black soldiers . The first such affair occurred in the trans-Mississippi but eventually spread to all theaters ofcombat. Confederate refusal to give quarter sometimes led Union 2??8Book Reviews351 black troops to retaliate, killing Confederates who attempted to surrender. However, as Burkhardt notes, efforts by Union black troops to kill Confederate captives occurred less often, lagging "far behind the much more proficient enemy" (p. 2). While die audior describes some occasions when black soldiers killed Confederates trying to surrender, this is essentially a description ofinstances where Confederates failed to take African American prisoners. Tragically, troops from Texas were involved in a number of such affairs. Texas Confederates first encountered black Union troops inJune 1863 when Henry E. McCulloch's brigade defeated four black regiments at Milliken's Bend in northern Louisiana. In die batde some of McCulloch's troops gave no quarter, killing dozens of black soldiers who attempted to surrender. Approximately eighty black troops were taken prisoner but some of these were killed after capture, and others were returned to slavery. Burkhardt points out that the refusal of Confederates to take black prisoners ofwar became more commonplace in the latter part of the war. At Poison Spring in soudiern Arkansas dozens ofblack troops attempting to surrender...