Book Notes

92CIVIL WAR HISTORY titles, and a new positioning of maps and illustrations, the second printing of this book is an improvement over the original printing of ten years ago. Phillip R. Shrivkr Miami University BOOK NOTES The Life of Nathan Bedford Forrest. By John A. Wyeth. (Dayton: Morningside Bookshop, 1975. Pp. xx, 653. $20.00.) Dr. John A. Wyeth spent the last two years of the Civil War in an Alabama cavalry regiment that once had served under Forrest. Wyeth himself was not directly under Forrest but commented that he was "impressed by the enthusiastic devotion to him of these veterans, who had followed his banner for the first year of the war, and who seemed never to tire in speaking of his kind treatment of them, his sympathetic nature as a man, his great personal daring, and especially of his wonderful achievements as a commander." Wyeth based this account upon interviews, correspondence with Forrest's veterans, and the public record of the war. What he produced was a highly-regarded volume, invaluable to students of Forrest and the cavalry war in the Mississippi Valley and points east. Wyeth's first edition (1899) went out of print in 1924; Harper's published a second edition in 1959 under the title That Devil Forrest (reviewed in CWH, March, 1960, pp. 105-107). The current edition, by Morningside, is a worthy successor to the earlier volumes . Recollections of a Maryland Confederate Soldier and Staff Officer under Johnston, Jackson and Lee. By McHenry Howard. Introduction by James I Robertson, Jr. (Dayton: Morningside Bookshop, 1975. Pp. xx, 483. $20.00.) In his introductory comments, James I. Robertson, Jr. describes this volume as "the premier Maryland book on the Civil War," one characterized by its accuracy and its engaging narrative. Howard was a staff officer and in that capacity, says Robertson, saw the war both from the perspective of the leaders and the followers. An honor graduate of Princeton (1858) and possessed of a sense of adventure, he seemed particularly well suited to serve as a staff officer and to leave a literate and penetrating account of his service. Howard began a journal in 1861 and BOOK NOTES93 in effect spent the next half-century writing this book. When it appeared in 1914, readers in both North and South received it as an authoritative volume. Professor Robertson notes that after examining Howard's work and comparing it with others, he concurs in the description of it as a "classic." Still, some editorial errors remained in the first edition, errors corrected in the reprinting, and by Robertson 's editorial notes and comments. Barbara Long's maps add much to the value and attractiveness of the book. Slavery ana the Numbers Game: A Critique of Time on the Cross. By Herbert G. Gutman. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1975. Pp. 183. $7.95, cloth; $2.95, paper.) Has any book on the Civil War era promised so much and delivered so little as Time on the Cross? Readers of Civil War History will recall August Meier's restrained critique in the September, 1974 issue (pp. 251-260), in which he remarked: "Not only are Fogel and Engerman scarcely modest in their claims to originality, but, despite disclaimers about the limitations of their method, they write with a certainty of tone that is frequently unwarranted by their data." Precisely. Since that time many economists and economic historians (and even "Cliometricians ") have commented on Time on the Cross, usually to the disadvantage of its authors. Now comes Herbert G. Gutman, with his aptly titled Slavery and the Numbers Game. Originally published in The Journal of Negro History (January, 1975), this study demolishes any claims Time on the Cross might have had to serious scholarly consideration. Professor Gutman, who has completed a study of the slave family, is well qualified by his years of research and his familiarity with quantitative methods to undertake the task. A careful reading of Gutman's volume can only lead one to conclude that the subject of his critique is indeed a book full of "egregious errors" and one that contributes nothing to our understanding of life under slavery. It is one of those books...