More Generals in Gray (review)

BOOK REVIEWS253 who died at Gettysburg. The criterion for selection was to include those people "who influenced the course of public policy, opinion and events" during the era (ix). There are few surprises. Politicians and generals predominate with a sprinkling of newspapermen, activists of one kind or another, a photographer or two, and such women as Clara Barton, Anna Ella Carroll, Mary Lincoln, and Harriet Beecher Stowe. Some of the selections, in the editors' eyes, are "individuals whose obscurity is breathtaking" (x), but they did lead troops, serve in Congress and\or state government, or perform some other service worth noting. Each entry is a succinct summary of the person's life, emphasizing the Civil War years, with some, occasionally colorful, commentary (some of it close to problematic editorializing: one congressman being described as "wily, practical and predatory" [444]). Each entry ends with a few brief bibliographic citations for further research. A very short general introduction and a good, extensive bibliography round out the whole. There is no attempt in the introduction to engage in any kind of biographical analysis or comparative assessment. Reading through the entries highlights the care and accuracy with which they have been composed, as it should, given that the contributors that the editors chose to write them include many of the leading scholars and biographers of these years. There are always, in a compendium of this kind, a few errors or missteps that creep in ("Long John" Wentworth of Illinois was much more than a newspaperman) and decisions to include or omit individuals that others would have made differently. I think that the very important behind-the-scenes Democratic leader Samuel L. M. Barlow and the busy New York politician Samuel Tilden, for example, deserve attention as much as others included. But they are not here. So be it. The editors recognize and accept that there will be some disagreement over their choices. More critically, such differences do not detract from a useful compendium that students will find helpful and Civil War buffs will greatly enjoy. Joel H. Silbey Cornell University More Generals in Gray. By Bruce S. Allardice. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1995. Pp. xviii, 301. $29.95.) In the post-Civil War decades, several people published lists of men who had been general officers in the Confederate army. The number of names on these rosters varied by as much as 15 percent. In 1959 Ezra Warner brought some order to the chaos by defining the term "Confederate general" and cataloging the 425 men who met his criteria and who, therefore, had been general officers in the Confederate army. Warner's list, Bruce Allardice notes, consisted of the "regularly appointedgenerals"—the men whose status derived from theirhaving been elevated to general officer grade in the manner prescribed by Confederate 254CIVIL WAR HISTORY law (in-2n). There is no doubt that these men were Confederate generals, and all historians working in Civil War military history have accepted them as such. As the earlier lists indicated, and as those working in the field soon realize, there were many other men who were (or were called) "generals" and who took part in the secessionist military effort in one way or another. These men are the subjects oí More Generals in Gray. Some of these other generals claimed that they had been legally appointed to general officer grade in March or April 1 865 but that the paperwork relating to their promotions had been lost in the chaos of the Confederacy's final weeks. Several others were appointed to general officer grade in state (as opposed to Confederate) armies or militia units that saw active service. Still others were "appointed" by Rebel officials other than the president and were regarded as generals by their contemporaries ifnot by Confederate law—"a nonpresidential route" to generaldom, Allardice calls it (4). Finally, some officers were "mentioned as generals in prominent modern works, but only occasionally called general by contemporaries" (12). As Allardice puts it, calling all of these men "generals" focuses on the grade they held, not on the authority from which they derived the grade. Allardice found 137 men who met at least one of his criteria for...