Upton and the Army (review)

BOOK REVIEWS313 entitled to an audience. It has the special quality that it is an appreciation of the campaigns according to the doctrine of the period, by a soldier who possessed (1) great eminence and (2) if not impartiality, at least the detachment of a non-participant. Even where his views are conventional —even where they seem somewhat ill-informed—it is worth knowing that they were Wolseley's views. Rawley's editing omits corrections of all but a few of Wolseley's slips, presumably because most of them are correctable at sight anyway; if there is a criticism of his work, it is that in an otherwise handsome introduction he echoes and joins in some of Wolseley's extravagances in the Lee eulogy. But this is beside the point; as the rediscoverer of Wolseley, Rawley is entitled to unqualified gratitude. Edwin C. Fishel Arlington, Virginia Upton and the Army. By Stephen E. Ambrose. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964. Pp. ix, 190. $5.00.) The author develops two main themes. He attempts to create a psychological interpretation of General Emory Upton's life and suicide and to give an explanation of the role of Upton's ideas and influence on the development of military thought To Upton the defeat of the Burnside BUI (creating a nidimentary staff system) says Ambrose, was a "major defeat. A worse insult was that, although he was convinced that what he had to say was vital to the security of the country, the public ignored him. Upton began to imagine that a conspiracy had been formed against him and to feel that his enemies would rather see the United States humiliated in the next war than to adopt his reforms. As his frustration grew, he withdrew into himself. He turned his bitterness and anger inward and, for the first time in his life, Emory Upton began to doubt himself. The result was tragedy." It was this psychological fear of failure, we are to believe, which compelled Upton to quit work on The Military Policy of the United States and to commit suicide. Psychoanalysis of an historical personality can be done only tentatively when an the evidence is gathered and properly consulted. A general rule should be not to seek a complex explanation when a simpler one is at hand. That Upton saw a conspiracy aimed at him is not supported by the evidence . While the author does present evidence that Upton felt Congress was wrong in its view, such a feeling is neither abnormal nor evidence that Upton considered "Congress's error" part of a conspiracy aimed at him. Furthermore, this "conspiracy" was supposed to have created a sense of frustration which caused Upton to withdraw inward during his last years with bitterness, anger, and self-doubt. Yet, in the last years Upton continued to write volumes of letters filled with military and personal matters to Henry duPont, James Wilson, William Sherman, WuTiam Church, James Garfield, his family, and others. Furthermore, Upton continued to 314CIVIL WAB HISTOBY work on The Military Policy. Only just prior to his suicide, on the last night of his life, when he claimed his scheme of military tactics was a failure and therefore his reputation would also vanish, is there evidence that he felt himself to be a personal failure. But this single act by a man about to take his own life is not sufficient evidence for the psychological interpretation the author has drawn, especially when there is a medical record going back several years indicating severe headaches which could have been caused by a brain tumor. The author's psychological view of Upton leads him into a position which weakens the second thème of the biography. He claims that Upton's reforms were motivated in large part by selfish reasons. Hence Upton viewed the rejection of his ideas as personal rejection. But again this reasoning places complex interpretation where a much simpler one is available. For certain reasons—which the author himself develops, namely that Upton grew up in an area of intense bmnnnitnrinnl«iti; and that Upton when young became infatuated with the soldier's life—Upton chose a career in the army and...