The Blue and the Gray on the Nile (review)

464civil war history two, neither of these pamphlets was pubUshed, as intended, in the Official Records. Now readily available, Wright's studies contain 169 pages of alphabetized unit nicknames and titles. After each is its officiai designation. Hence, the familiar "Joe Brown's Pets" is shown as Company C, 2nd Georgia State Troops. Following this section are lengthy compilations on miUtary departments and corps, plus an incomplete roster of general officers and their yearby -year commands. The second volume treats much the same material on the Union side and is divided into two parts. The first section, a reprint of Record of General Officers of the Armies of the United States, contains dates of appointment to general—and in some cases the mustering-out date—of 2,570 Federal officers. Part Two, originaUy pubUshed in 1885, is a list of synonyms for various Northern companies and batteries. Broken down by states and then alphabetized, the compilation contains units known by a person's name (Berdan's Sharpshooters ) or by a sobriquet (Graybeard Regiment). An alphabetical listing at the end of the volume of all synonyms facilitates quick identification. Personnel of the Civil War does not have the comprehensiveness of Dyer's Compendium, but it treats of both Federal and Confederate units. It will be of Uttle value to the person who knows the regimental number and wishes the nickname. No editing has been done, largely because Uttle is needed. On the other hand, these two volumes are a needed reference tool for any researcher on unit histories or general officers. For that, laurels go once again to Thomas Yoseloff, "the historian's pubUsher." James I. Robertson, Jr. State University of Iowa The Blue and the Gray on the Nile. By WilUam B. Hesseltine and Hazel C. WoU. (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1961. Pp. xii, 290. $5.00.) This book affords an extended postscript to the Civil War by describing the adventures of some forty-two Union and Confederate veterans who served the Egyptian khédive, Ismaü Pasha. Ismail was ambitious, imaginative, expansionist —a builder in the nineteenth-century tradition—but he needed help ("technical assistance" in current terminology) to make Egypt a modern power. Thaddeus Mott, a New Yorker with wide acquaintance in the Near East, persuaded Ismail to employ Civil War veterans to modernize his armed forces. Mott became Ferik Pasha (equivalent to major general) in 1869 and, with the advice of WiUiam T. Sherman, began to recruit suitable personnel. He coUected an interesting bag: "a Uttle more than haff of them [22] came from the Confederate Army [and Navy], and more than half were graduates of the service schools at West Point and Annapolis." The group included two former major generals, six ex-brigadiers, four colonels, and on down to two privates. By and large they performed weU; eight died in Egyptian service, at Darfur, Khartoum, and Suakin, besides Alexandria and Cairo; only one deserted. Book Reviews465 By its nature the book is anecdotal and episodic; it treats the careers of various Americans in Egypt, their individual case histories in Union or Confederate service, their achievements, failures, campaigns, and explorations. SoUd chapters deal with Ismail's grandiose plans, Egyptian society, and the problems of American adjustment to a culture widely different from their own. Five Americans stand out by reason of their distinguished and/or unusual services. Charles P. Stone, Union brigadier with professional reputation blasted by the Committee on the Conduct of the War after BaU's Bluff, became chief of staff under Ismail in 1871 and remained in Egypt until 1883. WiUiam W. Loring (Confederate major general who served through the war under a cloud because of the unfortunate Romney campaign of early 1862) was inspector general of infantry, designer of coastal defenses, and chief oi staff to Ratib Pasha on the iU-fated Gura campaign of 1876. Raleigh E. Colston was a Confederate brigadier who led expeditions to explore and map the territory between the Nile and the Red Sea. Charles Chaulé Long, after several years of Cairo staff work, made his major contribution exploring the Sudan (with Chinese Gordon) to Uganda and the Juba River country. And Alexander M. Mason also explored...