Generals in Blue: Lives of the Union Commanders (review)

BOOK REVIEWS305 their slim fare, they were joined in the complaint by their guards. The complaint was also shared by Confederate troops in the field. In general, the prisoners at Camp Ford were neither plagued by unusual harshness nor persecuted by unsympathetic townspeople. They exhibited grim humor at their situation by dubbing streets of the compound with such names as "42nd Street" and "Park Row." On one occasion they found themselves more than content to remain within their compound—during the chaotic period at the end of the war. The account is well-written, wen-illustrated, and well-documented. It is a good piece of history on a significant topic which has been long neglected. John Sherman Long Southern Methodist University Generals in Blue: Lives of the Union Commanders. By Ezra J. Warner . (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964. Pp. xxv, 680. $15.00.) This excellent biographical dictionary of the 583 Union generals is a companion volume to the author's Generals in Gray ( 1959) . Like the earlier work, it is a handy and extremely useful reference tool, as well as a fascinating time-passer for the idle browser. Wisely, its author has limited himself to those officers who held the full rank of general, merely listing in an appendix the 1,367 others who were breveted general. Each biography is a brief but careful, well-researched, and documented sketch of the man and his career. Each is accompanied by a photograph—and the variety of beards, mustaches, and other hirsute adornments bears magnificent witness to the boldness and livery imagination of Union commanders. While the biographies concentrate on the Civil War period, they also describe the earlier and later careers of their subjects and are generally as complete as one might wish. There is an occasional lapse, however. Emory Upton's important post-Civil War contributions, for example, deserve more than the statement that he "was the author of numerous military treatises of great value; some were not published until years after his death." Another minor annoyance is the lack of an index. Of the Union generals, fuDy a third were professional soldiers, a slightly higher proportion than in the Confederate army. Lawyers and jurists made up the next largest classification, with businessmen a close third. Next were the forty-seven politicians, who seem as a group to have achieved the most notoriety, followed by a scattering of other professions. Six of the Union generals had been editors, against one southern general so listed. Presumably this supports the mightiness of the pen over the sword—or perhaps simply indicates that the Confederacy was more discriminating in its choice of generals. The average age of Union major generals in 1861 was thirty-nine; of brigadiers, thirty-seven. As the war progressed, this average dropped sub- 306CI VIL W AR HISTORY stantially. The oldest general officer to see service was the septuagenarian John E. Wool, who had held general rank since 1841. The youngest was twenty-year-old Gahisha Pennypacker, the only general officer in the history of the United States Army too young to vote when appointed. European emigres were well-represented. Two natives of County Cork, Ireland, for example, were Thomas A. Smyth and Thomas W. Sweeny. The former died of wounds the day Lee surrendered, while the latter survived the war and took part in the abortive Fenian "invasion" of Canada. John Basil Turchin, born Ivan Vasilovitch Turchinoff, was a graduate of the Imperial Military School at St. Petersburg. He proved a successful commander , but spoiled his reputation by encouraging his men to rob and pillage and by taking his wife into the field with him. The only avowed Communist among the Union generals was August Willich, a former Prussian officer, who distinguished himself on several occasions. In contrast to the 8 per cent of Union generals who were foreign-bora, only 2 per cent were natives of the South, and of the latter only George Thomas and Winfield Scott made any significant contribution to the northern cause. Some 70 per cent of the North's generals were bora in New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. And of the native-born generals who gained...