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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 12/12/2006 12:28:37 AM   
captskillet


Posts: 2493
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From: Louisiana & the 2007 Nat Champ LSU Fightin' Tigers
Status: offline 		you need to do the three volume full monty sometimes Sarkus .............

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 12/12/2006 2:19:36 AM   
Sarkus

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: captskillet

you need to do the three volume full monty sometimes Sarkus .............


I've thought about it but they are pretty expensive as a set and it took me quite a while just to get through the abridged version. (Which I got for $15 at a B&N discount bin). Someday, though.

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Post #: 32
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 12/12/2006 1:50:38 PM   
Ironclad

 

Posts: 1924
Joined: 11/22/2006
Status: offline 		Don't forget the 4 volume series of "Battles and Leaders of the Civil War" as an important collection of original source documents and post war accounts. A good opportunity to read conflicting accounts - often from the same side! Who says feuds never die?

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Post #: 33
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 12/13/2006 1:41:16 AM   
Johnus

 

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Status: offline 		Lee's Lieutenant's is wonderful. If you enjoy military strategy and you like reading, the full three-volume study is a must. It's both military history and a critique of the generals and the campaign's. I find it unique and, yes, wonderful.

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/20/2007 5:14:25 PM   
Alan_Bernardo

 

Posts: 204
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From: Bowling Green, Ohio
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Johnnie

Lee's Lieutenant's is wonderful. If you enjoy military strategy and you like reading, the full three-volume study is a must. It's both military history and a critique of the generals and the campaign's. I find it unique and, yes, wonderful.


I'm now on Volume 3 of Freeman's three-volume set. To read any kind of abridgement would be considered, to me, apostasy. After finishing this last volume, I might consider Freeman's four-volume set of the biography of Lee, written nearly twenty years before Lee's Lieutenants.

Foote's narrative and McPherson's one-volume account of the Civil War I didn't really care for. I read McPherson's book and found its style suffocating: Foote's narrative lasted thirty pages before I became disgusted and returned the thing to the library. I don't particularly care for straight narrative accounts of historical events. Freeman's work, partially narrative, runs rings around Foote's, IMHO.

As for fiction, in two days I finished Michael Shaara's The Killer Angles. The novel is apparently pretty historical as far as the events go, though Shaara does what he wants with the individual historical characters, depending on how he thought they reacted to the situation at Gettysburg. I enjoyed the book. I believe the novel was rejected by 13 publishers before someone finally took it up. Shockingly to some it won the Pulitzer Prize in, I believe, 1975.

Gods and Generals, written by Shaara's son, is next on my list. I do think that novels, if a goodly part of them are historically accurate, are excellent introductions to understanding a particular event. My problem with Foote is that I might have continued reading the Trilogy if it had been considered, outright, fiction. Maybe sometime later I'll be able to read it without feeling the need to... er... upchuck.

As for movies, I know nothing of them. The last one that I saw, at the theater, was JFK. :)


Alanb


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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/20/2007 5:43:45 PM   
Drex

 

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From: Chico,california
Status: offline 		I'm sorry you have such a poor opinion of Foote, I enjoyed it as an introduction to the Civil War. the trilogy was what got me interested in the subject. But we all know there is much much more. ther are many personal memoirs of the war: Longstreet's "From Manassas to Appomattox", Chamberlain's "passing of the Armies",etc. I think these accounts are very valuable, although they present one man's veiwpoint.

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/20/2007 7:16:06 PM   
Alan_Bernardo

 

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From: Bowling Green, Ohio
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Drex

I'm sorry you have such a poor opinion of Foote, I enjoyed it as an introduction to the Civil War. the trilogy was what got me interested in the subject. But we all know there is much much more. ther are many personal memoirs of the war: Longstreet's "From Manassas to Appomattox", Chamberlain's "passing of the Armies",etc. I think these accounts are very valuable, although they present one man's veiwpoint.


Maybe at some point Foote's narrative will intrigue me. I've always disliked pure narrative history, which seems a veritible contradiction. Though Foote's account may be accurate, it disturbs me, as it does others, that he includes no references in his telling.

Of memoirs, I enjoyed Grant's and Sherman's. At times, Sherman gets too polemical; Grant's memoirs are better written, from an overall literary standpoint. Maybe after I finish volume three of Freeman's work, I'll turn to Longstreet's memoirs.

Having read Killer Angles and enjoyed it, I'll probably move to Gods and Generals. I'd rather read fiction that professes to be nothing else, than pure narrative history that might actually be fiction.

Alanb

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Post #: 37
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/20/2007 7:45:28 PM   
General Quarters

 

Posts: 1059
Joined: 12/3/2006
Status: offline 		I don't recall if I posted on this thread or not, but let me recommend Kenneth T. Williams multivolume, Lincoln Finds a General. It is narrative, of course, but analytical in nature. And he includes a lot of documentation -- for example, the text of many of the orders and other communications between commanders, subordinates, War Dept, and President. McClellan looks a lot better if you do not quote his actual communications (ala Foote) instead of doing so (ala Williams). Some other generals, even the much-condemned Burnside and Pope, look a bit better. Williams is also very careful to try to ascertain the facts. Fremont reports being delaying in his approach to the Valley by "egg-sized hailstones." Williams looks to see if the Confederates or civilians reported such a phenomenon. He must have been in the military at some point, but he looks at command structure, logistics, etc., with a professional eye.

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Post #: 38
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/21/2007 2:04:42 AM   
hotdog433

 

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Joined: 1/1/2007
Status: offline 		the compact history of the civi war is fairly detailed written by ernest dupuy

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/22/2007 4:18:48 PM   
Ian R

 

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From: Cammeraygal Country
Status: offline 		Anyone else here read the book by Archer Jones and ? Hathaway where they keep talking about "intrenchments" - fascinating, but harder to read than McPherson's Bttle Cry of Feedom.

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Post #: 40
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/22/2007 8:10:39 PM   
General Quarters

 

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Status: offline 		The book I read by Jones and Hattaway was How the North Won the Civil War. It was good but a bit of a one-note tune, as they explained everything in terms of "turning movements." I don't remember "intrenchments" -- maybe I should read it again. I am rereading Shelby Foote and amazed at how many things simply did not register with me the first time.

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Post #: 41
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/22/2007 8:49:52 PM   
Gil R.


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Status: offline 		Nosworthy's "Bloody Crucible" discusses hasty entrenchments, but the best book on this is "Field Armies and Fortifications in the Civil War: The Eastern Campaigns, 1861-1864" by Earl Hess. Very dry at times, but fascinating. It's supposed to be the first of a three-volume series.

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Post #: 42
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/23/2007 3:07:20 AM   
Ian R

 

Posts: 3420
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From: Cammeraygal Country
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quote:

ORIGINAL: General Quarters

The book I read by Jones and Hattaway was How the North Won the Civil War. It was good but a bit of a one-note tune, as they explained everything in terms of "turning movements." I don't remember "intrenchments" -- maybe I should read it again. I am rereading Shelby Foote and amazed at how many things simply did not register with me the first time.



Now you know why I was asking about how much manoeuvre the maps allowed

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/23/2007 3:13:03 AM   
Ian R

 

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From: Cammeraygal Country
Status: offline 		And one you can pretend your getting for the kids to read: Traveller by Adams.

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Post #: 44
RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/23/2007 2:16:15 PM   
General Quarters

 

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Status: offline 		What is Traveller about?

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/23/2007 3:08:27 PM   
chris0827

 

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quote:

ORIGINAL: General Quarters

What is Traveller about?


It's probably about Lee's favorite horse.

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RE: Essential Reading/Viewing - 1/23/2007 4:52:55 PM   
Ian R

 

Posts: 3420
Joined: 8/1/2000
From: Cammeraygal Country
Status: offline 		Its a history of the ANV from the point of view of Lee's favourite horse. It is in essence a kid's book but Richard Adams is an excellent author.

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