They Don't Write 'Em Like This Anymore

Here in Virginia, the Civil War aisle at the bookstore -- any bookstore -- will be one of the biggest. There are hundreds of books in print at any given time about the Civil War on virtually every aspect of the conflict.

Are you a Lincoln hater? Do you think Grant was a butchering drunk? Or maybe you agree that Lee blew the South's best chance to win the war? Did slaves really enjoy being slaves? Books with these angles -- and virtually any other -- can be found on bookstore shelves here in Virginia, although I can't speak for other parts of the country.

One author whose work should be on all these shelves, but alas may have fallen out of print, is Bruce Catton. I have now read three books by Catton: "Grant Takes Command," "Grant Moves South" and "A Stillness at Appomattox," the last of which deservedly won a Pulitzer Prize. All are excellent books that let me hear the distant cannons, wince at the crack of musketry and smell the sweat of a marching army.

"A Stillness at Appomattox" is the third of a trilogy on the history of the Army of the Potomac, the Union fighting force that fought at Antietam and Gettysburg, and endured huge losses in the Wilderness, at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor. I have not read the first two books of this trilogy and it is not a requirement to enjoy "A Stillness at Appomattox." This book is completely self-contained, beginning from the point that Ulysses S. Grant takes command of the Army of the Potomac in March 1864.

Written in 1953, "A Stillness at Appomattox" has 425 pages of text and another 71 pages of acknowledgements, bibliography, footnotes and index. This book is superbly researched and the footnotes made for interesting reading by themselves.

Although Catton's prose is modern and lacks the flower of many 19th century historians, he uses words more colorfully than current authors. James McPherson, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his wonderful Civil War history "Battle Cry of Freedom" (which I review here on Epinions) is the most likely heir to Catton. But McPherson writes with the level prose of a skilled journalist, while Catton uses more colorful language that seems slightly out of place today. For example, writing about how the Army of the Potomac had fought and maneuvered its way close to Richmond, Catton spells out the problems that lay ahead:

"If they were close to Richmond at last, and feeling good about it, the Rebels were always in front of them, ready for business. Furthermore, the field of maneuver was growing very narrow. The army could no longer swing back and forth in wide arcs, going twenty miles to one side in order to get five miles forward. This was coffin corner, and there was little room to sidestep. Any road that was taken now had to lead to Richmond, and all of the roads to Richmond were blocked by pugnacious Southerners, who had trenches and gun pits wherever there was high ground."

Since this is the history of the Army of the Potomac and since this was a Union army, it primarily covers the main Federal leaders such Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, George G. Meade, Phillip Sheridan and William Tecumseh Sherman. There are moving passages about some of the other Union war heros, such as George Custer and the amazing Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, the Maine college professor who saved the day at Gettysburg and who braved bullets leading infantry until the very last moment of the war. Catton has good things to say about all of these people but reserves the strongest praise for Sheridan, a tough fighter if there ever was one.

Southern leaders are not covered as thoroughly, although Robert E. Lee can't be ignored by Catton, just as he could not be ignored by Grant. The Confederacy's great cavalry leader, J.E.B. Stuart, is mostly brushed off in "A Stillness at Appomattox," his skill and cunning left in the earlier volumes of this series.

As Grant struggles to assume command of the Army of the Potomac, relentlessly driving Lee back into Richmond and trying everything to force Lee into open battle, the quirks of commanders and coincidences of combat are made clear in this book. Catton shows how there were several chances for the Union army to rout Lee in the spring of 1864, bringing the war to a much earlier and less painful conclusion. But lost and disputatious cavalrymen, reluctant generals and wayward orders always seemed to foul a perfectly good plan to get between the enemy and his safe home. More than any other book I have read, "A Stillness at Appomattox" makes clear why Grant had no choice but to wear Lee down, with both armies absorbing huge losses on the way.

Many quotes from actual Civil War soldiers really did help me smell the gunpowder, feel the homesickness and sense the tension of battle. I don't know how these soldiers could march into the teeth of ferocious musket fire, only to fall into trenches to fight hand-to-hand and face-to-face. Catton's book makes all this very real.

I highly recommend "A Stillness at Appomattox" as a vivid and moving history of the Army of the Potomac. It will not give you a detailed history of the Civil War and it does not cover Confederate leaders anywhere nearly as thorough as it does Union leaders. If you want an excellent overall history of the Civil War, you can do no better than James McPherson's "Battle Cry of Freedom."

But if you want to learn why Ulysses S. Grant is still considered a hero, what Phillip Sheridan really did in the Shenandoah Valley and how a college professor from Maine could become one of the best citizen-soldiers in history, "A Stillness at Appomattox" is your book. It is exciting, thoughtful and hard to put down, which is a good combination for any history book.