Author: Dennis Keating – Page 3 – The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable

George Crook

By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2007, All Rights Reserved

Introduction

Ohio general George Crook had one of the most adventurous and interesting Civil War and post-Civil War military careers. This included participation in many of the major battles of the Civil War (both East and West), acrimonious feuds with Phil Sheridan and Nelson Miles, and postwar campaigns against such notable Native American chiefs as Crazy Horse and Geronimo.

Jacob Dolson Cox

By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2014, All Rights Reserved

As Eugene Schmiel concludes in his biography of Jacob Dolson Cox, he was a Renaissance Man in the Gilded Age. Schmiel recounts his many pursuits as a Citizen-General. These include his life as a lawyer, politician, corporate executive, educator, author, and Civil War general.

A Review of Pickett’s Charge: A New Look at Gettysburg’s Final Attack by Phillip Thomas Tucker

Lee’s complex battle plan on July 3 was more brilliant than Napoleon’s at Waterloo…Lee unleashed a sophisticated and complex, three-part tactical plan to split the Army of the Potomac in two. Despite the failure of Stuart’s cavalry to charge into the rear of Meade’s right-center, and the lack of Longstreet’s and Hill’s coordination of the offensive effort as Lee bitterly reflected for the rest of his days, the attack had nearly succeeded nevertheless. (p. 359)

By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2017, All Rights Reserved

Historian Phillip Thomas Tucker claims about the Pickett-Pettigrew Charge on the third day at Gettysburg:

Lee’s complex battle plan on July 3 was more brilliant than Napoleon’s at Waterloo…Lee unleashed a sophisticated and complex, three-part tactical plan to split the Army of the Potomac in two. Despite the failure of Stuart’s cavalry to charge into the rear of Meade’s right-center, and the lack of Longstreet’s and Hill’s coordination of the offensive effort as Lee bitterly reflected for the rest of his days, the attack had nearly succeeded nevertheless. (p. 359)

Wilson’s 1865 Raid

By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2017, All Rights Reserved

On March 22, 1865, 13,480 Yankee cavalry in three divisions left their camps at Eastport, Alabama on the south shore of the Tennessee River for the biggest raid of the Civil War. Armed with Spencer carbines whose purchase for the expedition was arranged by its commander James H. Wilson, this corps would have devastating firepower as it aimed at the destruction of the South’s remaining war manufacturing centers in the deep South of the states of Alabama and Georgia. Wilson had successfully argued with George Thomas for this campaign in the waning weeks of the Civil War.

Jubal Early: Lee’s Bad Old Man

By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2017, All Rights Reserved

Edward H. Bonekemper III, our September 2017 speaker on “The Myth of the Lost Cause,” writes of Jubal Early in his 2015 book:

Early, who faltered at Gettysburg, lost the Shenandoah Valley and his corps, been relieved of his command by Lee, and fled the country for a few years after the war, was an early critic of Longstreet and others who could be blamed for Lee’s shortcomings. Early was a better propagandist than general. As an author and president of the Lee Monument Association, the Association of the Army of Northern Virginia, and the Southern Historical Society, he acted as Lee’s chief votary for three decades.