Lincoln’s Lieutenants – Stephen W. Sears, 2017 ★★★★

Epic Battles Led by Petty Minds

They were eventual victors in the highest-stakes battles their country ever fought, enduring gut-wrenching reversals and hellish casualties all the way. They were also whiny, bratty, narcissistic headcases easily triggered into launching dramas behind the front.

With such leaders was the Union saved.

The main takeaway from this book, the first by Civil War historian Stephen Sears to cover the entire war rather than a specific campaign, is just how brutal a spectacle it was not just during specific battles but all the way through. Yet the prima donna aspect hits home, too.

A Stillness At Appomattox – Bruce Catton, 1953 ★★★½

A Somber Last Waltz

The third and final volume of Bruce Catton’s “Army Of The Potomac” series winds up the story of Abraham Lincoln’s greatest fighting force as it struggled to its ultimate victory. Like nearly all such grand culminations, it can’t help but be at least a little disappointing.

Part of that is due to the natural deflation of finding oneself at the end of a long journey, wondering if all the toil and pain was worth it. Part of it is because the last year of the American Civil War, at least in Northern Virginia, was as dull as it was deadly, mired in an early form of trench warfare which put an end to dashing assaults and quick successes.

The author is also at fault. Catton, for all his factual command, his poetic turns of phrase, and his masterful word portraits, comes across somewhat more the way critics have painted him, moralizing and windy. The book is still good, very good in places, but a modest comedown from the fantastic first two volumes.