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A Savage War

By: Wayne Wei-siang Hsieh, Williamson Murray
Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
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Publisher's Summary

The Civil War represented a momentous change in the character of war. It combined the projection of military might across a continent on a scale never before seen with an unprecedented mass mobilization of peoples. Yet despite the revolutionizing aspects of the Civil War, its leaders faced the same uncertainties that have vexed combatants since the days of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War.

In a masterful narrative that propels listeners from the first shots fired at Fort Sumter to the surrender of Robert E. Lee's army at Appomattox, Williamson Murray and Wayne Wei-siang Hsieh bring every aspect of the battlefield vividly to life. They show how this new way of waging war was made possible by the powerful historical forces unleashed by the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution, yet how the war was far from being simply a story of the triumph of superior machines.

Murray and Hsieh paint indelible portraits of Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, and other major figures whose leadership, judgment, and personal character played such decisive roles in the fate of a nation. They also examine how the Army of the Potomac, the Army of Northern Virginia, and the other major armies developed entirely different cultures that influenced the war's outcome.

©2016 Princeton University Press (P)2017 Tantor
  • Unabridged Audiobook
  • Categories: History

Critic Reviews

"A genuinely fresh, persuasive perspective on the Civil War.... A book that will make even readers with a strong knowledge of the war think about how it was fought and why it ended as it did. A winner for Civil War history buffs." ( Kirkus Starred Review)

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    5 out of 5 stars

Outstanding

Loved it- brought history to life. The comparison of the two sides and methods of conducting the war were fascinating 👌

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Revealing read on civil war

I found this book most enlightening and revealing command personalities and their successes and failures

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Superb analysis

I have read dozens of books on the American Civil War and studied it academically and this is the best.

The writers provide a balanced narrative but the great strength of their book lies in their skilful analysis key leaders and their strategies.

They also effectively demonstrate the genesis of the Southern white ‘Lost cause’ narrative and its endurance into modern historiography, effectively demolishing the old canard that ‘History is written by the victors’.

Saying something new and intelligent about the Civil War isn’t easy but mission accomplished here. I’m definitely going to track down other works by these writers.

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    4 out of 5 stars

The US Military has failed to learn from history.

The book was biased toward the Federal side of the war. But it still maintained a reasonably accurate portrayal of events. Again and again, particularly in the early years, Federal forces failed to take advantage of the situation before them. Instead they waited for orders from above. From what I have read in modern US military history, it’s establishment still remains in a centralised command, that is biased against junior initiative, indeed threatens disciplinary actions against those who see an advantage in acting upon the tactical situation that opposes them, without first consulting with their superiors. In the early years of WW2, the Germans had no such problems. Hence their early success before overwhelming opposition got the better of them. We won’t have overwhelming opposition if we have to fight against the Chinese and Russians.

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