Shrouds of Glory: From Atlanta to Nashville--The Last Great Campaign of the Civil War

This well-written narrative makes a revisionist argument that the Confederacy's desperate offensive against Nashville in the winter of 1864-1865 was more than a manifestation of General John Bell Hood's incompetence. Groom argues that Hood took his Army of Tennessee north because President Jefferson Davis demanded an aggressive military policy to avoid the South's being worn down in stages. Groom's analysis of Union and Confederate strategies is solid, and his sketches of the principal commanders, including less familiar figures like Confederate Frank Chestham and the Union's John Schofield, are perceptive. His accounts of the slaughter of Hood's men at Franklin and their overrunning at Nashville by the Union forces of George Thomas convey the horror of Civil War battlefields without sacrificing narrative clarity. An excellent introduction to a complex campaign. (Apr.)