List price: $18.00 (that's 30% off!)
Used price: $8.60
Buy one from zShops for: $9.99
The one thing that stood out was that Robert E. Lee was an honorable gentleman throughout his life. He lived in the time when that was the thing to do. He not only was a fine military Officer, but a good man. Robert E. Lee was a man with a code of conduct that he imposed on himself and never wavered from it. He fought for the Confederation as the General of the Army when he knew that the south was loosing the war and did not really believe in what the south stood for, but he believed in honor and defending his home, Virginia as he always had.
This book was the result of combining seven volumes and making one book. Editing it must have been a job and it was a job well done. The book is seamless in spite of the fact that is a combination of seven volumes. The war was very well covered. It will make a lot of battle fans happy with its detailed description of every battle.
Lee's destiny was set when his father, 'Light-Horse Harry" Lee who was a brilliant dreamer about riches which, he never seen, had quite a bit of influence on Robert's life. Harry spent some time in debtor's prison. His father's life had a great deal to do with Robert's attitude toward any kind of debt. He believed in living on the money you had.
Robert managed to get into the Academy with the help of his friend's and mother's family. He graduated at the top of his class in West Point. He studied engineering; it was the only thing that emphasized physics and math at that time (1820). What Mr. Lee had during this time, was brains that was driven by his code of life, which allowed him to be a historical figure in the 19th Centenary. I'm afraid that this code of living, honest, truth, ethics, and honor has been downgraded by a lot of people to where it does not have impact in the 21 Centenary. It used to be what American stood for.
Robert E. Lee graduated from the West Point Academy with honors in 1828-29. Lt. Lee received his first orders as a Brevet Second Lieut. for duty with Major Samuel Babcock of the Corps. Of Engineers for duty at Cockspur, Island, in the Savanna River, Georgia.
His brother, Henry Lee disgraced him by losing the family place Stratford for a debt and getting in trouble with the younger sister of his wife. What would not have been worth bringing up now days, the honor of the family meant a lot more then--Henry Lee was never mentioned again by Robert E. Lee.
Finally, in 1846 Lt. Robert E. Lee received his order to report to Brigadier General John E. Wool for service in Mexico. He was chosen to fight in a war, his first. He left the Mexican war when it was over as a brevet of Colonel without the colonel's pay. During the Mexican war he had earned the high opinion of his supervisors and the other American Officers for his superior ability to think and carry out an action. He was now 'Colonel Lee', a title of respect.
A great part of the book explained in detail about the battles when he was the General of the Confederation of Army. This part of the his life is very covered in detail. Later he accepted a position at Washington and Lee University and left that position and the world in 1870.
Roger Lee
List price: $29.95 (that's 30% off!)
Used price: $16.75
Collectible price: $25.41
Buy one from zShops for: $14.95
There is a lot of literature written about the Civil War and most of it is excellent historical fiction, but there is an honest attempt to write the truth about the final days of "Lee's Last Retreat." This book has a goal in mind and it is to tell what happened in the last week of the Civil War from Spring 1865 and on into the final week Monday, April 3 to Sunday, April 9, 1865.
This book has limited the scope to mainly just the final seven days of the war as Grant is chasing and closing ranks around Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. The final day at Appomattox Court House, the day the Grant accepts Lee's total surrender.
The truth is that Lee made at least one fatal mistake during his last campaign, and his subordinates were guilty of errors and omissions for which another commanding general would have been held responsible. For all the ultimate good it might have done him, Lee could actually have escaped alone the line of the Danville railroad had the administrative framework of his army not disintegrated, and with it the morale of his men. Had his engineers not failed to provide a pontoon bridge for the escape of the Richmond column, or had they warned him of that failure, he might have avoided the final delay at Amelia Court House. These and other errors of omission could have swayed, if corrected, the final out come of the war and a much different result.
The book has a rapid paced narrative that brings to light the final week in the campaign of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia the finest army to be ever assembled and fight on American soil. This book is full of actual accounts, letters, diaries and other contemporary documents. This is a welcome addition to your library for this time period.
"Lee's Last Retreat" is a fast paced book retelling Lee's retreat and Grant's relentless pursuit. Unlike so many recent Civil War books, Marvel does not get lost in the details nor does he make his book too long. He tells the story in 199 pages including 23 pages of photographs. To use a term seldom used to describe works of nonfiction, this is a real page turner. That is not to say that this is a "light" work. The author spices his account with a lot of detail from diaries and letters. His research and documentation is first-rate. For those wanting more he includes @40 pages of appendices and an order of battle. This is Marvel's second work on Appomattox and he is very familiar with the material. His other book was "A Place Called Appomattox".
Marvel does not hesitate to state his opinion and I found his insights fair and refreshing. I found myself laughing at some of his characterizations. For example, on page 87, he refers to George Custer as "the insufferably arrogant Custer." He spares neither Rebels nor Yankees where it is deserved.
"Lee's Last Retreat" adds to the excellent reputation that Marvel earned with his book on Andersonville. Add this book to your library.
Used price: $28.00
Buy one from zShops for: $28.00
by Joseph L. Harsh.
Ouch!!!! Talk about painful!!! Harsh (a history professor who grew up in Hagerstown) simply cannot write!! Some people can write well; others write poorly. Harsh is at the bottom of the latter group. (I feel sorry for his students -- they probably suffered severe ear and brain trauma from his lectures. And he writes as if he were lecturing!!)
He LOVES R.E. Lee. (According to Harsh, everything that went wrong was someone else's fault -- without exception!!) Then there are Harsh's numerous "moments" when he tells you what a particular person MUST have been thinking at any given time -- as if Harsh (or anyone else!!) could know! Finally come are his analyses of various events and situations. In Harsh's eyes, all ideas that contradict his opinions OBVIOUSLY MUST be wrong -- it's just plain "foolish" to think otherwise.
It's too bad that Harsh just didn't tell what happened and allowed us to form our own judgements. (By the way, he plays pretty "fast and loose" with the facts. Plus, he omits vital information that doesn't correspond to his interpretation.)
In his preface, Harsh even has the audacity to state that, besides his book, there are only one or two other books that cover the Maryland Campaign in depth. Well, I have been studying Antietam for over 35 years, have been there several hundred times, and have read literally thousands of books, articles, and documents about Antietam. Harsh is full of it!!
If you were thinking of buying this book, don't bother. You can gain just as much by pulling out all your teeth with a pair of pliars, then dropping a 200-pound lead weight on your foot.
(Disclaimer: I sat in on a few classes of Dr. Harsh's as an undergraduate).
Used price: $17.00
Buy one from zShops for: $17.00
He makes the critical error of looking for evidence to support his apparently pre-supposed idea that there was a scientific "paradigm" (read "conspiracy") to develop and use a biowarfare agent in the unlikely form of a chronic retrovirus infection. Had he gone about his argument in a better way he might have made better (and easier) reading, but instead I found myself dragged through completely disparate and unconnected fields of research, strung together with a comedy of errors to support this rather unlikely idea. My girlfriend laughed so hard at this book she cried.
But there lies the crunch. Unless you understood my first paragraph you are likely to be taken in by this story. My girlfriend and I are working in the field of molecular biology and have had formal training in veterinary and medical pathology respectively. Bob himself has told me that he did try to get answers to many of his questions from people in the field, but was rebuffed, and perhaps understandably so. The sad thing is that had he had input from a research assistant of any half-decent laboratory, most of his errors would have been spotted. This would have meant that most, if not all, of his case would have been rendered redundant: this book need never have been written.
I think Bob sincerely believes what he says here, but that doesn't make him right. There may well be evidence to support the creation of HIV by a world-wide cabal of military-directed scientists, but if such evidence exists it isn't presented here. Bonus marks are given for humour.
Used price: $3.77
Collectible price: $12.00
Used price: $1.18
Collectible price: $4.39
It does however cover a large selection of material in a succint manner, yet with enough detail to satisfy the curiosity of the interested student. Some of the stuff in this textbook is not common to geology texts--principally the aspects that have to do with the biosphere.
Overall, it's a reasonable textbook, besides the cost, which I think is inflated. Textbook prices are inflated in general in any case!
If you are curious about global warming this book has great factual information to start an understanding of the concept.
Used price: $39.90
Buy one from zShops for: $32.09
Used price: $2.75
Collectible price: $37.06
This book helps a person to understand how history evolves in the process of retelling over a period of several generations.
Used price: $40.00
Hale's attempts to defeat the concept of laissez-faire (linguistically) put him in the position of beating up on traditionalists like Thomas Nixon Carver, without giving us any practical reason as to why they were right or wrong. Even if we were to take Hale's central argument as correct, (he essentially contests the idea of a minimalist state as conceptually incoherent) Hale gives litte to no insight as to why the "coercion" he advocates is preferable to the "coercion" of the marketplace. Only once in Fried's book is the antithesis of Hale, Frederich Hayek, mentioned - whose defense of laissez-faire was primarily based on it's efficiency in conveying vast amounts of interspresed and fragmented knowledge as to the opportunity costs of goods and labor, and contantly changing values and preferences throughout complex societies. Yet it is this argument which is (by far) more central to the debate about laissez-faire - and this argument which Hale essentially ignores - preferring instead to defeat classic liberals on their choice of terms. Even if he were right, Hale gets us absoultely nowhere; not to mention, as does Fried, that Hale's expansive notion of "coercion" to include any form of human conduct tends to embarrass the idea of free speech or the civil rights movement - of which his progressive counterparts have been so active in protecting.
The book does not only deal with the so-called "empty" ideas of liberty and property, but also extends to Hale's analysis of "suplus value" of property and rate regulation of monopolies. There are problems here as well - but by far the most important are his idea regarding freedom and coercion. Hale is a intellectual challenge, but really nothing more - and while he clearly rejects the conceptions of liberty and property as they were conceived in the Lochner era, he gives us no good reason to do the same; and at times it seemed that even Fried wanted to pop Hale's balloon - but for some reason could never quite bring herself to do it.
Hale clearly explains why laissez-faire is wrong about liberty: all property is a grant of unaccountable private power from the state. Thus, it doesn't matter if liberty is infringed by the state retaining the power or private owners abusing the power (as in the cases of monopolies, public utilities, and opposition to unions.) Those were Hale's primary interests throughout his career. And interestingly, they are also precisely places where Hayek's social calculation arguments fail.
Hale (and Fried) don't bother explaining why they thought their alternative was better: the progressive case was being widely made elsewhere at the time. Hale's contribution was to specialize in kicking out the supports of laissez-faire so that progressive arguments could compete fairly with extremist capitalist arguments.
College-level reading, and not for those with short attention spans.
However, until some other historian writes it, Freeman has produced the most comprehensive biography available. His research is thorough, and the writing is definitely beautiful and enjoyable to read.
It is not unbiased. Lee is practically shown as infallible, the Yankees are portrayed as malignant, vile creatures that cheerfully trample the Constitution underfoot, and Lee's mistakes are written off to the bumbling incompetence of his subordinates. While the biography abounds with detail (which makes it an indispensable part of any good bibliography), there is definitely an agenda at work here. This is work which needs to read in concert with more recent scholarship.
This abridged version eliminates some of the mind-numbing detail of Lee's life (I do think that Freeman got a little carried away with this...if he had pared it down a little it might not have taken 20 years to write), but you will still get plenty of the worshipful, gushy prose. What would Freeman be without the gush?