The Battles of Chickamauga and Chattanooga
Henry V. Boynton should be much better known than he is. Through his efforts the Chickamauga and Chattanooga battlefields were the first ones preserved by the federal government. This action led to the creation of other battlefield parks in the 1890s and many more since then. In his role as the first park historian, Boynton wrote quite a bit on Chickamauga and Chattanooga. He wrote an extensive tour of the battlefields with a history of the preservation efforts. He also wrote a book covering the formation of the park for the grand dedication in 1895. These books can still be found in libraries and online. Boynton also wrote three small books that are much less readily available. Timothy B. Smith has reproduced them in one volume. He also provides an introduction that places Boynton and these three books in their proper historical context. The books are presented as originally published; Smith confines his notes about them to the introduction. Two of the books focus on the orders of battle. Boynton follows each divisional order of battle with text explaining what each one did in the battles. There is a book for Chickamauga and another for Chattanooga. These give a good overview of the battles. They were also intended to be used with an atlas that was created at the same time. Those maps are not included in this modern volume, but the University of Tennessee Press has put the maps online at http://utpress.org/chickamaugamaps. In the third book Boynton made clear that he considered the entire campaign from August until the end of November as the Campaign for Chattanooga. Chickamauga was the first battle fought for control of Chattanooga and the final battle at Missionary Ridge was decisive. Boynton also commissioned topographic models to supplement the text. Three models were built, but none apparently has survived. Smith’s three-in-one volume is a very useful addition to the study of these battles. These rare books can now be owned by anyone. Being able to pair the text with the online maps makes Smith’s volume even more worthwhile. If you wish to learn more about Boynton’s role in the formation of Chickamauga, check out A Chickamauga Memorial: The Establishment of America’s First Civil War National Military Park by Timothy B. Smith Reviewer: Nicholas Kurtz Nicholas Kurtz graduated from the University of Colorado-Denver in 2001 with a B.A. in history. He loves wandering battlefields and is an aspiring author. Although he finds all aspects of the war interesting his primary interest is the Western Theater.
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Illustrated, photographs, maps, index, 152 pp., 2010, University of Tennessee Press,