Three Well-Done Confederate Primary Sources
Confederate Correspondent: The Civil War Reports of Jacob Nathaniel Raymer, Fourth North Carolina. Edited by E.B. Munson. Illustrated, photographs, maps, appendix, notes, bibliography, index, 212 pp., 2009, McFarland & Company Inc., www.mcfarlandpub.com, $45, softcover. Lieutenant Drennan’s Letter: A Confederate Officer’s Account of the Battle of Champion Hill and the Siege of Vicksburg. Edited by Matt Atkinson. Photographs, maps, notes, 64 pp., 2009, Thomas Publications, www.thomaspublications.com, $7.95, softcover. Great Things Are Expected of Us: The Letters of Colonel C. Irvine Walker, 10th South Carolina Infantry, C.S.A. Edited by William Lee White and Charles Denny Runion. Photographs, notes, bibliography, index, 226 pp., 2009, The University of Tennessee Press, www.utpress.org, $35.95.
In historical writing, context is everything. Too often, collections of Civil War letters or writings are rushed into print, with little or no effort made to edit the documents and place them within their proper historical context. Fortunately, the editors of three new primary Confederate sources have done a commendable job preparing their material for publication. The best of the three books is Confederate Correspondent, edited by E.B. Munson. The correspondent of the title is Jacob Nathaniel Raymer of the 4th North Carolina. What makes Raymer’s writings exceptional is that he wrote them for publication in hometown newspapers during the war. Raymer’s highly descriptive accounts of battle action and the aftermath of combat resound with a gripping immediacy. His story of watching a soldier’s final moments in a field hospital after the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863 is moving and haunting. Raymer did not have to look back over the years through the hazy mists of memory to piece together his accounts; he wrote them within days, even hours, of what he witnessed. Lieutenant Drennan’s Letter is an interesting account of Champion Hill and Vicksburg. Whether the letter merited publication as a separate book is perhaps debatable; it might have worked equally well as an extended magazine article. Editor Matt Atkinson provides comprehensive notes to flesh out Drennan’s remembrances and to correct minor factual errors. Indeed, there are pages where Atkinson’s notes take up more space than Drennan’s words. The strength of this book is the vividness and timeliness of Drennan’s account; he wrote his letter over a five-week period beginning on May 20, 1863. Drennan’s observations of men deteriorating under the relentless stress of the Vicksburg siege bring to mind the modern diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder. Great Things Are Expected of Us features the letters of Col. C. Irvine Walker. They were actually edited twice – once by William Lee White and Charles Denny Runion to prepare them for publication in the Voices of the Civil War series, and once by Col. Walker himself. After writing his letters during the war, he looked them over in the postwar period and added notes and corrections. Walker’s letters are highly detailed and provide valuable insight into several campaigns in the Western Theater of operations. Walker held an almost uniquely positive view of the much-maligned Braxton Bragg He also praised John Bell Hood, whose destructive combativeness is thought by many to have wrecked the Army of Tennessee. Walker, in his postwar notes, also sought to polish his own apple just a bit, a not uncommon tendency among military writers of both sides. A flaw in Great Things Are Expected of Us is the complete absence of maps. Even with the details of Walker’s writings and the extensive notes of the editors, readers may find it difficult to follow the action in their mind’s eye, particularly given the vastness of the Western Theater. Unfortunately, the best of these three books is also the most expensive. McFarland Publishers deserves enormous credit for being willing to publish historically important books that other publishers will not even consider — the excellent work of Michael A. Dreese comes to mind. However, the exorbitant cost of these books — in the case of Confederate Correspondent, $45 for a softcover — makes them accessible only to those with the keenest interest in the subject, or to those with the deepest pockets. Thomas Publications deserves praise for its efforts to bring material such as Lt. Drennan’s Letter to a wider audience. Thomas’ books are generally affordable, but some material, like this book, might have achieved an equal measure of success in a military history periodical. The common factor with these three books is the editors’ recognition that readers of Civil War history want more than firsthand accounts slapped carelessly between two covers. Readers are interested in history that is prepared with skill and thoughtfulness, and presented in a format that is both understandable and contextually appropriate. History does not occur in a vacuum, nor should it be studied in a vacuum. All of these books meet this standard and are recommended. Reviewer: John Deppen John Deppen is past president of the Susquehanna CWRT, a member of General John F. Hartranft Camp #15 of the SUVCW and a living historian who portrays Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock. His articles and reviews have appeared in Military Heritage, Gettysburg Magazine, The Civil War News and The Daily Item in central Pennsylvania.
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