By Cormac O’Brien
Illustrated, bibliography, index, softcover, 319 pages, 2007. Quirk Books, 215 Church St., Philadelphia, PA., $16.95 plus shipping..
Reviewer: Clint Johnson
Clint Johnson's latest book is The Politically Incorrect Guide To The South. His next book will be Pursuit - The Chase, Capture, Persecution and Surprising Release of Confederate President Jefferson Davis coming in June 2008.
Review:
Your personal library doesn’t need this book, but you may want it anyway.
Apparently following the same formula he used in books on presidents and first ladies, O’Brien has put together a collection of short biographies of Civil War figures, men and women, blacks and whites.
He separates them into Union and Confederate personalities. Each personality opens with a caricature of that person. Each main article comes with a number of sidebars detailing facts that may be little-known.
For example, O’Brien says that Phil Sheridan once refused an assignment to the Northwest because he was concerned he would run into an old girlfriend who had married someone else. Who knew Little Phil, who braved Confederate shot and shell, would be afraid of a woman?
A sidebar about Jubal Early describes how he once threatened his own men with sending them into battle so that they could all be killed and burn in hell. These stories were new to me and I have written several similar trivia-related books about the war.
On the other hand, some of the facts O’Brien throws into the book are just plain curious. For instance, he lists the astrological sign of each personality. Would one general’s sign make him a good or bad general? O’Brien does not speculate.
The book is entertaining, the kind of book you want to have around for browsing or maybe reading on a long trip. That said, the production values of the book bothered me. The paper on which the pages are printed is the thickest I have ever encountered in any book. It is literally an effort to open it and keep it open as the thick pages cling to the spine.
The original illustrations are also caricatures, which don’t always make their subjects look appealing.
On the cover, a sad-looking Grant looks into the eyes of a very angry-looking Lee. Harriett Tubman seemingly flies like Superman over cotton fields. The well-known image of a seated J.E.B. Stuart has been enhanced with a grinning Southern belle over each shoulder.
One other interesting thing about the book is that O’Brien calls it The War Between The States. Interesting that he chose the Southern description, considering he lives in New Jersey.