The Scourge of War

Reviews / Votes

...leaves the readers wanting more... * Jennifer M. Murray, The Annals of Iowa * [T]his deeply researched and deftly argued investigation will likely prove to be the definitive one for the foreseeable future....[Holden] Reid carefully connects Sherman's personality traits to his military strengths and weaknesses. * Gordon Berg, History Net * Brian Holden Reid offers us a wide-ranging biography that serves the field well by placing Sherman within the larger military, political, and intellectual forces of the nineteenth century-in the process helping to restore an oftmaligned historical figure to his rightful place as a supreme military thinker. * Zachery A. Fry, Military History Review * Military history with a twist... A complicated portrait of a complex man in a nation at war. * Paul Lay, History Today * In this compelling and lucid reassessment of William Tecumseh Sherman (1820-91), Reid (King's Coll. London; America's Civil War) dispels the myths and misreadings of the commanding general of the Union Army and, later, secretary of war, recasting him as a man of wide intellectual interests who understood that winning demanded strategic vision and assiduous planning. Reid's Sherman grew from an officer unsure of himself to a confident general at once bold in thought, meticulous in planning, and deft and decisive in action....Sometimes argumentative but always insightful, this study of Sherman ranks among the best renderings of the man and the conduct of the Civil War, and will help readers reconsider Sherman's character and the discipline necessary to succeed in war. * Library Journal * It would be hard to find an author better qualified to write a study of the American Civil War general, William Tecumseh Sherman, than Brian Holden Reid. He is a master historian and the preeminent British scholar of that war, who has walked many of its battlefields and written extensively on the subject...Holden Reid's assessment of Sherman reflects his own experience as a mentor in the operational art... Holden Reid's study of Sherman is as perfect as one could wish. He has captured the essence of a great commander and a fascinating human being * Julian Thompson, RUSI Journal * Holden Reid...is skeptical of the provincialism that characterizes many American histories of the Civil War. The moment one places the March to the Sea in the overall context of nineteenth-century warfare in Europe and elsewhere, the impression of Sherman's unprecedented brutality fades away... Holden Reid's concluding chapter... is a gem of scholarly military analysis worth the price of the book. * Allen Guelzo, First Things * Holden Reid probes Sherman's intellect and moves the iconic figure beyond familiar conversations of total war; he assesses Sherman's US Army career at various command echelons from the bottom up to see Sherman's successes and failures at the tactical, operational, and strategic levels of war. On the subject of Sherman's tenure as commanding general, Holden Reid is the most thorough to date and points to new directions in Sherman scholarship. * Mitchell G. Klingenberg, Parameters * Essential reading and an instant standard in the field, Holden Reid's The Life of William Tecumseh Sherman....will profit students of military history for years to come...For all of its erudition and scope, and more than its decisive refutation of the false view that Sherman inaugurated total war in the American context, The Scourge of War never loses sight of Sherman's humanity. Indeed, its author has demonstrated why his subject remains one of the most compelling figures of the Civil War and Reconstruction eras. The story of Sherman's life is improbable, almost incredible, and yet relatable. * Mitchell G. Klingenberg, Army History *