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The Union Cavalry Comes of Age: Hartwood Church to Brandy Station, 1863
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The Army of the Potomac's mounted units suffered early in the Civil War at the hands of the horsemen of the South. However, by 1863, the Federal cavalry had evolved into a fighting machine. Despite the numerous challenges occupying officers and politicians, as well as the harrowing existence of troopers in the field, the Northern cavalry helped turn the tide of war much earlier than is generally acknowledged. It became the largest, best-mounted, and best-equipped force of horse soldiers the world had ever seen. Further, the 1863 consolidation of numerous scattered Federal units created a force to be reckoned with--a single corps ten thousand strong. Award-winning cavalry historian Eric J. Wittenberg chronicles this story, debunking persistent myths that have elevated the Confederate "cavaliers" over their Union counterparts.
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Eric J. Wittenberg
Eric J. Wittenberg is an Ohio attorney, accomplished Civil War cavalry historian, and award-winning author. He has penned more than a dozen books, including Gettysburg’s Forgotten Cavalry Actions, which won the 1998 Bachelder-Coddington Literary Award, and The Devil’s to Pay: John Buford at Gettysburg, which won the Gettysburg Civil War Roundtable’s 2015 Book Award.
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Reviews for The Union Cavalry Comes of Age
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- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5At times brilliant and other times mediocre, this study of the evolution of the Union Cavalry Corps in the first half of 1863 is a fine addition to the growing body of cavalry-oriented literature that tries to explain the puzzling weakness of Union cavalry in the first war years.Wittenberg sees the Chancellorsville campaign and its sandwiching battles of Kelly's Ford and Brandy Station as the turning point of the Union cavalry. He argues that organizational change (creation of a dedicated cavalry corps), training by George Stoneman, and William Averell, and a newly found spirit of giving cavalry combat missions at army command level (Alfred Pleasonton, Joe Hooker) as the principal reasons for the emergence.While these are all worthy reasons, the actual performance of the Union cavalry in the battles up to Gettysburg showed a continuing stream of failures and missed chances. The key difference to earlier events, however, was that now these failures were the sole responsibility of the cavalry corps and, especially if not mostly, its leadership. At last, the pruning of inept and over-cautious leadership (which started in the infantry in 1861) could begin in the cavalry branch too. Only after the battle of Brandy Station and its resulting purge was the Union cavalry directed by aggressive and (mostly) capable generals. Thus, the turning point is less the extended Chancellorsville campaign but the changes undertaken at its end.The book presents a good narrative on a strategic level. The battle descriptions lack clarity. Rapid movements and the flow of cavalry engagements are difficult to render in text and need visual support the included maps do not provide. Maps appear much too late in the text (eg the map on Brandy Station is found on the tenth page of an eleven page battle description) and cover brigades whereas the narrative focusses on regiments. As brigades had mostly three to six regiments, the largely empty maps could easily have been enriched by regimental positions and tracings of the attack and retreat paths. The conclusion deals with the careers of individual cavalry officers and neglects to summarize the findings of the study. Overall, a mixed recommendation: great topic, flawed execution.