The Shiloh Campaign

The battle of Shiloh on April 6-7, 1862, was the biggest battle of the Civil War up to that date. Confederate General A.S. Johnston’s daring surprise attack failed and cost him his life. The gallant stand of the then-unknown Union General Ulysses S. Grant created a new national hero and was the turning point in the career of the Civil war’s eventually victor. The Shiloh Campaign provides a moment-by-moment account of the battle at the level of the individual soldier, but also examines the grand tactics of the Civil War’s Western theater and problems at the highest level of leadership on both sides. Grant’s uneasy relationship with his then commander Henry Halleck is described, as well as Grant’s and Sherman’s very modern-sounding problems with the press.David G. Martin’s The Shiloh Campaign provides the most accurate order of battle available.

A special “Leaders” section profile 33 major personalities of the battle and the book’s “Campaign” format shows the relationship of Shiloh to previous engagements at Fort Donelson and Island No. 10, and the opening up of the decisive Western Theater of the Civil War.On the Confederate side, Martin describes the unique concentration of Mississippi and Gulf Coast garrisons that gave Johnston his strike force for the attack on Grant’s camp at Sihloh. Also featured is an in-depth examination of General Beauregard’s controversial role in the campaign, and his relationship with other Confederate generals. A unique “Sharing the Blame” section explores the tactical successes and failures of both sides. A combination of contemporary and specially commissioned maps add clarity to the river campaigns against Forts Henry and Donalson and Island No. 10, and the final conflict at Shiloh.The battle of Shiloh showed all America how bloody and serious a conflict the Civil War really was. The closely fought battle was long and intense and proved to both sides that the war was a serious affair and would not be decided quickly.