Don Carlos Buell: Most Promising of All.

Don Carlos Buell: Most Promising of All. By Stephen D. Engle. Civil War America. (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, c. 1999. Pp. xx, 476. $45.00, ISBN 0-8078-2512-3.)

Stephen D. Engle's Don Carlos Buell: Most Promising of All is, surprisingly, the first biography of this significant Union field commander. Buell's short tenure as commander of the Army of the Ohio, from 1861 to 1862, his subsequent fading away into private life, and a paucity of personal papers or memoirs seemed to render him unworthy of an extended study. But Engle's experience writing The Yankee Dutchman: The Life of Franz Sigel (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1993) has equipped him to provide a thoroughly researched and clearly written account of a most challenging subject. Of necessity, the author concentrates on Buell's Civil War career, only briefly sketching his subject's early life, West Point experience, Mexican War record, and routine years as assistant adjutant general. An epilogue sums up his post-Civil War years. Engle admits his book offers little about Buell's social and political views or his innermost personal thoughts and character. His approach is to use Buell as a case study for analyzing the Union's changing political-military relations by 1862. He sees Buell as an excellent negative example of an army commander who failed because his conservative philosophy, caution, and southern sympathies made him incapable of waging revolutionary hard war.

The book has its strengths, including new information about Buell's problems at West Point, his heroic combat record in the Mexican War, and the intricate command relations among Buell, George McClellan, and Henry Halleck. The photographs and maps are excellent. Nevertheless, the book has serious flaws. Engle concedes that Buell would not recognize himself and certainly would not like what he read in this biography. Yes, but why? Engle's reading of the records convinces him that Buell was a rigid, self-absorbed, and narrowly conservative man whose manner often repelled people. His southern sympathies, Engle theorizes, came from marrying a southern woman who owned slaves. As a military leader, he was "Jominian to the core" (p. 44), afraid to fight his army, and always put rules and regulations over friendship or victory. By mid-1862, Engle concludes, Buell's conciliatory policy had antagonized many of his troops and consequently contributed to the army's deterioration and near defeat at Perryville. Whereas some biographers over-emphatize with their subjects, Engle can scarcely conceal his contempt for Buell.

Engle's thesis is superficially plausible, clearly argued, and supported with abundant critical comments about the general from soldiers and political leaders. The problem is that the author simply overdoes it, emphasizing certain facts at the expense of others. Every wild rumor, such as Buell drawing his sword on General Thomas in a fit of anger, is repeated. Engle purports to find it "incredible" that Buell designated Nathan Bedford Forrest and John Hunt Morgan as CSA cavalry commanders instead of branding them guerrillas. Engle seems oblivious that recent studies, such as Mark Grimsley's The Hard Hand of War: Union Military Policy Toward Southern Civilians, 1861-1865 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995), have refuted most of the aspects of the old hard war-soft war dichotomy. Certainly down to 1863, proponents of conciliation were not only morally correct but realistically effective. And why did a substantial proportion of troops and officers, not to mention the Democratic politicians, always support Buell? What would a mere battlefield victory at Perryville, for example, have done to hostile criticism?

Military historians expecting new insights into Buell's role at Shiloh, and the 1862 Chattanooga and Kentucky campaigns, will be disappointed. Although quiet and modest, Buell was remarkably articulate when presenting precise reasons for his command decisions, both in wartime statements and in later magazine articles. Yet Engle brushes these reasons aside with impatience. The overall result is that he misses the real complexities, the awful ambiguities, the sheer drama of an officer of high intelligence and character doing his dead level best, and yet failing. Worst of all, Engle misses the measure of the man. Don Carlos Buell deserves better.

JAMES R. CHUMNEY
University of Memphis