This Astounding Close: the Road to Bennett Place.By Mark L. Bradley. (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press The University of North Carolina Press (or UNC Press), founded in 1922, is a university press that is part of the University of North Carolina. External link
abbr. International Standard Book Number ISBN International Standard Book Number ISBN n abbr (= International Standard Book Number) → ISBN m 0-8078-2565-4.) Even after Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox, the Civil War continued to be fought and surrenders negotiated on different fronts. The most notable of these occurred at Bennett Place, near Durham, North Carolina Durham is a city in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is the county seat of Durham CountyGR6 and is the fourth-largest city in the state by population. , when Confederate general Joseph E. Johnston This article is about the Confederate general. For the Governor of Alabama, see Joseph F. Johnston. Joseph Eggleston Johnston (February 3, 1807 – March 21, 1891) was a career U.S. surrendered the Army of Tennessee The Army of Tennessee was the principal Confederate army operating between the Appalachians and the Mississippi (the Western Theater) during the American Civil War. It is named after the State of Tennessee, unlike the Army of the to Union general William T. Sherman. In this first full-length examination of the end of the war in North Carolina North Carolina, state in the SE United States. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean (E), South Carolina and Georgia (S), Tennessee (W), and Virginia (N). Facts and Figures Area, 52,586 sq mi (136,198 sq km). Pop. , Mark Bradley traces the campaign from the battle of Bentonville The Battle of Bentonville was fought March 19–21, 1865, in Bentonville, North Carolina, near the current town of Four Oaks, as part of the Carolinas Campaign of the American Civil War. It was the last major battle to occur between the armies of Major General William T. in March 1865 to the surrender at Bennett Place on April 26. Early in 1865 Sherman had set out with his troops to march northward from Savannah, Georgia, through the Carolinas in order to join forces with General Ulysses S. Grant in Virginia and to destroy what remained of the Confederacy's dwindling war resources. Few southerners wanted to admit it yet, but the end of organized Confederate resistance was not far off. After cutting a vicious path through South Carolina, culminating in the burning of Columbia, Sherman moved into North Carolina for a final confrontation with Confederate troops led by Johnston. Within weeks of the battle of Bentonville and in the wake of the events at Appomattox, Johnston agreed to surrender. Alternating between Union and Confederate points of view and drawing on his readings of primary sources, including eyewitness accounts and final muster rolls of the Army of Tennessee, Bradley depicts events as they were experienced by both the troops and civilians. In addition to Generals Sherman and Johnston, he includes cameos of such Tar Heel notables as Governor Zebulon B. Vance, Senator William A. Graham, and University of North Carolina president David L. Swain. Bradley shows that "the Army of Tennessee was larger, better equipped, and better supplied" in April 1865 "than has generally been thought" (p. xiii), and that as late as April 16, morale remained surprisingly strong. Whereas most historians interpret the Bennett Place surrender as Johnston's capitulation CAPITULATION, war. The treaty which determines the conditions under which a fortified place is abandoned to the commanding officer of the army which besieges it. 2. following Appomattox, Bradley establishes that Johnston negotiated from a position of strength, having kept his army intact and well beyond Sherman's reach. By focusing on the final days of the Army of Tennessee, Bradley sheds light on a neglected chapter of the Civil War story. This splendid book will long stand as one of the best accounts of the war's final days. J.H. DEBERRY Somerset Community College |
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