Illustrated with 9 figures and 11 maps of the campaign and engagements at Perryville. The battle of Perryville symbolized the high-water mark of the Confederacy in the western theater of operations. In Aug. 1862 General Braxton Bragg and Major General (MG) Edmund Kirby Smith led separate armies into Kentucky to wrest the state from the Union and install a Confederate governor. They initially met success and captured the state capital, simultaneously shifting the war in the west from northern Mississippi and Alabama to Kentucky. In response the North raised additional forces to protect Cincinnati and Louisville while MG Don Carlos Buell halted his offensive against Chattanooga and marched his Army of the Ohio back to Kentucky. On 8 Oct. 1862 Buell’s army clashed with Bragg’s at Perryville. The Confederates achieved a tactical success in a hard-fought engagement that generated more than 7,000 casualties. Of the regiments engaged, 10 suffered losses between 40 and 60 percent. However, outnumbered by three to one, Bragg’s army could not sustain its victory and withdrew. Within days of the battle, all of the invading Southern forces retired from the state. Kentucky remained firmly in the Union and secure from Confederate invasion for the war’s duration. Despite its importance to the course of the war in the west, Perryville does not benefit from the high visibility accorded the better-known Civil War sites such as Manassas, Gettysburg, Antietam, and Chickamauga. Although more than 70,000 Union and Confederate soldiers deployed in and around Perryville, understanding of the battle and its significance to the overall course of the war remains poor. For staff ride purposes this unfamiliarity can be a benefit. It forces the participants to study and think about the situation facing their Civil War counterparts without the preconceived notions that surround the more popular sites.

The US Army has used Civil War and other battlefields as “outdoor classrooms” to educate and train its officers. Since 1983 the Combat Studies Institute has produced a series of staff ride guides to assist units and classes in this training. The Confederate counteroffensive defeated Union hopes to end the war in 1862. However, by mid-October, hard on the heels of the broad Confederate advance the Union forces had regained the strategic and operational advantage. Union victories at Antietam in the east and Perryville in the west carried significant weight in determining the final outcome of the conflict. While vast literature surrounds the former battle, Perryville has been somewhat neglected. This work seeks to alleviate that lacuna. This Staff Ride Handbook for the Battle of Perryville, 8 October 1862, is a valuable study that examines the key considerations in planning and executing the September-October campaign and battle. Modern tacticians and operational planners will find themes that still resonate. Cameron demonstrates that Civil War leaders met their challenging responsibilities with planning, discipline, ingenuity, leadership, and persistence—themes that are well worth continued reflection by today’s officers.

The staff ride remains an important tool for teaching military history and promoting leadership development. It links historical events with the actual ground upon which they occurred, providing an emotional as well as intellectual experience. The staff ride thus offers a vehicle for analyzing the human experience of combat. From this analysis emerge insights that are applicable to modern battle command. Technology and doctrine change over time, but the human dimension provides a connection between past and present. By concentrating on the actual ground upon which armies fought, the staff ride combines the formal study of the schoolhouse environment with the more visceral experience of the battlefield. By merging the analysis of command, doctrine, and weaponry with the terrain on which they were employed, the staff ride immerses students in the dynamics of combat. This handbook serves to facilitate military staff rides to Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site in Kentucky. It is a tool to assist in applying the U.S. Army's staff ride methodology to this battlefield. It provides a means of interpreting and understanding the battle of Perryville. In particular, the handbook assists small-group instructors in organizing and conducting a staff ride that focuses on relevant training objectives. The handbook is modeled on the series of staff ride guides developed by the Combat Studies Institute (CSI), Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. It includes information concerning the nature of Civil War armies, the 1862 Kentucky campaign, maps, and more specialized material detailing the Armies of the Ohio and the Mississippi. A variety of instructional information helps readers to understand the flow of the battle; its participants; and related doctrinal, materiel, command, and organizational issues. The heart of the guide is chapter 3, which outlines a recommended route through the park based on the sequence of actual battle events.

This book is to honor the sacrifices and courage shown by the Forty-Second Indiana Infantry in their military campaigns during the Civil War from their organization in 1861 until final victory in April 1865.

In August and September 1862 Confederate armies were on the move northward. Robert E. Lee was invading Maryland, Earl Van Dorn and Sterling Price were moving into Tennessee, and Braxton Bragg and Edmund Kirby Smith were advancing into Kentucky. James McPherson, in his acclaimed Battle Cry of Freedom, cites this period as the first of the four major turning points of the American Civil War. The Confederate counteroffensive defeated Union hopes to end the war in 1862. However, by mid-October, hard on the heels of the broad Confederate advance the Union forces had regained the strategic and operational advantage, cited by McPherson as the second turning point of the war. Union victories at Antietam in the east and Perryville in the west carried significant weight in determining the final outcome of the conflict. While vast literature surrounds the former battle Perryville has been somewhat neglected. This work seeks to alleviate that lacuna. The US Army has used Civil War and other battlefields as "outdoor classrooms" to educate and train its officers. Since 1983 the Combat Studies Institute has produced a series of staff ride guides to assist units and classes in this training. The most recent volume in that series, Dr. Robert Cameron's Staff Ride Handbook for the Battle of Perryville, 8 October 1862, is a valuable study that examines the key considerations in planning and executing the September-October campaign and battle. Modern tacticians and operational planners will find themes that still resonate. Cameron demonstrates that Civil War leaders met their challenging responsibilities with planning, discipline, ingenuity, leadership, and persistence-themes that are well worth continued reflection by today's officers.

At the outset of the Civil War, the cavalry of the Army of the Ohio (Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Tennessee) was a fledgling force beginning an arduous journey that would make it the best cavalry in the world. In late 1862, most of this cavalry was transferred to the Army of the Cumberland and a second cavalry force emerged in the second Army of the Ohio. Throughout the war, these regiments fought in some of the most important military operations of the war, including Camp Wildcat; Mill Springs; the siege of Corinth; raids into East Tennessee; the capture of Morgan during his Great Raid; and the campaigns of Middle Tennessee, Perryville, Knoxville, Atlanta, and Nashville. This is their complete history.

@font-face { font-family: "Times New Roman";}p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; line-height: 200%; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Times; }table.MsoNormalTable { font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } The American Civil War was won and lost on its western battlefields, but accounts of triumphant Union generals such as Grant and Sherman leave half of the story untold. In the third volume of Confederate Generals in the Western Theater, editors Lawrence Hewitt and Arthur Bergeron bring together ten more never-before-published essays filled with new, penetrating insights into the key question of why the Rebel high command in the West could not match the performance of Robert E. Lee in the East. Showcasing the work of such gifted historians as Wiley Sword, Timothy B. Smith, Rory T. Cornish, and M. Jane Johansson, this book is a compelling addition to an ongoing, collective portrait of generals who occasionally displayed brilliance but were more often handicapped by both geography and their own shortcomings. While the vast, varied terrain of the Western Theater slowed communications and troop transfers and led to the creation of too many military departments that hampered cooperation among commands, even more damaging were the personal qualities of many of the generals. All too frequently, incompetence, egotism, and insubordination were the rule rather than the exception. Some of these men were undone by alcoholism and womanizing, others by politics and nepotism. A few outlived their usefulness; others were killed before they could demonstrate their potential. Together, they destroyed what chance the Confederacy had of winning its independence. Whether adding fresh fuel to the debate over the respective roles of Albert Sidney Johnston and P. G. T. Beauregard at Shiloh or bringing to light such lesser known figures as Joseph Finegan and Hiram Bronson Granbury, this volume, like the ones preceding it, is an exemplary contribution to Civil War scholarship. Lawrence Lee Hewitt is professor of history emeritus at Southeastern Louisiana University. A recipient of SLU’s President’s Award for Excellence in Research and the Charles L. Dufour Award for “outstanding achievements in preserving the heritage of the American Civil War,” he is a former managing editor of North & South. His publications include Port Hudson: Confederate Bastion on the Mississippi. The late Arthur W. Bergeron Jr. was a reference historian with the United States Army Military History Institute and a past president of the Louisiana Historical Association. Among his earlier books were Confederate Mobile and A Thrilling Narrative: The Memoir of a Southern Unionist.

At the Battle of Stones River, General David Stanley's Union cavalry repeatedly fought General Joseph Wheeler's Confederate cavalry. The campaign saw some of the most desperately fought mounted engagements in the Civil War's Western Theater and marked the end of the Southern cavalry's dominance in Tennessee. This history describes the events leading up to the battle and the key actions, including the December 31 attack by Wheeler's cavalry, the Union counterattack, the repulse of General John Wharton by the 1st Michigan Engineers and Wheeler's daring raid on the rear of Williams Rosecrans' army. The author reassesses the actions of General John Pegram's cavalry brigade.

A description of major battle sites, past and present. Such battles as Paducah, Perryville, and Middle Creek played a significant role in the outcome of the Civil War. Through firsthand documents, maps, and photographs, this volume provides an overview of the thirteen major conflicts that took place in the Bluegrass State. Sections detail the level of preservation of each site to provide readers with a contemporary perspective.

The Battle of Perryville, fought on October 8, 1862, was the largest and most significant Civil War battle fought in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. The Battle of Perryville laid waste to more than just soldiers and their supplies. The commonwealth's largest combat engagement also took an immense toll on the community of Perryville, and citizens in surrounding towns. After Confederates achieved a tactical victory, they were nonetheless forced to leave the area. With more than 7,500 casualties, the remaining Union soldiers were unprepared for the enormous tasks of burying the dead, caring for the wounded, and rebuilding infrastructure. Instead, this arduous duty fell to the brave and battered locals. Former executive director of the Perryville Battlefield Preservation Association, author Stuart Sanders presents the first in depth look into how the resilient residents dealt with the chaos of this bloody battle and how they rebuilt their town from the rubble leftover.