The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 91, July 1987 - April, 1988 Page: 94
619 p. : ill. (some col.), maps (some col.), ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
or recipients of liberation but as actors in their own right and indeed "the
prime movers in securing their own liberty" (p. 3). Because so much of
this volume deals with the evolution of diverse and often conflicting military
policies toward slaves, however, the documents themselves consist primari-
ly of white records-especially military correspondence-that are far more
revealing about the attitudes and behavior of army officers and slaveholders
than about the lives of the blacks.
Nevertheless, this is a superbly edited volume that is part of an exciting
and important documentary project. We can eagerly anticipate the publica-
tion of future volumes of this project, which will make the complex history
of emancipation more readily accessible to historians, students, and the
reading public.
University of Delaware PETER KOLCHIN
This Band of Heroes: Granbury's Texas Brigade, C.S.A. By James M. McCaf-
frey. (Austin: Eakin Press, 1985. Pp. viii + 262. Introduction, preface,
illustrations, maps, appendices, endnotes, bibliography, index.
$16.95.)
Within these pages the author presents a chronological account of an
illustrious Civil War unit, tracing the brigade "from the formation of
each individual Texas regiment until the end of the war and beyond"
(p. 1). This would indeed have made an indispensable volume, as there
is a dearth of materials relating to this organization. All too soon, however,
it becomes obvious that James M. McCaffrey has been unable to meet
his own demands. In order to capture the flavor of these men one must
keep in mind that a military unit is an assemblage of different people
possessing unique hopes and fears, and bonded together only so long as
needed to accomplish a specified purpose. When the writer does not reveal
the basic social fabric beforehand, or is unable to define the many changes
attendant upon the rigors of military service, little appreciation can be
had of how the nineteenth-century soldier differed from or resembled the
soldier of our generation.
Conspicuously absent are descriptions of how war affected the newly
enlisted soldiers-especially those social phenomena that explain
camaraderie on the one hand and the concept of individuality on the other.
Additionally, the author fails to indicate the activities occurring between
mid-1862 and the following year that changed these soldiers from marginal
performers at Arkansas Post to stalwart fighters at Missionary Ridge.
Similarly, one wonders what explains their stoic behavior during the At-
lanta campaign, when generally army morale suffered. And certainly,
the lay reader must be made to fully understand the Texan character that
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 91, July 1987 - April, 1988, periodical, 1987/1988; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101211/m1/120/: accessed April 30, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.