Confederate Commissary General: Lucius Bellinger Northrop and the Subsistence Bureau of the Southern Army

When I picked up this book, I had not studied the Civil War since high school, and knew little more than the basics. After reading it, I have a much more vibrant picture of the Confederacy, and especially of the reasons why the South lost. In view of what Moore reveals, I'm astounded the Confederacy survived as long as it did! Moore has done a masterful job of primary and obscure-secondary source research (he quotes the primary sources extensively, adding much interest to the narrative), piecing together the intricate puzzle of subsistence in the Confederacy. The influences on and factors affecting subsistence permeate the entire history of the war, encompassing physical geography, land exhaustion, rife speculation, egotistical generals, corrupt officials, dithering beaurocrats, rickety railroads, salt mines, currency devaluation, careless strategists, hog cholera, personal vendettas, blockade runners, vicious media, and a slew of other factors that wove the complex web of failure. In the course of the book, familiar characters such as Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and southern generals Beauregard, Bragg, and Johnston are fleshed out, offering the reader either new appreciation or condemnation. Northrop himself is presented as a man completely honest and dutiful, though entirely lacking personal charm. He was a man with an impossible job, frustrated at nearly every turn, and then generally blamed for each shortage or failure. After reading this book, the reader cannot help but sympathize with Northrop, as well as understand his plight and the plight of the South.My only complaints with the book were that I often got lost in the plethora of names; a repetition of the individual's role whenever he or she is mentioned would have helped, or perhaps a character list at the beginning of the book. Also helpful would have been a reference map encompassing the geography of the Civil War, for those of us who have forgotten those high school classes and can't recall exactly where Chancellorsville or Chickamauga are. Overall, I found this a dense and fascinating book.