Not War But Murder: Cold Harbor 1864

Ernest Fergurson is one of the most readable writers of Civil War history. If you begin reading Grant's campaign's from the Battle in the Wilderness written by Gordon Rhea, then read Rhea's book on the Battle for Spotsylvania Court House and his To The Anna River, you will be ready for Not War But Murder. This book is a page turner. I read the first 100 pages in two nights. Staying awake until 5 AM, I just couldn't put the book down. As a Civil War buff for over 60 years, I never had books available that could detail this part of the Civil War. Even after reading Grant's own biography of the war, the explicit details of all four of these books is mind altering. Following each battle one more deadly then the next. You are transported in time to 137 years ago, when tens of thousands of men died weekly as Grant moves The Union Army to his eventual victory. But the opportunities to defeat Lee were there on almost every given day as these two armies fought from the Wilderness to Richmond. Not War But Murder illuminates the Battle at Cold Harbor, just outside the Richmond fortifications. Here Grant came with a force twice the size of Lee's. Lee's army was ill fed, ill clothed and ill armed. But the Confederates were fighting to save the south in their backyard. Lee was sick, tired and without his greatest generals, Longstreet, Jackson and Stuart. Yet Grant and Meade made blunder after blunder allowing Lee the opportunity to slaughter Union soldiers. In the end Lee was forced to the seige of Petersburg and Richmond, but at what a price in dead, wounded and captured soldiers. This book relates less than two weeks of battle but they are told from the viewpoint of North and South, Officer and enlisted man. Fergurson has done his research and is a master storyteller. No Civil War buff should miss all four of these great books.

In "Chancellorsville 1863: The Souls of the Brave" and "Ashes of Glory," Ernest B. Furgurson showed a mastery of the anecdotal style of historical writing, weaving personal accounts together to tell a story from ground level. In "Not War But Murder," he combines this ability with thorough archival research and an ability to write good operational military history. The result is a joy to read, a book that will appeal to the scholar and the general reader, the Civil War neophyte and the serious buff. The book is also attractively presented, with George Skoch's matchless maps- he's the best in the business as far as I'm concerned.This book is also a winner because Furgurson creates a concise but comprehensive thesis, and argues it very persuasively. Whether he is "right" about everything, or has the final word on Lee and Grant is hardly the point. His arguments are coherent and believable, and he presents them in an entertaining format. I applaud him especially for picking a side on the Lee vs. Grant cease fire controversy. Grant apologists should realize that the author is not condemning U.S. as a bad general.I heartily recommend this book to anyone with an interest in the Civil War's eastern theater. It is certainly difficult to provide fresh material on Lee and Grant, but Furgurson carries it off with style.

Ernest Furgurson's Not War But Murder is recommended for avid followers of Civil War history: it focuses on Cold Harbor events, recounting the bloody campaign there and providing the first book-length analysis of the battle. 1864 history and military events come alive in a survey which includes underlying influences.

Ernest B. Furgurson has proven that Walt Whitman was wrong. The "good gray poet" once said the real Civil War would never get into the books. "Not War But Murder: Cold Harbor 1864" is about as close to the reality and horror of that struggle as we are likely to get. I absolutely defy anyone to read the opening paragraph of the Prologue without reading the book to its end. I recommend it not only to everyone interested in the Civil War but to everyone who admires brilliant writing. This book is not only military history at its best, but it is far more than than military history because of the complex moral, philosophical and pyschological questions that it raises and with which it deals. With "Not War But Murder," Furgurson, who has already written two fine Civil War books, joins the ranks of our most distinguished historians of that perilous time.