Tarnished Eagles

Union Col. Newton Lord, in demanding "A brandy for my horse", while in a saloon(and in the saddle as well)sets a high standard for shameful and hilarious buffoonery in uniform. Once again, author Thomas Lowry takes readers on a dizzing ride of strange and amusing tales from civil war court records. The war between the states was a large conflict requiring the sevices of millions of troops and thousands of officers--and with only a handfull experienced soldiers availible at the beginning of the war, the opprotunity presented itself for any gentleman of means to start his own regiment. I recommend this read most highly for anyone who has served under an eccentric leader, or laughed at Shakespeares' Falstaff,or George Frasers' Col. Flashman. Perhaps those fictional clowns were based on the sort of real-life poltroons that every army seems to have. Lowry joins a great fraternity of those who show that history is funny as well true.

Far too many writers addressing the Civil War are guilty of childish romanticism. While that tremendous conflict certainly had its noble heroes and ample demonstrations of courage and self-sacrifice, any war--or human crisis of any sort--has its cowards and fools, its liars, thieves and rogues. This fine, factual book serves as a much-needed (and highly readable) balance to pulp fiction and pulp history heroics. It tells the stories of some of the officers who went wrong, either from deficiency of character or circumstance. In doing so, it enriches our understanding and visceral sense of the Civil War in ways that the next dozen adulatory biographies of mediocre generals will not. While I am a long-time fan of co-author William C. Davis, Dr. Lowry deserves special praise for his continuing literary efforts to describe the dramas and tragedies around, between and, sometimes, in the great battles. As a former soldier who served a full career, I can guarantee any reader that this book shows soldiers as more than a few of them really are--not gallantly charging the enemy, but energetically looking after themselves. While this book concentrates on some of the darker aspects of the war, those aspects are exactly the ones that are lacking in too much of what passes as history or historical literature. I would also recommend any of Lowry's or Davis's other superb Civil War books.

Dr. Lowry has added some color to the realm of Civil War History with his two books, Sex in the Civil War, and Tarnished Eagles. Lowry does a great job in picking out the interesting cases that also represent a good cross section of Civil War Justice. I heartily enjoyed this work. I'm not too sure of just how scholarly this is, but it certainly makes the soldiers appear much more human.