Civil War Horror

Get me to 1000 Twitter followers!

2012-02-24T11:08:00.000-06:00

I'm getting close to 1000 followers on my Twitter feed. When I checked on Friday afternoon (Spanish time) I had 978. Let's get that to 1000 by the end of the weekend! I tweet about travel, archaeology, history, the Civil War (of course), the Horn of Africa, and writing. Every now and then I retweet something off-topic if it strikes my fancy. There's a minimum of tooting my own horn, although of course I do a little. :-)

So drop on by and check it out. If you like it, please follow me. Also check out my Facebook page. I link to all my online writing there so you won't miss anything I do for Gadling, the Osprey blog, or my guest posts.

Thanks in advance!

Civil War Photo Friday: Union soldier of the VII Corps (Department of Arkansas)

2012-02-24T04:24:00.001-06:00

This is an unidentified soldier from the Union VII Corps of the Department of Arkansas. The Corps was formed in January of 1864 and got most of its fighting during the Camden Campaign under General Steele.

The soldier carries a "Volcanic pistol" from the fearsomely named Volcanic Repeating Arms Company. This was a lever-action repeating pistol that saw some use during the war although it wasn't as popular as the Colt revolver.

Was this Union soldier from Arkansas, or just assigned there? Although Arkansas was a Confederate state, several Union regiments were raised there. In fact, every Confederate state contributed regiments to the Union army. Support for secession was by no means universal in the South. Desertion was rife and Unionist guerrilla bands operated in many areas. On the other hand, there were Southern sympathizers in northern states, although their activities were limited.

Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Book Review: The Many Faces of Jesse James

2012-02-20T07:45:00.000-06:00

The Many Faces of Jesse James by Phillip W. Steele

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There have been hundreds of books about Jesse James. As far as I know, this is the only one that focuses on what he looked like and attempts to separate legitimate photos of the famous outlaw from the piles of fakes.

This short (128p page) book starts with a potted history of his life and death. This has been done more in-depth in several other books, especially Yeatman's landmark biography. The facts are accurately laid out, though, which is more than I can say for some Jesse James books. There's also a sizable and amusing chapter on the many Jesse James imposters.

Authors Steele and Warfel then move on to the meat of the book--examining the many purported photos of Jesse James, and to a lesser extent his brother Frank, to figure out which are real and which are fake. This is generally well done. I'm not convinced by some of their "genuine" photos, but this just makes the chapter all the more engaging. They also debunk many of the widely circulated fake photographs.

The last section of the book is given over to Warfel's sketches of Jesse at various stages of his life. While these are well done, I don't see much point in them. Many are simply copies of existing photos, such as the famous bushwhacker shot taken in Platte City in 1864.

This book will be of some interest to those who want a deeper understanding of Jesse James and the legend surrounding him. For someone looking for the definitive biography, Yeatman's "Frank and Jesse James" remains the leader in the field.

View all my reviews

Guest blogging over at Osprey Publishing

2012-02-18T09:11:00.000-06:00

As my regular readers know, one of my many writing hats is as a military historian for Osprey Publishing. Regular readers will also know that I recently wrote a travel series about Greece. Well, I've put one hat atop the other and write a guest post for the Osprey blog about Oddities from the Athens War Museum. Head on over and check it out!

Civil War Photo Friday: Sterling Price

2012-02-17T04:41:00.000-06:00

This week 150 years ago was an important one for the Civil War in Missouri.

General Sterling Price's Missouri Confederate army had enjoyed success the previous year, culminating in the Battle of Lexington, when his forces briefly held a portion of the Missouri River in the center of the state. Supply problems and a precarious position with Union armies to the east and west soon forced him to move south, and he eventually in and around Springfield in the southern part of the state. Now, in February 1862, a large Union army under General Samuel Curtis marched south to push him from the state entirely.

Price realized he was outnumbered and abandoned Springfield on February 12, leaving a rearguard to skirmish with the advancing bluecoats at several points. They held out at creeks, where the thick underbrush reduced the effectiveness of the Union artillery and the creek impeded any Yankee charge. None of these skirmishes lasted very long, however. Their purpose was to slow down the Union advance. Once Union troops and artillery appeared in large numbers, the rebel rearguard would retreat to the next creek and set up another defense.

This rearguard action bought Price some time to close up with a Confederate force marching out of Arkansas under General Van Dorn. All these maneuvers would culminate in the Battle of Pea Ridge on March 6-8. I'll post more on that when the time comes. A good online summary and driving tour of the Pea Ridge campaign can be found at The Civil War Muse.

Price is one of the many historical figures who get a walk-on role in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Jimmy and his band of bushwhackers meet him as he's passing through Boonville during his doomed 1864 campaign to retake the state. There's an excellent biography of this interesting general titled General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West. You can read my review of it here.

Last day to get my Civil War novel at the discounted price

2012-02-15T04:28:00.000-06:00

Today is the last day to get my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness at the discounted rpice of $2.99. After that it will go back to $4.99. You can get it from the following online dealers.

Amazon.
Amazon UK
Smashwords
Barnes and Noble

Amazon Germany
Amazon France
Amazon Spain
Amazon Italy

Paypal customers can buy directly from the author. Contact me at seansontheweb (at) yahoo (dot) com. Please do not send emails containing attachments as these will be deleted as spam.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day! I LOVE my readers!

Guest Post by Cynthia Hope Clark: History is the Foundation for Any Novel

2012-02-14T06:04:00.001-06:00

Before I get to my very special guest blogger today, I want to make two quick announcements. First, welcome to all my new readers who dropped by for the Origins blogfest. I had a great time reading your blogs and I look forward to getting to know you. Second, the $2.99 sale of my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness ends on February 15. Get it now at Amazon, B&N, or Smashwords before it goes back up to $4.99!

While I try to avoid clichés, Cynthia Hope Clark needs no introduction. Famous for her blog and Funds for Writers site where she passes out writing wisdom like candy on Halloween, she is a cornerstone of the online writing community. Now she's published her first novel, Lowcountry Bribe – A Carolina Slade Mystery. I've known Hope for years and I can't think of a more appropriately named person. She keeps it positive while keeping her eyes wide open to the pitfalls of writing life. Her persistence has paid off and now the world is getting an exciting new mystery series. So without further ado, here's Hope!

When we contemplate history as writers, we think of historical romance, period novels, time travel sci-fi, nonfiction travel guides, textbooks, and magazine features. However, I propose that all authors must study history to create the best prose, no matter what genre they write.

I write contemporary mystery fiction. Like any novelist, I had to establish setting for my new release Lowcountry Bribe – A Carolina Slade Mystery. The location is the rural coastal area of South Carolina, known locally as the Lowcountry. My protagonist grew up in the outskirts of Charleston County. A client offers her a bribe, and the story takes off through downtown Charleston and rural Edisto Island. History has no bearing on the bad guy’s motives or the heroine’s efforts to take him down, but the colorful past of the region certainly gives the reader a more 3-D image of where the murders and kidnappings take place.

For instance, while Slade hunted in the courthouse for deeds related to real estate fraud, a task that should seem mundane, I whisked the reader away with a quick mention of Sherman’s march through Charleston.

Heir property without clear chain of title was a common issue in a county so steeped in history. General Sherman’s march through the state at the end of the Civil War had devastated hundreds of title records. Many longtime residents still wouldn’t mention his name, or spat when they did. I wasn’t too fond of the General myself. My great-great grandfather had fought in the Mississippi Cavalry, Company F, along with five of his brothers. One of them had deserted, something we didn’t discuss.

Not only do we better understand the degree of difficulty of the quest, but we become more engaged with the character. She might not be a battle flag-waving confederate, but she respects her heritage.

Slade then finds herself hunting for clues and ultimately seeking a deranged farmer in remote regions of a county most people only affiliate with Charleston, the beautiful city that serves as vacation destination for so many. While one could write about wide open fields and broken down barns and call it rural, a description that could fit in any county in most any American state, a dose of history keeps the reader captivated while Slade eats up road in her search.

People stepped back in time traveling outside of civilization where a historical past and the present blended together. Pockets of plantation slave descendants lived incognito between pieces of water, dirt roads and pine-oak thickets dripping with Spanish moss.

Knowledge is empowering. Before we write about fictional characters, we often jot notes, even pages, of traits, likes, desires, flaws and looks about them. Authors don’t use those lists for reference. On the contrary, they write that material to develop an inherent feel for the character. When the author opens a scene with the protagonist, she already knows how he’ll walk in the room and treat what he finds, all because she studied him top to bottom, inside and out, from his past to his present, even to what he hopes to gain in the future.

Understanding the history of your story’s setting empowers you precisely the same way. By understanding Civil War history, I could capitalize on it in my characters’ reactions, the landscape depiction, even decisions made by the players possibly because of their ancestors or who they once knew.

Let’s leave setting and talk more about character. As a writer, you use tags in dialogue, like he said or she said. Great dialogue, however, needs few, if any tags, because the dialect, manner of phrasing, and word selection can paint a clear enough picture to keep the reader oriented as to who is speaking. History plays a heavy role in that depiction.

All my books are set in rural South Carolina. In the Charleston area, one meets a variety of speech designs, from the downtown bluebloods to the Geechie dialect of some natives. In my second novel, however, the setting shifts to Beaufort, to islands known for the Gullah culture. That remarkable past dates to the 1600s, and helps the reader fall in love with the story. Between the voodoo and the impressive fact that those people were freed in 1861 by the Union Army, while the rest of South Carolina continued to fight the Civil War, the characters become more than cohorts in crime solving. Even the agriculture has a pertinent history, filtering into the plot. Also, immigrants in the story come from Haiti. After weeks of analysis, I pieced enough background together to weave a story how Haitians could be enticed to travel to America via other islands, and fall prey to human trafficking, because it’s happened before.

Every setting, every story, every genre has tremendous potential to grow into a deeper, higher quality read with the incorporation of history in the telling. I can’t imagine not doing historical research for my fiction, because with each tidbit I learn springs opportunity for my characters, my setting and even the direction of my story.

C. Hope Clark writes mystery by the banks of Lake Murray, South Carolina. Lowcountry Bribe, the first of The Carolina Slade series, can be found at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bell Bridge Books, and your neighborhood bookstore. Hope is also editor of FundsforWriters.com , a well-known resource for working writers, recognized by Writer’s Digest Magazine in its 101 Best Websites for Writers from 2001 through 2011, over a decade of excellence.

Origins blogfest: How I started writing

2012-02-13T03:48:00.000-06:00

Today I'm participating in the Origins blogfest, where we all discuss how we started writing.

I actually don't remember when I started. The first short story I remember writing was when I lost my first baby tooth. To honor the occasion I wrote a story called The Ghost with One Tooth, complete with illustration! That story is at the bottom of a Toronto landfill now. Oh well.

As a kid I was more of a cartoonist than a short story writer. I did cartoons about time travel, a car race around the world, and a revolution where kids overthrow the adults and take over the world. Ah, every child's dream! My drawings were never very good and the cartoons got more and more text driven, with the words gradually edging out the illustrations. The same thing happened to the famous comic book writer Harvey Pekar of American Splendor fame. I never met him, but I'm in a writers group with Lance Tooks, one of his illustrators.

From about age 12 until my late twenties I stopped writing. I was briefly involved in the zine boom of the late Nineties, writing and publishing a zine called Ichthyoelectroanalgesia about archaeology and travel. I also had stuff published in other zines.

I didn't consider writing as a career until after I got my Masters in archaeology and had worked for a while in the field. It was then I realized that academia wasn't for me and got a second Masters at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. After a brief stint at the New Delhi bureau of Reuters and a couple of small newspapers, I went freelance. Two guidebooks, seven history books, a novel, and a short story collection later, I'm still loving it!

Civil War Photo Friday: Civil War blockhouses used a medieval design

2012-02-10T05:57:00.000-06:00

In a previous Civil War Photo Friday I wrote about Union blockhouses, simple fortifications that proved effective against bushwhackers and cavalry raiders. My Civil War novel A Fine Likeness includes a fictionalized account of Bloody Bill Anderson's attack on a blockhouse at Fayette, Missouri. Above is a photo of a typical Civil War blockhouse. Note that the top floor is bigger than the ground floor.

In his Medieval Mondays series, fantasy/mystery author A.J. Walker wrote about Motte-and-Bailey castles, those cheap and quick wooden forts made famous by William the Conqueror. A photo of a reconstruction of one of these castles at Saint Sylvain d'Anjou dans le Maine et Loire, France, stuck me immediately.

Same construction! A little research found that this to have been common with these 10th-12th century castles. Not all of them had this feature, and not all Civil War blockhouses did either, but it's interesting to see the similarity in design.

For the castles, this feature was called a bretasche, and apparently added structural stability, one flat wall being weaker than a staggered wall with cross supports between the floors. It would also increase the number of defenders who could use their bows (or Springfield rifled muskets) from the firing platform.

Blockhouse photo courtesy Library of Congress. Castle photo courtesy Wikipedia.

Northern Arkansas in chaos during the Civil War

2012-02-08T08:19:00.000-06:00

In my last post about foot burning in the Civil War, I talked about how northern Arkansas was a No Man's Land during the late Civil War.

For the first two years of the war, most of Arkansas was firmly in Confederate hands. The Ozarks in the northern part of the state, however, went their own way as they always have. Some people were for the south, others for the north, and many simply wanted to stay out of it. When Little Rock fell on 10 September 1863, central Arkansas came under the control of the Union. The rebel armies retreated to southern Arkansas and were too weak to challenge the Union troops in the center of the state.

The Union troops in Arkansas were undermanned, and could do little more than hold the line. Large swaths of the Arkansas Ozarks were left unguarded and soon became prey to roving bands who robbed civilians. Some of these groups claimed to be on one side or the other, but many were simply bandits.

In the fall of 1864, Confederate General Sterling Price decided to launch an ambitious plan to march north from southern Arkansas and invade Missouri. This is the setting for my Missouri Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. In preparation for the invasion, Price sent Confederate cavalry raider J.O. Shelby and his Iron Brigade to slip across the Arkansas River into northern Arkansas to round up deserters and conscript locals. Shelby reported “the entire country overrun with able-bodied men; recruiting officers quarreling or sunk in total apathy; predatory bands of thieves roaming over the country at will, killing some, burning the feet of others, and all hungering with the lust of robbery; one officer refusing to report to another, no organizations, no discipline, no arms, no leader, no desire to fight, no anything.”

Currently I'm writing another book in the House Divided series that is loosely tired to A Fine Likeness. One of the protagonists is a member of Shelby's Iron Brigade who deserts after Price is defeated and retreats south. He finds himself hiding out in this chaotic region. It's a great setting for a historical novel because anything can happen there, and everything does.

For more on Shelby and his Iron Brigade, check out my book Ride Around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863.

Foot burning in the Civil War

2012-02-06T05:59:00.001-06:00

As I've noted before in my post about scalping (Warning: graphic image) the Civil War was anything but civil in some parts. One common method of torture in the Trans-Mississippi theater was foot burning.

An example from Turnbo's Tales of the Ozarks: War and Guerrilla Stories is typical. Silas Claborn Turnbo was born in Taney County, Missouri in 1844 and fought with the 27th Arkansas Confederate Infantry. After the war he collected many tales from the Ozarks about the chaotic times that region experienced. In one story, he relates how a man named John Sights or Sykes living in Madison County, Arkansas, lived alone in a sparsely populated region. Two of his sons were in the Federal army and two in the Confederate army. He himself was for the South. Sights/Sykes sent his daughter and slaves to Texas for the duration of the war and sent all his valuables with her.

Turnbo relates: "One night in the fall of 1864, a set of cut-throats rode up to Sight's house and told Mr. Sights in a threatening way to give up his money. His answer was, 'I won't do it, you devils.' They told him they would make him do it.

"'Well,' said he, 'go to work if you think you can make me do it, you heathenish set of scoundrels.'"

The gang then strung him up as if to hang him, then let him drop. They did this twice but he refused to tell them anything. Interestingly, this is the same method of interrogation used on Reuben Samuel, the father-in-law of Jesse James in an attempt to learn the whereabouts of Frank James and his guerrilla buddies.

When hanging didn't work on poor Sights, they "tied his feet fast together and his hands behind his back and took his shoes and socks off his feet, and when this was accomplished, the wretches picked him up and poked him feet foremost into the fire and pulled him back, then jabbed them into the fire again." They continued this torture until "the flesh on his feet was burned to a crisp and the flesh on his legs was cooked half way to the knees."

Eventually they left him for dead. Later one of his few neighbors happened by and summoned a doctor from the Federal army, who had no choice but to amputate both legs. Sights survived the war for four years and all his children survived too, but they must have all been forever traumatized by what had happened.

Note that Turnbo doesn't state which side the ruthless gang was on. Chances are they weren't on either side. Northern Arkansas was sort of a No Man's Land at that time, filled with deserters from both sides, bushwhackers who claimed to fight for the South, Jayhawkers who claimed to fight for the North, and simple bandits. More on that next time.

New travel series on Greece

2012-02-04T04:51:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned last week, I've started a new travel series on Greece. It's called. . .well you can see what's it's called from the pinbox above. I spent a week in Greece interviewing museum curators, archaeologists, and regular Greeks about the problems facing our collective past. How are the strikes inhibiting access to museums and sights? How much are staff cuts reducing opening hours and the nation's ability to conserve and restore our heritage?

Five posts are already up, three of them illustrated with galleries of photos. Several more posts are on the way over the next two weeks. So hop on over and check it out!

Civil War Photo Friday: Quantrill's black flag

2012-02-03T08:22:00.003-06:00

Here's yours truly with a reproduction of Quantrill's famous black flag the rebel guerrilla supposedly flew as a sign that he'd take no prisoners. It's in the Clay County Savings Association bank museum. This bank, of course, was the first target of the James gang. This photo was taken by Rex Dickson, who shows no patience whatsoever with my obsession with Missouri's Civil War, but has seen a lot of the sights anyway. I wrote about the Liberty bank as part of my Gadling series on our Jesse James road trip.

Quantrill was the baddest of a bad crew. His gang slaughtered civilians, scalped soldiers, and raised hell generally. Frank James rode with him during the Civil War, as did famous outlaw Cole Younger. Jesse James may have ridden with Quantrill too before joining Bloody Bill Anderson in his own group.

This is an interesting flag for several reasons. You'll notice that Quantrill's name is misspelled. During the war his name was generally spelled with an "e", and the bushwhacker leader didn't exactly have a strong motive for correcting people. It's debatable whether he actually had a flag like this, though. There are several references to Quantrill's black flag, but both Frank James and Cole Younger said there never was one. At the time, "raising the black flag" meant that you'd show no mercy, so Quantrill's flag was probably metaphorical. In my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness none of the bushwhackers carry a black flag.

Woohoo! My short story collection got a one-star review!

2012-02-02T05:26:00.000-06:00

My short story collection The Night the Nazis Came to Dinner, and other dark tales has received a one-star review on Amazon UK! Under the title "Can't believe I paid for this" the reviewer said:

"The four stories are not badly written. However, I reached the same conclusion on each -"So what". I didn't find any of them interesting; one I found difficult to understand.The first story about the Nazis, the reason I bought the book, offered all sorts of ideas in my mind but the story was flat and too short. The title was the best bit of the story. The other stories also promise more than they deliver.

"The stories are not badly written.

"I cannot think of one reason why I would recommend anyone to read these stories. They must have some redeeming features so let's hope somebody else reviews them and finds something I missed completely"

So, um, why am I celebrating a bad review? Because I totally don't care. After twelve years as a professional writer and the same number of books published, I finally looked at a bad review, shrugged, and got back to work. It's one guy's opinion and he has a right to it, even if he doesn't express very clearly what he didn't like about the stories. So he felt cheated out of 77 pence. So what? It won't kill my career, it doesn't mean I'm a bad writer, and it probably won't even hurt my sales.

As writers we need to stop worrying about what other people think. Oh yes, easier said than done, and some people can still get under my skin, but if we're to survive in this literary jungle we have to learn to slough off rejection and negativity and keep on writing. So thanks, anonymous reviewer, you just marked a milestone in my writing career!

In other news my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness is still on sale for $2.99 and will remain so until the day after Valentine's Day, because I love my readers.

Book Review With Fire and Sword, Arkansas 1861-1874

2012-02-01T08:42:00.000-06:00

With Fire and Sword: Arkansas, 1861-1874 by Thomas A. Deblack

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When I was researching my book Ride Around Missouri, Shelbys Great Raid 1863, this title served as background reading.

With Fire and Sword: Arkansas 1861-1874 by Thomas A. DeBlack is a detailed account of the period from just before the war to the end of Reconstruction as is second in a four-part series covering the history of Arkansas.

It's nice to see a volume that covers both the war and Reconstruction. DeBlack convincingly argues that they're essentially two phases of the same event. The focus is more on political and social history than a detailed discussion of military strategy (which has been done at length elsewhere) and DeBlack skillfully interweaves primary sources and academic studies to give a clear picture of how Arkansas and Arkansans changed during this tumultuous period. A long annotated bibliography rounds out the work, adding a valuable resource.

I do have a couple of reservations. The book could have used a stricter editorial hand to clear away some overly academic writing, one howler (Missourians will be interested to know that Lexington is west of Kansas City), and a glossing over of some important details. The reduction of Sterling Price's army after the Battle of Lexington, for example, was not so much due to desertion as it was Price ordering many units to go home for lack of provisions.

Also, the book could do with a general map of the state and region. Many history books lack proper maps and I've never understood why some publishers feel the small amount of extra expense and work isn't necessary. I doubt most readers, including Arkansans, will know the locations of all the towns, villages, and rivers DeBlack mentions.

But these are minor quibbles. With Fire and Sword is an excellent overview of an important period in Arkansas history that affected the region as a whole. Highly recommended to students of the region and period.

View all my reviews

Hunting Quantrill in Civil War Missouri

2012-01-31T02:44:00.000-06:00

A hundred and fifty years ago this week, Union forces in Missouri were hunting someone who would become a legend. The Seventh Missouri Infantry had moved to Blue Springs in Jackson County, where infamous Confederate bushwhacker William Clarke Quantrill was operating.

A schoolteacher from Ohio, Quantrill made a name for himself during Bleeding Kansas by fighting on whichever side offered the most chance for booty. Once the war started in earnest, he threw in his lot with the South and rampaged across Missouri. Even at this early stage of the war he was robbing stagecoaches, wagon trains, mail carriers, and stealing horses. Many of these actions were hit-and-run attacks on Union forces; others were simple banditry. His followers rode the best horses, either stolen or given to them by Confederate sympathizers, while Union troops, indifferently mounted on government-issued steeds, had a hard time catching him.

From January 29-February 3, the Seventh Missouri tried their best. They managed to kill six of his men and capture much of his booty, including a fine stagecoach and team and seven wagons filled with pork and tobacco. Quantrill got away, however, and would only die in the last days of the war in 1865.

The Official Records include an interesting complaint from a Union officer stating that his men lacked boots and shoes and "the suffering men have filled the hospitals with frostbite." They also hadn't had any sugar for two weeks. The rebels weren't the only ones suffering from supply problems during the Civil War.

Quantrill appears briefly in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Two men who rode with Quantrill for part of the war, Frank James and Bloody Bill Anderson, are supporting characters. One of the reasons I picked Civil War Missouri as a setting for my novel was because there were so many interesting real characters for my fictional ones to meet!

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Siamese twins in the Middle Ages

2012-01-30T09:56:00.001-06:00

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been traveling in Greece writing a new series for Gadling called Our past in peril: Greek tourism faces the economic crisis. The first in the series is here.

I've always been more interested in Byzantium than Classical Greece and so I spent a lot of time exploring Byzantine sights, including Mistra, a Byzantine ghost town overlooking Sparta. On one of the signs there I came across this strange story. The image above is from a Byzantine manuscript owned by the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid and the caption reads:

"In the time of Romanos Lekapenos (10th cent.) a pair of Siamese twin boys were brought to Constantinople from Armenia and they 'stayed in the city for a long time and everybody went to see them as if they were some kind of curious monster; and then they were expelled from the city because they were thought to be an evil omen."

There's a story in the making. . .

Traveling in Greece

2012-01-27T13:45:00.000-06:00

Hi everyone. I've been a bit silent this week and that's because I'm traveling in Greece! Gadling has sent me here to write a series about how the economic crisis is affecting tourism and heritage management. The first article will appear January 30.

I'm writing this to you from Sparta. The Classical ruins here aren't as impressive as those of Corinth or Delphi, and the real reason I came here was to see Mistra. This is a late Byzantine ghost town that is, hands down, the most impressive thing I've seen in this county. Acropolis included. I've always wanted to see this place since researching my book Byzantium: An Illustrated History. It's great to finally get here! I'll be doing a heavily illustrated article on Mistra as part of the series. Here are a couple of photos to give you a taste.

Guest blogging with Cynthia Hope Clark

2012-01-23T11:52:00.002-06:00

Today I'm guest blogging over at Cynthia Hope Clark's blog on the subject of "Self and traditional publishing: why doing both can be good for your career". Pop on over at check it out!

Hope will have her first novel published next month and she'll be over here talking about it after it's released.

Civil War Photo Friday: Happy (early) Valentine's Day!!!

2012-01-20T09:43:00.001-06:00

Um. . .isn't Valentine's Day February 14? Yes it is, but I love my readers so much I've decided to celebrate early. From now until the day after Valentine's Day (Feb. 15) I'm discounting my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness to $2.99. The changes are already in place on Smashwords. I've made the changes on Amazon and their affiliates like Amazon UK. It may be a few more hours before the system makes them visible, though. Same goes for other websites like Barnes and Noble.

My novel has been out two months now and I've received some wonderful reviews and a modest number of sales. I'd like to increase both by offering this discount. I love getting new readers! I also love my existing readers, so if you've already purchased A Fine Likeness at full price, here's a deal for you: I'll send you a complimentary copy of my short story collection The Night the Nazis Came to Dinner and other dark tales. Just email me at seansontheweb (at) yahoo (dot) com and answer this question about the book: what Union officer was entrusted to guard Rocheport? (Hint: he did a really crappy job!).

I love my readers!

Valentine's Day card from 1861 courtesy Library of Congress.

Movie Review: The True Story of Jesse James (1957)

2012-01-18T08:48:00.000-06:00

One of the nice things about my new home in Santander is that it's just five minute's walk away from the local Filmoteca. These are a national chain of government-subsidized cinemas showing local films, international indies, and classics.

Last week I saw The True Story of Jesse James, a 1957 remake of a 1939 film. It stars Robert Wagner as Jesse, Jeffrey Hunter as Frank, and Gilligan's Island skipper Alan Hale, Jr., as Cole Younger. I recently completed a book about the James gang so I was interested to see how much of the "true story" was in this picture.

OK, now that all of you've finished laughing, I can attest that while it doesn't come anywhere close to the true story, it's the most accurate film about the James gang other than Brad Pitt's The Assassination of Jesse James. That's not saying much. Read my post on Jesse James in Hollywood to see just how bad the Dream Factory screws up history.

The film opens with a presumptuous text saying how this is the real story, unvarnished by myth. That's a bit like Dan Brown saying at the beginning of The Da Vinci Code that his story is all true. What follows is about ten percent history, ninety percent myth. The basics of Jesse James' life are outlined fairly accurately: his beating at the hands of a Unionist militia, his subsequent enlistment in Quantrill's bushwhacker band, his inability to stop fighting after the end of the Civil War, etc. Much of the film is dedicated to the gang getting shot up during their failed heist at Northfield, Minnesota, and the ensuing chase.

Throughout this basically correct narrative are strewn historical errors and fables. Robert Ford is somehow along for the ride to Northfield despite his not being a member of the gang yet. The Northfield shootout is turned into a fairly even gunfight in which several armed citizens die, when in fact only two unarmed civilians were shot down in cold blood. There's also a completely made up subplot about a neighbor of the James family who wants their land and is conspiring with the local Union soldiers and law enforcement.

No such neighbor existed. The James brothers were no more persecuted for their wartime record than any other ex-Confederate. Yes, in post-war Missouri former secessionists had many of their rights curtailed, but the James family had a prosperous farm and were in fact better off than many of their Unionist neighbors. Greed drove Frank and Jesse to rob banks, not persecution. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder may have also played a part. They weren't the first, or the last, veterans who were unable to put a war behind them.

The overall point of this movie seems to be to put the James brothers on a pedestal, making them into American Robin Hoods when in fact they were nothing more than capable bandits with a flair for public relations. This was only one of the many films that helped create the Jesse James legend and as such, it's worth watching for those with an interest in the Old West and folklore. Plus it's got some cool gunfights.

At least it wasn't as bad as Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter. That made my list of the ten worst horror films ever.

Book Review: The Civil War on the Lower Kansas-Missouri Border

2012-01-13T10:01:00.000-06:00

The Civil War on the Lower Kansas-Missouri Border by Larry E. Wood

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Larry Wood is a familiar name to those who study the Civil War in Missouri. He's written several books on lesser-known aspects of the war in the state.

This book covers the two Westernmost tiers of counties in Missouri, those that border Kansas. They were the hardest hit in the vicious border fighting of Bleeding Kansas and things would only get worse once the war started in earnest.

The Border Wars can boil blood even today, so it's refreshing that Wood covers the subject with an even hand, doling out praise and blame to those who deserve it regardless of what side they were on. The tit-for-tat burnings of Osceola and Humboldt are a perfect example of how both sides inflicted unnecessary suffering on civilians and his chapter on this is especially good.

Another interesting chapter covers the Skirmish at Island Mound, where the First Kansas Colored Volunteers became the first black unit of the American army to see combat. They fought off a much larger force of Confederate irregulars and went a long way to changing public attitudes about the ability of black soldiers.

There are also chapters on Shelby's 1863 raid, Price's retreat after his disastrous 1864 campaign, and the two battles of Newtonia. This last chapter has since been expanded by the author into a full book. It's high on my "to read" list. Additional chapters cover the small skirmishes and deadly personal rivalries that were rife in this part of Missouri.

While narrow in geographic scope, regional studies such as this one are valuable in giving readers a view of what in was really like to live in those days. Wood has been very productive and I hope he continues comes out with more books in the future.

This is a review for the second edition, published in 2003. Wood says it has been completely revised and has two new chapters. Make sure you get the second edition.

View all my reviews

Hazards of the Civil War battlefield (besides the enemy)

2012-01-12T06:07:00.000-06:00

In a recent post I pondered the origin of the many so-called "slight" wounds of the Civil War. How could so many soldiers only receive reportedly minor wounds when a direct hit by a musket ball or rifle bullet so often meant death or dismemberment?

My main theory was that the widespread use of buck and ball--a musket ball and three shotgun pellets--meant soldiers were being hit more often by pellets than actual bullets. Some researchers over at the Missouri in the Civil War Message Board pointed out that buck and ball was only used in smoothbores, and these fell out of favor later in the war.

After a holiday lull, the thread has picked up again. Now one very well-read individual has examined ordnance reports listing buck and ball rounds well into 1864 and said many units in fact preferred smoothbores because they had a greater chance to hit. Also, rifles have an arced trajectory and require a great deal of target practice most units on both sides never got. Smoothbores fired at a higher muzzle velocity than contemporary rifles and this gave them a flatter trajectory, further increasing their accuracy over rifles. We'll take up the subject of smoothbore vs. musket again once I've done some more research.

Of course, getting "slightly wounded" doesn't have to come from enemy action. General Lyon got kicked in the stomach by a horse when he was breaking up the rebel Missouri State Guard camp outside St. Louis in 1861. A reenactor in Missouri recently got his groin stepped on by his horse. Not sure how he managed that. Horses aren't always the gentle beasts we like to think they are, especially when shells are bursting nearby and they're getting hit by bullets.

Also, when large groups of men are charging over rough ground, it's quite easy for one or more of them to sprain an ankle and be put hors de combat for some time. I used to be on the cross country team and I remember this risk all too well. When you have an enemy formation shooting volleys at you, chances are you aren't looking where you're stepping! Add to this powder burns in the face or eyes, accidentally jabbing someone or yourself with your bayonet, cavalrymen getting hit by low branches, and any number of other embarrassing pratfalls, and one wonders why the number of "slightly wounded" wasn't higher

Of course, these are rarely reflected in the historical record. What commander wants to put in his official report, "I charged the enemy up a steep slope under heavy fire. We lost three men dead and five seriously wounded by enemy action. Ten more were slightly wounded: three sprained their ankles on the uneven slope, one was knocked out when a panicked horse ran him over, three suffered painful power burns to the face, two of my cavalrymen were thrown by their horses and injured their backs, and one man put out his shoulder due to the recoil of his weapon."

Not very glamorous. War rarely is.

Charge of Weaver's brigade across the Salkehatchie, South Carolina, courtesy Wikimedia Commons. Can you imagine several thousand guys running across this swamp and nobody spraining an ankle?

The Civil War Battle of Roan's Tan Yard, Missouri

2012-01-08T07:37:00.000-06:00

One hundred and fifty years ago today the Civil War in Missouri had not taken a break for the winter. Confederate General Sterling Price still occupied Springfield in the southern part of the state, and rebels in north and central Missouri gathered to join him.

One such group consisted of about 800 men under Col. John A. Poindexter, camped at Silver Creek in Randolph County about 14 miles northwest of Fayette. His men were a mixed bag of Missouri State Guard and raw recruits, indifferently armed or not armed at all. When Union Maj. W.M.G. Torrence heard of the camp, he gathered 450 cavalry and sharpshooters to go break it up. His force included units from Ohio and Iowa. Units from many northern states were in Missouri at that time.

Torrence led his men on a 15 mile march to within 4 miles of the camp and then planned his attack. The main body of his troops would fire into the camp and keep the rebels occupied while a strong detachment would charge into the camp.

The advance guard drove in the rebel pickets. They were soon joined by the main Union column. The rebels were in a strong position behind ravines, thick underbrush, and trees. As both sides traded heavy volleys, three companies of the First Iowa and a part of a company of Merrill's Horse charged the camp and threw the rebels into confusion. The Confederates fled, leaving behind a large amount of their gear. Two companies from the Union rearguard tried to cut off their retreat, but darkness, heavy fog, and thick underbrush helped the rebels escape.

Union reports list 6 killed and 19 wounded on the Union side, with the rebels suffering 40 killed and 60 wounded. Maj. Torrence also "captured 160 horses, 60 wagons, 105 tents, 80 kegs [of] powder, about 200 rifles and shot-guns, and a large quantity of clothing, blankets, and bed-quilts" along with 28 prisoners. As is usual with the Official Records, these numbers must be taken with a grain of salt. Officers on both sides tended to exaggerate enemy numbers and casualties.

This skirmish/battle was only the latest in a series of engagements between Union regulars and camps of rebel recruits. In December 1861, Union troops had swept through Saline County, fighting numerous small engagements and bagging a small camp of rebels at Roper's Mill. A larger engagement at Mount Zion Church broke up a rebel force of 900 men (according to the Union report, 350 according to an interview with a Confederate officer 20 years after the fact).

This series of small Union victories added up to a major headache for Confederate recruiters. The hope of a rebel takeover of the state was fading.

A Fine Likeness now available at Barnes and Noble!

2012-01-06T07:18:00.000-06:00

My Civil War horror novel, A Fine Likeness, is now available at Barnes and Noble. This is the Nook edition and is priced at $4.99.

I'm still tinkering with the print edition, which should be out by the end of the month. Yeah I know I said that last month, but there were a few formatting gliches. The downside to doing stuff yourself!

The Civil War in Missouri at the start of 1862

2012-01-03T06:00:00.000-06:00

A hundred and fifty years ago today, Missourians had finished their subdued Christmas and New Year’s celebrations and were looking ahead with trepidation to a new year of war. Everyone was asking the same questions—how long would the war last, and who would win?

Secessionists hoped for a quick rebel victory. Back East, the Confederacy had won a string of battles, the most spectacular being the First Bull Run. The new government hoped to gain international recognition and maybe even military aid from the British Empire and other European powers.

In Missouri, the situation looked bleaker for the South. While there had been major victories at the Battle of Wilson’s Creek and the Battle of Lexington, the Union held key positions such as the Missouri River, which flows from west to east and cuts the state neatly in half. The main rebel force, under General Sterling Price, was currently in the south of the state at Springfield. Potential recruits were having a hard time making their way from counties north of the Missouri River south to join Price. He couldn’t move north to help him because he had chronic supply problems and was outnumbered by Union forces.

In the central part of the state, rebel guerrillas were cutting telegraph wire, burning bridges, and generally causing mayhem. Union detachments had been successful at defeating and dispersing large groups of rebels, but these smaller bands were proving to be an even greater problem. They would continue to be until the end of the war.

In these early months of the war, few thought it would last another three-and-a-half years. If everyone knew what they were in for, perhaps they would have lobbied their leaders, North and South, to sit down at the negotiating table.

The war would end all too soon for these two Union recruits. Daniel and Joseph Budd both died in 1862. Daniel died of smallpox at the age of 16. Joseph, 18, was killed at the Battle of Vassar Hill on July 18, near Memphis, Missouri. This photo is courtesy Frank Furillo, who is the great-great nephew of both men.

Three good reviews for my military history books

2012-01-02T06:16:00.000-06:00

This week I've discovered three more reviews of my military history books. My Armies of the Adowa Campaign got its fourth five-star review on Amazon:

"A very good introduction to this forgotten battle. This is the only english language book that I know of devoted to the battle of Adowa.
"Twenty years after Little Bighorn which ended in the massacre of nearly 300, the Italians suffered nearly 6,000 killed in a huge catastrophe that resulted in the collapse of an Italian government. The two battles had many similarities--mis-judged indiginous enemy's strength; allowing an already outnumbered force to be split in the face of the enemy; over-estimated ability of a modern European/American army to overcome indigenous numbers; indigenous forces armed with modern weapons (in some cases more modern than that of the European/Americans).
"However, the scale of the battle, and the Italian disaster was exponentially greater with concomitant strategic effects. Despite this, Adowa gets hardly a notice in English language military histories where the writing and study of Little Big Horn is prolific. This Osprey volume is a good start to remedy this knowledge gap of a very dramatic and horrific battle."

My Civil War book, Ride Around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863, also got a five-star review on Amazon. The reviewer gives his review the unfortunate title "a moderate success", which is actually my assessment of the raid, not his assessment of my book!

"There are a good selection of supporting illustrations, both contemporary photographs and line illustrations, along with several colour paintings. There are also some modern photographs of memorabilia, such as cannon. Unfortunately there are also a number of photographs of modern re-enactors. Unfortunately, these do nothing for me, but they probably make up a good proportion of the audience for these books. That aside, this is an entertaining and well-researched volume."

The Civil war wargaming blog Charge! also reviewed my Shelby book:

"McLachlan gives a thorough overview of the strategic situation, the troops involved in the raid, some insight into Jo Shelby’s personality and previous experience, and the Northern (and Southern) reaction to the daring incursion. Lavishly illustrated, like all Osprey books, Ride Around Missouri includes an array of vintage period photographs, original maps commissioned for the book, bird’s-eye views, first-person accounts drawn from primary sources, and the usual excellent color illustrations of men, uniforms, equipment, and events. The book is 80 pages, including the index and bibliography. It’s a useful addition to your wargaming or Civil War library."

My writing year: a look back and a look forward

2011-12-31T05:56:00.000-06:00

This year has been an important one for my writing career. I had two military history books published, Armies of the Adowa Campaign 1896: the Italian Disaster in Ethiopia and Ride around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863. Both have received positive reviews on Amazon and on various blogs and magazines. The Adowa book has been especially well received because it’s the only book in English that covers this campaign in detail. That’s one of the fun things about working for Osprey Publishing—you get to break new ground.

I have a book on the James-Younger gang’s Northfield raid coming out from them next year and I’m starting a book on Wyatt Earp. There may be more Osprey projects in the works for 2012 but those aren’t finalized yet.

I also continued to blog for Gadling and wrote a series on living in Harar, Ethiopia. I’ll be continuing my regular postings this coming year as well as writing a series on the Orkney Islands and hopefully another visit to Ethiopia.

My biggest advance in my career was publishing my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness via Kindle Direct Publishing. I’ve blogged about why a traditionally published author would choose self-publishing. The novel came out less than two months ago so it’s too soon to see if this is a good career move, but it's already garnered some sales and positive reviews. A couple of weeks ago I followed up with a short story collection called The Night the Nazis Came to Dinner, and other dark tales.

So what’s in store for 2012? My focus will be fiction. Of course I’ll continue to blog for Gadling and write for Osprey because that’s where I earn 90% of my income. The big change now, however, is that my fiction career has finally started. After waiting for months or even years for rejections from publishers who kept telling me how much they liked my writing, I’ve taken my fiction career into my own hands. I have several old manuscripts I’ll be polishing and publishing, as well as works-in-progress that I’ll be finishing, editing, and publishing.

First order of business is getting a print edition of A Fine Likeness prepared. This will be followed in short order by four fantasy novels, a novella set in Viking Greenland, a historical fantasy novella set in an 18th century Germany where paganism never died, and the as-yet-unnamed sequel to A Fine Likeness. There may be a few other surprises in store. Writing has a tendency to surprise even the writer!

Of course I’ll also be keeping this blog up to date, so check in regularly or add an RSS feed.

See you in 2012!

Civil War Photo Friday: A Floating Battery

2011-12-30T07:39:00.001-06:00

Over at the fine blog Seven Score and Ten, there's a reprint of a report by General Grant about moving a floating battery to New Madrid, Missouri. this would make sense as that town is on the Mississippi River, and a battery there would help reinforce Union control of the all-important waterway.

But what was a floating battery? Basically a floating platform for several cannon that could be towed to a strategic position where there wasn't any convenient land. They weren't warships per se, not being very navigable and often not having any locomotive power of their own.

Perhaps the most famous floating battery of the Civil War was the first, built by the rebels and used in the bombardment of fort Sumter. As you can see from these Wikipedia images, it was a barnlike structure with only three walls, yet it gave good service during the bombardment. made of thick wood sheathed in iron, it took several direct hits from the fort with the loss of only one man wounded.

The Battle of Mount Zion Church

2011-12-28T05:35:00.000-06:00

Brig. Gen. Benjamin Prentiss was making a sweep through Boone County looking for rebels. He found them just outside the town of Hallsville on December 27, where a company of his cavalry came across a much larger force of the enemy and had to beat a hasty retreat, leaving their captain and a private in the hands of the rebels.

Prentiss set out with his entire force of 440 men at 2am the next morning, 150 years ago today. He marched 16 miles in the predawn darkness and passed through Hallsville, heading west. At 8am his vanguard encountered a company of rebels guarding the road.

Prentiss tried to surround this force, but the move was spotted and the rebels withdrew. Some prisoners told him the main rebel body was at Mount Zion Church, one-and-a-half miles further on, and numbered about 900 under the command of Col. Caleb Dorsey. Prentiss immediately moved forward and a lively battle ensued. The rebels enjoyed good cover in some woods near the church and the Union troops had trouble dislodging them. After much firing the battle descended into a hand-to-hand fight for half an hour before the timely arrival of the rest of Prentiss’ troops, who seem to have been delayed in their maneuvers, made the rebels quit the field around 11am.

The Union troops captured 90 horses, 105 stand of arms. Prentiss reports his total loss over the two days of fighting as 3 killed, 17 severely wounded, and 46 slightly wounded. The rebel loss was 25 killed and 30 captured. No reports on rebel wounded.

Only the Union side gave a report of the battle, so the above is from that perspective. The History of Boone County, published in 1882, includes a report by an unnamed participant on the rebel side. The entire account can be read here.

This participant states that not all the rebels were armed, and that the rebels retreated only after their ammunition was exhausted. Considering the chronic rebel supply problems that’s probably true. He gave Dorsey’s loss as 5 killed, 35 wounded, and 10 prisoners. He estimated Prentiss lost 30 killed, 60 wounded, and 10 prisoners. Such precise figures twenty years after the fact (and probably several battles later) should be taken with a grain of salt. In general, though, his account agrees with the report Prentiss gave.

It’s interesting that this aging rebel showed no ill-will to his former adversaries and made a point to say “Gen. Prentiss in every respect acted the gentleman and the soldier, in regard to the Confederate wounded, affording all the assistance in his power, and detailing a guard from his own command to keep soldiers out of the church. [where the rebel wounded lay]

The Battle of Mt. Zion Church was typical of many smaller engagements early in the Missouri Civil War. A Union force of trained soldiers would disperse a larger force of rebels who suffered from lack of training, organization, and weapons. With most of the Missouri State Guard in southern Missouri with General Price, the raw recruits the Union army was mopping up in central Missouri weren’t ready for a serious fight.

That doesn’t mean they always broke and ran. At Mt. Zion Church they fought hard for three hours. The rebels retreated some distance and then after a rest of a couple of days Col. Dorsey ordered his force to “scatter”. Most probably went home, while others probably did some guerrilla fighting guerrilla or made their own way south to Price. The Boone County history reports that in February “the major portion of the command crossed the Missouri and made its way to Price’s army”.

Defeats like this didn’t stop the secessionist cause in the area. The rebels continued to gather, and another small battle would come within two weeks. You’ll just have to stay tuned for that one.

Union troops sweep through central Missouri looking for rebels

2011-12-27T06:22:00.000-06:00

With General Price in southwest Missouri and not showing any inclination to move northwards, the Union army busied itself with sweeps through Missouri catching Confederate recruits. All across the state, especially in the "Little Dixie" region along the Missouri River, large bands of rebel volunteers rallied around Price's recruiters. While poorly armed and untrained, many of these bands numbered in the hundreds and required a sizable force to defeat.

Brig. Gen. Benjamin Prentiss, shown here in this Wikimedia Commons image, certainly felt the need to bring a large force along on his rebel hunt. He was patrolling Boone County with five companies of the Third Missouri Cavalry and two of Birge’s Western Sharpshooters, some 440 men in all. He was looking for secessionist recruits, plus he wanted to protect the North Missouri Railroad, which had already been the object of an attack.

He set out from Palmyra on Christmas Eve and arrived in Sturgeon on the 26th. There he heard of a Missouri State Guard force rallying recruits near Hallsville. The Missouri State Guard was the original state militia, most of whom had followed Price into rebellion.

On December 27th, 150 years ago today, Prentiss sent Captain Howland and one company of cavalry to check out the situation at Hallsville. About two miles outside of town Howland found them and a sharp skirmish ensued. Finding himself outnumbered, Howland ordered a retreat but he was wounded and lost his horse, probably being shot off it. He and one of his privates were captured.

The rest of Howland’s company retreated back to the Union camp around 9pm and reported. Prentiss made plans to move out the next morning.

To be continued tomorrow!

Civil War Photo Friday: Santa Claus in camp

2011-12-23T07:17:00.000-06:00

Happy holidays everyone!!!

Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

My short story collection is out!

2011-12-21T10:07:00.001-06:00

My short story collection, The Night the Nazis came to Dinner, and other dark tales, is out now as an ebook.

A spectral dinner party goes horribly wrong. . .
An immortal warrior hopes a final battle will set him free. . .
A big-game hunter preys on endangered species to supply an illicit restaurant. . .
A new technology soothes First World guilt. . .

Here are four dark tales that straddle the boundary between reality and speculation. You better hope they don’t come true.

These genre-bending tales mix fantasy, science fiction, horror, and a dose of satire. I've priced it at 99 cents in order to entire readers, and hopefully get them to move on and buy my Civil War novel. A special thanks goes to Dale Roberts, author of Irrefutable, for doing the excellent cover art.

The Night the Nazis came to Dinner is available at Amazon, Amazon UK, and all other Amazon outlets. Coming soon to Smashwords too!

Civil War bridge burner goes on trial

2011-12-21T05:34:00.000-06:00

There's an interesting item from the Official Records about a trial held in Columbia, Missouri, on March 1, 1862.

"William F. Petty, a citizen of Boone County, Mo., did aid and assist and incite others to aid and assist in the destruction by fire or otherwise of certain rails, ties, bridges and timbers belonging to and necessary for the use of the North Missouri Railroad Company in the transaction of their ordinary business. All this at or near Sturgeon, Mo., on or about the 21st of December, 1861."

Petty pleaded not guilty to burning the Sturgeon railroad bridge or having any knowledge of plans to burn the bridge. Since the punishment for such an act was death, his plea was hardly surprising.

So what really happened 150 years ago today? A carpenter named Jacob Crosswhite testified, "I had been taken a prisoner in Sturgeon before the fire. Was at home in bed when some men came to my house, burst open the door, called me to strike a light. I did so. A man put his hand on my shoulder and told me I was his prisoner. I dressed myself and they carried me up in town; from there to Sturgeon bridge. The bridge was on fire and a good many there. Some were standing around; some piling up chunks on the fire; some tearing up railroad track.

"From that place we marched about four miles to Long Branch bridge; found that afire; staid there two or three hours. There were a good many men there had gone down from Sturgeon bridge. After the bridge was pretty well burned down we went back to Sturgeon. I did not see prisoner at either bridge. First saw him next morning at Mr. Riggs', two and one-half miles southwest of Sturgeon, where the band camped. He was in the crowd of men who had burned down the bridge and tore up the railroad the night before. 'Twixt daylight and sun-up a crowd of cavalry attacked them. Some few men fought awhile; the rest ran. Don't recollect seeing him any more until we got three or four miles from place of fight. I was still prisoner of the bridge-burners. They stopped on White Oak Ridge. They there released Schooler, another prisoner they had, and carried me on with them. They next stopped for any length of time at prisoner's house. I was released on parole near prisoner's house. W. R. Schooler and Adam Gosling were prisoner with me."

Crosswhite added that the men called him "captain" and he seemed to be in charge. Two other former prisoners of the rebel band testified the same thing. None of the three said they saw Petty at the scene of the crime.

Some witnesses to the defense swore that he was elsewhere on the night of December 20/21, when the Sturgeon bridge was burned.

"The court was then closed and after mature deliberation on the evidence adduced finds the prisoner, W. F. Petty. . .guilty. And does therefore sentence the said W. F. Petty as follows: To be shot to death at such time and place as the commanding general of the department may direct."

Reviewer calls A Fine Likeness "Historical Horror at its Finest"

2011-12-20T05:55:00.000-06:00

Well this made my morning! My Civil War novel A Fine Likeness has received another four-star review. This time it's from Scott over at the Indie Book Blog., who is designated as a Top Reviewer at Amazon. He was kind enough to put his four-star review up on Amazon, Amazon UK, and Goodreads.

(by the way, I'm always happy to connect with readers on my Goodreads page)

He says, "Sean has written several books about the Civil War the history of Missouri, so he has a lot of knowledge to share. The book is very well done using actual people (Bloody Bill) who were involved with the War in the area to add a layer of realism to the story. He does such a wonderful job with the weapon descriptions and battle detail that the book really comes alive. I had some interest in this time period in high school so it appealed very much to me. This is the only book like this I have ever read so I don't have anything to compare it to, but if he writes any more like this I will read them"

You can read the entire review here.

Guest blogging over at Guerrilla Explorer

2011-12-19T05:26:00.000-06:00

I'm a bit late in announcing this one, sorry! I recently guest blogged over at the super-cool Guerrilla Explorer on the enduring historical debate: Did Jesse James fake his own Death?

David Meyer does a fine job with his blog. Guerrilla Explorer explores mysteries of science and history, as well as conspiracy theories and other interesting subjects. His combination of an open mind and a critical eye make for interesting reading. Drop on by to my post and leave a comment, and don't forget to read his other postings!

Small unit action in the Civil War

2011-12-17T08:14:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in a previous post, the Official Records have some interesting details about all-but-forgotten skirmishes in Civil War Missouri. These small-unit actions are often overlooked by military historians in favor of larger battles, yet these skirmishes can tell us a lot.

The Union sweep through Saline County from 3-12 December 1861 netted numerous prisoners and armaments. Perhaps the most interesting engagement was on December 7.

On that day a detachment left the Union force. Major Marshall and 26 men "proceeded to Roper's Mill, opposite Glasgow, where he had learned a portion of Captain Robert W. Swynne's company were encamped. They took the four pickets he had out prisoners, after giving one of them a hard chase, thus enabling him to surprise all there. Lieutenant Elwell took the left, with 16 men; Sergeant Bradshaw the right, with 5 men; and the major the center, with 3 men. A portion of the enemy were caught playing cards and others getting breakfast. Another portion, which had just crossed the river with the captain, well armed and mounted, started to run, but were soon halted by a few prompt shots."

The report then goes on with a bit of back patting, "It was a finely-conducted surprise, completely bagging the whole of them, 28 in number, and getting their arms, ammunition, teams, cooking utensils, &c. The column then moved north through Cambridge and encamped on William T. Gilham's farm."

Assuming no exaggeration (always a major assumption with the OR) this shows the huge difference in ability and discipline between the two forces. Note that the forces were almost even in number, there were no reported casualties, yet the entire rebel force was captured. Most likely the rebels were new recruits, while the Union soldiers had had at least some training. Major Marshall appears to have had some field experience, perhaps earned in the Mexican-American War.

Deja-vu Blogfest: The Thunderbird photo and False Memory Syndrome

2011-12-16T04:20:00.001-06:00

Today I'm participating in the Deja-vu blogfest, where bloggers are reposting their favorite old post. I first published this one back in 2009 on my blog Grizzled Old Traveler. It's a travel blog that I don't update anymore now that I blog professionally for Gadling. There are still some good posts on there, though. This is my favorite. My second favorite is Ten Reasons the Moon Landing Conspiracy theory is Stupid.

Yesterday I was chatting with a fellow writer about a book she's writing on legendary beasts. One of my favorites is the Thunderbird, a giant dinosaur-like winged creature that haunts the American Southwest, and the conversation turned to the strange role I've played in the story of this mysterious creature.

Let me say at the outset that I don't think the Thunderbird is real. With all the aviation, birdwatchers, and development in the United States in the past century, no giant flying monster could have remained undetected. My skepticism, however, makes this story all the more interesting.

The Thunderbird is part of Native American religious belief, but that creature is like a giant bird with feathers. The more modern Thunderbird is always described as reptilian, which makes some cryptozoologoists (people who study unknown animals) think it's a pterosaur. Supposedly there was an article in the 26 April 1890 edition of the Tombstone, Arizona, Epitaph, about two cowboys shooting a creature with leathery wings like a bat and a head like an alligator. They dragged it back to town and nailed it up to a barn, its wingspan covering the barn's entire length. I haven't seen this article myself, but I know that frontier journalism often played with the truth. Mark Twain got started on fiction while working on his brother's newspaper in the Nevada Territory!

Some photos have turned up over the years. The most famous one shows a giant Thunderbird nailed to a barn with some cowboys standing nearby. I can't show it to you because it doesn't seem to exist, at least not anymore. Many investigators claim to have seen it or even owned a copy, but nobody has one now

This is where it gets weird. I remember seeing that photo. My memory is of a fairly clear black and white image of a Thunderbird nailed to the roof of a barn, its wingspan almost equal to the barn's length. Men in old western costume are lined up on the roof and in front of the barn. I remember it looked like a rather poor cut-and-paste job. It was common for frontier people to pose next to and on a barn after a barn raising, so perhaps someone added the Thunderbird to a real photo. I even remember where I saw it, in a paranormal magazine at Bookman's, a used bookstore I used to work at in Tucson, Arizona. For some reason I didn't buy the magazine.

This must be a false memory. If the picture existed in a paranormal magazine, it would have been located by dedicated cryptozoologists by now. My experience is just like other people's, in that I have a very clear memory of the event and I no longer have the photo. Some people claim to have seen it in the possession of someone else. Others had a copy and lost it. In my case, I saw it in a magazine I didn't buy. I have unwittingly become part of an urban legend.

Weird, huh? What's going on here? Paranormal investigator Jerome Clark theorizes that the idea of the image is evocative enough to implant a false memory. Perhaps I read about the photo and created the memory? I wonder if ten years from now my writer friend will be writing another book on monsters and will be pulling her hair out trying to find that image of the Thunderbird she remembers seeing.

Oh, and not all memories of this photo are alike. This article includes the memory of a different image of the Thunderbird, and other reports say the creature was nailed to the wall of the barn, not the roof.

While I'm careful to use only public domain photos in this blog, I'm not sure these are. If they are really as old as they appear to be, then they are in the public domain. They could simply be old fakes. If they are modern fakes, then I'm in breach of copyright, but the only way the creator could sue me is if they admitted faking the photo! I'll take that chance. :-)

Mud mortars of the Civil War

2011-12-15T04:12:00.001-06:00

By mid-December of 1861, things had calmed down somewhat in Missouri. The Union command still worried that General Price would return from the southwestern portion of the state with his Confederate army, but there was no real sign he would do so. So while they waited, Union troops busied themselves with sweeps through northern and central Missouri to capture bands of secessionists harassing the area or heading down to join Price.

One of these sweeps is detailed in the Official Records. Major George C. Marshall's command, composed of 300 men of the regiment Merrill's Horse and three companies of regular cavalry, moved through Saline County on December 3-12. They fought several skirmishes and took prisoners almost daily. Some were rebels who had skirmished with them, others were not so designated and were probably civilians suspected of supporting the South. Searching houses as they went, the Union cavalry found several caches of gunpowder and other items of war.

On December 5 they proudly encamped on the farm of the secessionist Missouri governor Claiborn Fox Jackson (who had long since fled with Price), "and raised the Stars and Stripes over the traitor's house."

December 9 found them near Waverly, home to J.O. Shelby, who had not yet made a name for himself as one of the Confederacy's greatest cavalry raiders. As the Union troops camped that night, "Shelby brought his company down that night to try to annoy us by firing at our pickets and to try to scare us by bombarding us with a 10-inch mortar loaded with mud. Lieutenants Kelly's and Gordon's companies were called out, and soon scattered them and silenced their formidable battery."

I've never heard of a mortar being packed with mud. I would assume Shelby was a victim of the nagging ammunition shortage of the Confederacy, and simply used whatever he had at hand. One would think rocks or gravel would prove more effective! In my book on Shelby, I describe how the raider used many tactics to fool his enemies. Once he held up shipping on the Missouri River with a sinister-looking log. Not a hollowed-out log converted into a cannon like at the Battle of Athens, Missouri, just a log.

The next day the Union troops proceeded on into Waverly and "found 9 kegs of powder concealed under a platform in Shelby's store. The celebrated mortar was found and taken."

And thus ends the saga of the Civil War mud mortar.

Photo courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

How to load and shoot a Colt 1851 Navy Revolver

2011-12-13T03:29:00.000-06:00

I've talked a lot on this blog about the Missouri bushwhackers and their use of the Colt Navy revolver. They often carried several of these and would close with the enemy as quickly as possible, absorbing the one volley of the Union troops single-shot rifles and then opening up a murderous fire at close range. This tactic worked time and again. In my Civil War novel, Union militia captain Richard Addison begs his general for pistols to fight back against the bushwhackers. When they aren't forthcoming, he decides to raise the money in other ways. . .

The revolvers weren't perfect, however. They were extremely slow to reload, as this annotated video shows. This is why the guerrillas carried more than one, and often had preloaded cylinders in the deep pockets of their guerrilla shirt. Also note how much smoke these things create. I've talked about the fog of war before. Now imagine fifty bushwhackers blazing away as quickly as they could. Things would get pretty hazy.

Laying poor Jesse in his grave

2011-12-12T07:06:00.000-06:00

I just finished my latest book for Osprey Publishing. The Last Ride of the James-Younger Gang—Jesse James and the Northfield Raid 1876 examines the gang's disastrous robbery attempt of a bank in Northfield. The gang swaggered into this Minnesota town thinking they'd get some easy money, and instead got the mother of all shootouts, followed by a grueling chase across the state.

All of this is covered in detail, along with biographical information about each of the gang members (some of whom were quite obscure) and will be richly illustrated in Osprey's trademark style. The book will come out in 2012.

As usual, I had a lot of fun writing this book. I learned about odd customs such as anvil artillery, and got some more insights into Jesse James, who is a minor character in my Civil War novel. The only problem is that I sent it off on a Monday. Anytime I finish a major project I get a post-book slump and I'm useless for the rest of the week!

Photo courtesy Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs division.

Getting a hundred hits a day!

2011-12-11T02:50:00.000-06:00

After the first ten days of December I had a total of 1,010 hits for this month. I'm now getting a hundred hits a day, my Technorati ranking is steadily rising, and I only started this blog in July. Thanks to all of you for the retweets, follows, etc! Of course I'm not in the big leagues yet (I can't even imagine how many daily hits Alex Cavanaugh gets) but I'm slowly building this blog up.

I'm slowly building up sales and visibility of my Civil War novel too. Thanks a million to those who have been buying it!

Getting "slightly" wounded in the Civil War

2011-12-10T01:30:00.001-06:00

"Buck" from a "buck and ball", Wikipedia

I’ve been thinking about the term “slightly wounded” that's so often seen in battle reports. I doubt if the large lead balls of the era were capable of giving a light wound unless they barely grazed a man. From what I’ve heard, a body or head shot was always grievous and often fatal, and a shot to the limb often shattered the bone and led to the loss of that limb. So how did these "slight" wounds come about?

If my personal library can't help me, my first stop with Civil War questions is the Missouri in the Civil War Message Board. I asked if these wounds could come from the common use of “buck and ball”, in which three (or sometimes more) pellets of buckshot were wrapped in the cartridge paper along with the ball.

Consider for a moment that your position takes a volley from a hundred of the enemy. One hundred bullets are now singing through the air at you. Not a pleasant thought. Also there are 300 buckshot pellets coming at you, so you are three times as likely to get hit by a bit of buckshot as you are by a ball.

Assuming you only get hit by one pellet, you'll probably only be wounded, and probably only “slightly” wounded. Now add to this that many soldiers, especially Confederates and some Union militia, only had shotguns or squirrel rifles and were firing at an unsuitably long range for those weapons, and you can see why there were so many “slight” wounds.

You can even be slightly wounded by a cannonball. I read of one incident of a shell bursting right next to a soldier. The force threw him into the air and his trajectory was stopped by the trunk of a nearby tree. He was knocked out cold, but when he came to he was unscathed except for some nasty bruises.

Someone pointed out that buck and ball was only used in smoothbores, not the Enfield or Springfield rifled muskets with their deadly Minié balls. Smoothbores were only used early in the war. That had slipped my mind. I’m sure some smoothbores still saw action in later years with the Union militia and Confederate forces. Even as late as Price’s invasion in 1864 there were many unarmed rebels in the ranks. I would think they’d grab anything available. But in essence the poster was right. The answer must lie elsewhere.

Civil War author Bruce Nichols replied, "I read in Connelley's 1910 Quantrill and the Border Wars, pages 318-9 and in Castel's 1962 William Clarke Quantrill: His Life and Times, page 113 that the west-central Missouri guerrillas developed the wartime practice of reducing the amount of gunpowder in their revolver loads both to save precious powder and to reduce pistol recoil to improve accuracy, especially from horseback. I think this was especially helpful with repeated or continued shots. Guerrillas from this region were influential in passing along such techniques and tactics to other Missouri guerrillas they encountered, so this practice may have spread."

I'm thinking this may have been common practice with regulars in the Confederate army too, since they were often short of powder.

Another researcher pointed out that slight wounds may have been caused by "spray" from whatever those bullets hit. If soldiers were hiding behind rocks or fences, and bullets hit those barriers, all sorts of stuff would be flying around. There might also be "shavings", bits of the bullets sheared off while coming out of the barrel, creating an unintended "buck" along with the "ball".

Ask a question on this forum, and you always get a wealth of answers! I'm thinking that all of these explanations contributed to the high number of slight wounds in the Civil War. Not that these wounds always stayed slight. One poster mentioned his great-great uncle received a "slight" wound in the side at Hartville in January 1864. He was listed as dead the next month.

Civil War Photo Friday: The Last of Shelby's Men

2011-12-09T02:32:00.000-06:00

I first saw this gravestone more than ten years ago at the Confederate retirement home in Higginsville, Missouri, and it has always stuck in my mind. Many old warriors came here to live out their days, and the last one to die was John T. Graves. He joined J.O. Shelby's famous Iron Brigade of Missouri cavalry raiders, survived the war, and lived through half of the twentieth century.

Remarkably, he wasn't the "last of Shelby's men". Joseph Hayden Whitsett was still alive in Texas and made it to 1951.

Of course I put this image in my book Ride Around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863. Shelby's Iron Brigade made numerous grueling raids into Union-occupied Missouri. His "ride around Missouri" was the most ambitious, and led the Union troops on a merry chase through the entire state.

It's amazing to look at these old gravestones and realize that some Civil War veterans lived so long. Albert Woolson, a Union drummer boy and the last surviving Civil War veteran whose story is confirmed, lived until August 2, 1956! There must be old folks around today who remember some of these guys. The Civil War wasn't so long ago after all.

A Fine Likeness gets its first review: four stars!

2011-12-08T11:48:00.001-06:00

Less than three weeks after my Civil War horror novel A Fine Likeness was released, I just got my first review! It's on Amazon UK and it's four stars. The review is short but sweet.

"Intriguing and chilling"
"An assured debut novel which clearly shows the author's grasp of the period, without ever getting bogged down in period detail. The characters are well drawn and morally murky, and the sense of unease builds throughout the story. A good read."

I don't know E.L. Woodcock but she recently became a fan of my Facebook page. I really need to buy her a beer sometime.

Hopefully more reviews will be coming soon. Two bloggers have already promised to review my book. Stay tuned. . .

Anvil artillery

2011-12-08T02:00:00.001-06:00

You learn the weirdest things writing for Osprey Publishing.

While researching my latest project, The Last Ride of the James-Younger Gang—Jesse James and the Northfield Raid 1876, I came across an account of the citizens of Northfield celebrating after they fought off the James-Younger gang. The gang had tried to rob the bank and local shopkeepers grabbed their guns, killed two of the robbers on the spot, wounded the rest, and sent them galloping out of town.

To mark this special occasion, Northfielders set off some "anvil artillery". This consisted of putting a load of gunpowder under an anvil, lighting a fuse, running away, and watching the anvil fly into the sky.

I wonder if anyone used anvil artillery in the Civil War? It would have been more useful than the hollowed out log used at the Battle of Athens, Missouri

Kids, don't try this at home!

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

In other news. . .

2011-12-07T03:46:00.000-06:00

The ebook edition of my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness has been out a little less than three weeks. I’m busy finishing up a print edition before Christmas. This is important because a print magazine requested a review copy. They want print instead of an ebook so they can photograph it “in context”. Not sure what this means. Are they going to have some reenactors duking it out in the background?

In other news, we just moved into our new place in Santander, on the north coast of Spain. The top view is from my new home office, where I get a sweeping view of the bay. This should provide some inspiration! The photo below is taken from my son’s room, which looks out over the port. Hopefully this will instill the travel bug in him. National Geographic maps did it for me. He has a light-up globe, and that combined with this view should get him itching to travel. He already wants to join me the next time I visit Harar, Ethiopia. My wife likes the new place because it's within walking distance of her astronomy institute. No more long commutes!

We’ve been settling into Santander pretty quickly. I’ve been doing some hiking in the mountains and exploring the town’s nightlife. Also, my wife and I are preparing a photo exhibition of shots taken during last year’s road trip in Ethiopia and my shots of Somaliland.

I’m also on deadline to finish The Last Ride of the James-Younger Gang—Jesse James and the Northfield Raid 1876, my next book for Osprey Publishing. I should be done by the end of the week. Tomorrow I’ll post some interesting tidbits from that research.

Another Osprey book, Armies of the Adowa Campaign 1896—The Italian Disaster in Ethiopia, has received its third five-star review. I’ve posted it below.

Excellent addition to the Osprey library

Armies of the Adowa Campaign, an account of Italian colonial defeat in Ethiopia in 1896, is an excellent addition to the Osprey library.

Any English-speaker with an interest in military history (or modeling, or miniatures) knows the Osprey canon. And knows that the quality of the various titles varies extensively. While (almost) never actually bad, there are many titles that are "just okay" while there are others that are outstanding. This is one of the latter.

The illustrations by Raffaele Ruggeri are very good (for the modelers and miniaturists), but what really sets this volume apart is the excellent account of the Adowa campaign itself. Sean McLachlan does a fine job of describing the historical background and then providing a vivid and detailed account of the fateful battle at Adowa itself. Similar to a prior reviewer's comment, this is one of the instances where Osprey has packed a good, though brief, campaign account into one of its slimmer Men-At-Arms series titles (viz Alexei Ivanov's volume on the Russo-Japanese War). The account clearly benefits from McLachlan's personal research at the remote battle site (a factor often missing from Osprey's weaker titles), enhanced with photographs of the terrain by the author which are included in the text.

Surprisingly little remembered today (outside of Ethiopia and Eritrea, one suspects), this battle was, as McLachlan points out, the third great contender (with Isandlwana in 1879, and Anual in 1921) for the title "greatest colonial defeat ever". Perhaps easiest thought of as the Italian version of the Little Big Horn.

Highly recommended, and an absolute must for anyone with a special interest in 19th Century European colonial warfare.

Guest post: Getting the facts straight with my historical novel

2011-12-06T04:36:00.001-06:00

Today we have a guest post from someone I met on the Missouri Civil War forums. John J. Gschwend Jr. has written a novel about the Civil War and part of the action takes place in Arkansas, which of course was intimately tied to the Civil War in Missouri. Take it away, John!

Pigeons began landing everywhere: on the ground, on stumps, in the trees. Soon there was little room for another bird, but they kept coming, reminded Joe of ants. Large limbs moaned, cracked, then fell under their weight. A big one from the sycamore crashed to the ground killing scores of pigeons, yet they kept coming.

This didn’t really happen, only in my novel, Chase The Wild Pigeons: A Novel of the Civil War. It could have happened, though. During the time of the Civil War there were estimates of 4 to 5 billion passenger pigeons in America. Yes, I said “billions.” Now there are none.

I spent almost as much time researching facts for my novel as I did writing it. I traveled from Helena, Arkansas, to the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia. I prowled the battlefield at Brice’s Crossroads, Mississippi. I went to New Albany, Mississippi just to see the topography. I wanted to tell the truth when I spun my story.

I love reading history, and first-person narratives are the cream. With these, you are going straight to the horse’s mouth. You can get lost in time with these. They should use this stuff in school—kids would like it better than remembering stupid dates.

The internet is a treasure. You can find letters, diaries, and all sorts of records. I found Iowa soldiers longing for home and away from the disease in Helen,a Arkansas—“Hell in Arkansas” they called it. Slaves describing the beatings, or tell how good “Marse” was to them. A found a letter from a woman telling of hiding between the bed and fireplace as the Battle of Helena raged. It goes on and on.

My story is of two boys traveling from Helena Arkansas to the Shenandoah Valley during the Civil War. I placed them in battles and situations that were real. They lived in Yankee-occupied Helena and lived through the battle there. They visited a large plantation in Mississippi. They were witness to a Yankee raid. They lived the hardships of a deprived South. They saw the institution of slavery from many angles. They were at the Battle of Brice’s Crossroads where they met General Forrest. There is much more, and all of it could have happened, because I researched extensively. I wanted to tell the truth.

If you are interested in historical narratives, here are two sites you must visit: Library of Congress and Documenting the Old South.

Chase The Wild Pigeons: A novel of the Civil War can be found at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. My website is http://civilwarnovel.com

A Fine Likeness now available on Smashwords!

2011-12-05T04:25:00.000-06:00

My Civil War horror novel A Fine Likeness is now available as an ebook on Smashwords! This is a big plus for shoppers who like to use Paypal because Smashwords accepts Paypal and Amazon doesn't.

Speaking of Amazon, they just opened up websites for Spain and Italy. Both carry my book at the links provided. I haven't gotten any sales at either site yet, because my book is only available in English, but hey, it can't hurt to be up there, right?

I can also sell this ebook in all electronic formats directly to you by Paypal. Drop me a line at my public email address seansontheweb (at) yahoo (dot) com and I'll get in touch. This would be a big favor for me because then I don't have to split royalties with a distributor. Please don't send emails with attachments as those will get deleted as spam.

Many of you have asked about the print edition. I'm setting that up right now and it will be available in time for Christmas.

Book Review: Jesse James, My Father

2011-12-03T01:52:00.000-06:00

Jesse James, My Father; The First and Only True Story of His Adventures Ever Written by Jesse James

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

What an odd book.

The son of the famous outlaw, Jesse James Jr., spends the first half of this book trying to exonerate his father, and the second half trying to exonerate himself for an 1898 train robbery. After much media hype, Jesse James Jr. was found innocent.

In between the mythologizing of his father and himself we get interesting tidbits, like Jr.'s earliest memory being of a shooting at their home. There are also some rollicking good tales (wildly exaggerated) of his father's time fighting in the Civil War.

I've always been interested in Jesse James Jr. He lived in his father's shadow, and even played his famous father in two silent films that were later reworked with sound added and released as Jesse James Under the Black Flag, which is still available.

This is a fun read and a great insight into the mind of someone who barely knew his father (he was a kid when Jesse was killed) yet always lived with him. Just don't read it as history! for that see Yeatman's excellent biography Frank and jesse James: The Story Behind the Legend.

View all my reviews

Guest blogging about Jesse James in the movies

2011-12-02T10:11:00.000-06:00

Jesse James is a minor character in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness, and he's the theme of my guest post today over at Alex Cavanaugh's blog. Check out my post on How not to screw up the Jesse James legend.

Oh, and leave a comment. Alex loves comments. He's a blogger extraordinaire with a bazillion followers, plus the author of a cool science fiction novel.

WARNING!!! GRAPHIC!!! Civil War Photo Friday: Scalping Victim

2011-12-02T07:03:00.003-06:00

Today’s Civil War Photo is at the bottom of the post instead of the top to give squeamish readers a chance not to see it. I’m not squeamish and even I find this photo hard to look at.

This is Robert McGee, c.1890, in a photo courtesy the Library of Congress. When he was a young boy in 1864, he was scalped by Sioux chief Little Turtle. The Sioux and many other tribes in the Far West rose up during the Civil War to take some of their land back and avenge many broken treaties. Perhaps Little Turtle was thinking of all the Indian children who had been killed by the white man. None of that, of course, justifies maiming a child.

Both North and South sapped the frontier of regular troops and young men, leaving it open for attack. Local militia and small detachments of Union and Confederate troops had their hands full fighting Indian war parties. In nearly all of these fights, the white’s superior weaponry led to victory, and the victors weren’t loathe to take scalps themselves. In one notorious incident called the Sand Creek Massacre, troops and townsmen slaughtered about 150 men, women, and children who had made peace with the Federal government and had been promised protection. A good introduction to the war in the Far West is Colton's Civil War in the Western Territories, which I reviewed here.

Scalping took place in other theaters of the war too, especially Missouri. In a scene from my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness, teenaged Confederate bushwhacker Jimmy Rawlins and his friends have joined the guerrilla band of Bloody Bill Anderson. They’re appalled when they see Anderson scalp a Union soldier. The next day Anderson shows them something calculated to change their minds.

“Mount up!” Anderson ordered. “We got some riding to do.”

“Where we off to this time, sir?” Jimmy asked.

“Another fight, what you figure? Bring your boys over here. I want you to see something.”

Jimmy gathered his group and Anderson led them through the woods about a hundred yards to where some bushwhackers were digging graves. Five bodies lay beside them. Jimmy gagged when he saw they’d all been scalped.

“These were my men,” Anderson said. “Serving as rearguard as we made our escape yesterday. Some Yanks caught up with them and look what they did.”

“My God,” the Kid muttered.

“Take a good look,” Anderson said. “The Yanks won’t show us no mercy, so I don’t want no more bellyaching about the way I do things. This is war to the knife, and the knife to the hilt. If you want to win it, you do things my way.”

The Rawlins Rangers walked back to their horses in silence. As they mounted up Albert whispered, “What with what Jesse told us about Anderson’s sister, and what we just saw, I wouldn’t give a plug nickel for that Union prisoner’s life.”

“Worth more than that,” Elijah grinned, patting his saddlebag. “Two more to go.”

He trotted off as the others stared at him. Morgan paced his horse up to Jimmy’s side.

“Yankee soldier or no,” Morgan muttered, “this ain’t no way to do things. I swear to God one day I’m gonna put a bullet in that son of a bitch.”

Guest blogging about writing historical fiction

2011-12-02T03:01:00.000-06:00

Fellow Missouri author Dianna Graveman is hosting me for a guest post on Writing a Historical Novel in my own Back Yard. I talk about the advantages of writing historical fiction in familiar settings. I also give some tidbits from the book as well as some Missouri Civil War trivia. Well, not so trivial for those who had to live through it!

Comment moderation enabled, no anonymous cowards allowed

2011-12-01T12:27:00.000-06:00

Due to the recent spate of personal attacks against me by people who haven't read my novel and are too cowardly to even identify themselves, I have now enabled comment moderation. From now on, I will filter comments and any anonymous comments will be deleted unread. You need to use a real name and/or a link to your site. My regular readers already do this, so I don't think it will be such a big deal for them.

The Neo-Confederates and other crazies can continue to show their bias and ignorance, but they must have the guts to identify themselves. Thanks to fellow ebook author A.J. Walker for reminding me that my time is better spent with the good people in my life and doing what I do best--writing.

Gadling named one of the top ten adventure blogs by Outside Magazine

2011-12-01T04:25:00.000-06:00

Ethiopian monk with medieval manuscript, Lake Tana.

In the midst of hateful spew coming at me from Neo-Confederates on this blog, the Missouri Civil War Forum, the Kindle Forum, and even anonymous messages to my public email account (didn't know you could do that until now) I got some good news.

Outside Magazine has named the travel blog I work for, Gadling, one of the top ten adventure blogs! While we cover all aspects of travel, it's the adventure travel that most interests me. Our bloggers go all around the world, doing everything from riding camels in the Middle East to eating bugs in Asia. It's a fun team to work with. I've done a few adventure travel series myself, including a road trip in Ethiopia, visiting Somaliland, and living for two months living in Harar, Ethiopia.

I'm making plans for 2012 but there's nothing solid yet except a visit with my family to the Orkney Islands. In the meantime you can follow my feed where I give you updates about archaeology, art, and short trips I'm doing. Don't forget to go to Gadling's main page to see what my ultra-cool coworkers are writing about too.

I'm interviewed on One Writer's Journey

2011-11-30T10:45:00.000-06:00

Fellow author and blogger Penny Lockwood Ehrenkranz is interviewing me today on her blog One Writer's Journey. Besides my endless nattering on about my Civil War novel, I talk about how I got into writing, my creative process, and my take on the future of ebooks.

This is a very cool blog I've been reading for a while now. Penny gets a wide variety of authors to talk about their careers and books. Interesting stuff!

Book review: The Civil War in the Western Territories by Ray Colton

2011-11-30T08:20:00.004-06:00

The Civil War in the Western Territories: Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah by Ray Charles Colton

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Civil War in the Far West--New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah--is the least studied theater of the war. Having lived there I find that strange because those years redefined the borders of all the states and created Arizona. Colton's classic study has been around since 1959 and it still makes useful reading today.

Colton gives a relatively brief (209 page) description of the conflict in this region, focusing on the military aspects. A long final chapter goes into politics, but those seeking in-depth political coverage will have to seek elsewhere. Same goes with the economic and social aspects. These are covered, but take a back seat to military operations.

It's here that Colton is at his best. the descriptions of battles are clear and full of color, and even the tiniest skirmish gets its due.

A few criticisms: the maps are a bit simple and the map of the Battle of Glorieta is reproduced so small that it is almost illegible. Also, there is little coverage of the motivations behind the Native Americans. They are seen as simply another combatant with little context as to why they did what they did. The Native Americans are shown in a somewhat sympathetic light (rare for work from the 1950s) yet they remain voiceless.

I would recommend this book as a starting point for those looking to study the war in the Far West, or as a basic coverage for those who only want to read one book on this aspect of the war.

View all my reviews

More Neoconfederate nonsense

2011-11-30T04:32:00.000-06:00

As I mentioned in my last post, the Neo-confederates don't like my Civil War novel's negative portrayal of Bloody Bill Anderson, rapist and murderer of unarmed prisoners. Big surprise.

The admin over at the Missouri in the Civil War Message Board deleted the thread, saying,

"The message boards extend a courtesy to our "Contributing Authors" to promote their books, articles, speaking engagements, etc. In the case of a book or article posting, I must ask that any critique of an author's work be on the highest and most polite level. If you have an "historical" issue with the content of an author's work, please specifically address a statement from the book or article with page numbers, dates, the text in question and your documented response to the author's position. No personal or "petty" exchanges will be tolerated on the message board from authors or respondents. Thanks for your cooperation."

Yeah, I was partly guilty for the petty exchange, but as anyone who knows me knows, I have a zero-tolerance policy to assertive stupidity. Despite the admin's words, Bloody Bill's #1 fan Neil Block wrote again. This time he used a spell checker, sort of.

"One last time, if it remains here, I'll express an opinion. I hope it suits this board:

I find it unexceptable for anyone to make remarks or assumptions about the mental condition of anyone who has been involved in close quarters combat in any war. If you ain't been there, don't assume that you would be able to handle the stress in any given situation or the results of having war waged upon "your soil" and againest your friends and family. None of us can judge others or be for sure how many of us would regain their humanity after having cared so little for it to survive. For 150 years those have that demeaned Missourians to be less than perfect in their eyes have assumed that they are moral & intellectual superior to the rest of us. Promoting work that makes statements about real life soldiers should be based on works by those that actually knew the soldier and not statements made in judgement by his adversaries. I know there are soldiers and former soldiers that read this message board and if they have been CQC they may have known a few "Bill's", but they have also known some "John's"........John McCorkle suffered the same fate as Bill Anderson did, CQC, losing family in the same event, but John was able to return and make a life after the war. We don't know his ghosts but he was able to maintain his civility thru some pretty tough times...........Nobody Knows Who Will Return..............that is why soldiers make the best peace makers...........beating up on Bill Anderson has made quiet a few folks a little $$$......."Doing right ain't got no end" is the redleg way..........defending his victims is mine..........Neil Block"

To which I responded,

"And I find it unacceptable for anyone to make remarks or assumptions about a book they haven't even read.
I hope this thread does stay up because it points out the narrow pro-Confederate bias that is all too obvious among some in the community. The idea that one side was bloodthirsty and evil and the other side was perfect and honorable is contrary to the facts. Both sides did terrible things in that war, and both sides included honorable men.
Mr. Block says: "Promoting work that makes statements about real life soldiers should be based on works by those that actually knew the soldier and not statements made in judgement by his adversaries."
I'd like to see him apply that idea to Union soldiers and Redlegs as well Confederate soldiers and bushwhackers."

Will this end the debate? I doubt it, considering the Neoconfederates griping at me anonymously in the comments section. Those comments were all redirected to my blog from the same cc'ed message sent via Yahoo mail. Gee, I wonder who sent THAT? Blogger tells you some amazing things if you understand the system.

Neo-Confederate threatens author of Civil War novel

2011-11-29T08:21:00.000-06:00

My Missouri Civil War novel A Fine Likeness has only been out ten days and it's already getting an angry response from Neo-Confederates. I posted an announcement on the normally sane Missouri Civil War Discussion Board and included my blurb. Skip down if you've already read it.

A Confederate guerrilla and a Union captain discover there’s something more dangerous in the woods than each other.

Jimmy Rawlins is a teenaged bushwhacker who leads his friends on ambushes of Union patrols. They join infamous guerrilla leader Bloody Bill Anderson on a raid through Missouri, but Jimmy questions his commitment to the Cause when he discovers this madman plans to sacrifice a Union prisoner in a hellish ritual to raise the Confederate dead.

Richard Addison is an aging captain of a lackluster Union militia. Depressed over his son’s death in battle, a glimpse of Jimmy changes his life. Jimmy and his son look so much alike that Addison becomes obsessed with saving him from Bloody Bill. Captain Addison must wreck his reputation to win this war within a war, while Jimmy must decide whether to betray the Confederacy to stop the evil arising in the woods of Missouri.

Bloody Bill Anderson was a real person. Neil Block, Commander of the Captain William T. Anderson Camp #1743 SCV (Sons of Confederate Veterans), posted this response. I've kept his and grammar spelling intact.

"Any writing, even fiction, especially fiction that portreys Capt. Anderson in a negitive light should be considered a Hertiage Violations by the Captian William T. Anderson Camp #1743 SCV and steps will be taken to address this writers material as such............"

Okaaay. Neil Block can't even spell the name of his own organization! As you can see from their website, they're desperately trying to rehabilitate the name of this guerrilla who killed unarmed prisoners, scalped victims, and according to the scholarly biography Bloody Bill Anderson: the Short, Savage Life of a Civil War Guerrilla, had a fondness for raping young black girls. This isn't just some damned Yankke talking. The self-styled modern Missouri Confederate government admits Anderson's band had a penchant for rape.

I used Bloody Bill as a character in my novel because while he was a real person, his personality was like something straight out of central casting for a horror movie. I didn't include the rapes because I didn't want to write those scenes, so in a sense I was actually kind to Anderson's memory.

Of course I responded:

"Mr. Block,
You misspelled "portrays", "negative", "heritage", and "captain".
And you forgot the apostrophe in "writer's".
After careful consideration of the evidence I find you guilty of a Literacy Violation and hereby sentence you to complete grade school."

You can read the inevitable continuation of the thread, here.

Interview with the Missouri Writers Guild

2011-11-29T04:13:00.000-06:00

Fellow Missouri author Dianna Graveman has published an interview I did for the Missouri Writers Guild's newsletter. I talk about my travel and history writing. I'll be back on her blog this Thursday talking about why I picked Missouri as the setting for my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Check my page of Online Appearances for a complete and constantly updating schedule for my virtual book tour.

To learn more about Dianna, check out this interview I did with her about her local history writing and research.

Guest blogging about historical fiction over at Cynthia Hope Clark's blog

2011-11-28T01:37:00.000-06:00

Today I'm guest blogging at Cynthia Hope Clark's blog on Tips for Writing Historical Fiction. Hope is a great inspiration for lots of writers out there and has been plugging away at this crazy game for many years now. If you are an aspiring, struggling, or professional writer, you can get a lot out of her blog.

Be sure to check out my Online Appearances section for more stops on my virtual book tour. I have several this week!

The horror photography of Amanda Norman

2011-11-26T05:18:00.001-06:00

Dark Road Nowhere by Amanda Norman

Horror photography enjoys a growing acceptance among fans of all things frightful. While most of us think of books and movies when we think of horror, talented photographer Amanda Norman sees terror through the lens of her camera.

Graveyards, Gothic architecture, forests in winter, even beaches become places of eerie light and shadow. Most of these aren't straight-up horror in the style that Hollywood embraces. The shots have disturbing subtly, more like The Seventh Seal than Seven. Occasionally she goes for fanged punks growling at the camera, and these aren't nearly as effective as her main body of work. She's at her best when she's being contemplative and melancholy.

Some of these would work great as book covers, although as tiny Amazon thumbnails they'd be all but blacked out. That's one thing I don't like about ebooks or shopping online in general. It's like what happened when album labels went from being on big record sleeves to being on CD jewel boxes. A shame, because the image below fits perfectly with a dark fantasy novel I'm writing.

I have a feeling we'll be hearing more from Amanda Norman. Art of this quality could take her places.

Three by Amanda Norman

Civil War Photo Friday: Bushwhackers

2011-11-25T05:20:00.002-06:00

Some readers have asked me about the profile photo I use so I'm featuring it here for Civil War Photo Friday.

It shows three bushwhackers in the band of William Clarke Quantrill. They are (1) Arch Clements, (2) Dave Pool, and (3) Bill Hendricks. As you can see they are well armed with pistols and bottles of liquor.

This was taken in Sherman, Texas, where the band was wintering. As the leaves fell and the underbrush thinned, bushwhackers would leave Missouri for their homes or for Texas. In my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness, the young bushwhackers Jimmy and Morgan discuss wintering over in Texas instead of going home as they usually do.

Those two dangerous but otherwise honorable teenagers wouldn't have fit in. The three real bushwhackers shown here sat for their photo right after shooting up a hotel on a drunken spree. They didn't like this picture and trashed the photographer's studio, although Quantrill later made them pay for damages.

Dave Pool makes a brief appearance in A Fine Likeness. A real firebrand, he is absolutely fearless in the face of the enemy, yet is very afraid of what some of his band are trying to summon in the woods of Missouri. Another member of the gang was a young Jesse James, who has a larger role in the novel.

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Lancers in the American Civil War

2011-11-24T04:25:00.000-06:00

I recently did a guest post over at Genre Author about Medieval Weapons in the American Civil War. Space limitations didn't allow me to include all examples of "primitive" weapons used in the war, so here are some more.

Some Texas cavalry units had lances. These weren't the huge lances of the medieval jousting era, rather the slim lances used in the Napoleonic era. The Texans' lance blades were 3 inches wide and 12 long, mounted on a 9 foot shaft. Each sported a red guidon with a white star to "drink the blood" of the Yankees.

At the Battle of Valverde, New Mexico Territory, on 21 February 1862, Texas lancers under Capt. W.L. Lang, Fifth Texas Regiment, formed three columns and charged the Union left flank. Facing them were the Second Colorado Volunteer Infantry. The infantry waited until the horsemen were only 20 yards away and then gave them a volley. At that range it was hard to miss. At least 20 fell and the Coloradans quickly reloaded and gave them some more of the same.

Some Texans managed to close with the infantry. The Colorado troops didn't break, instead fighting back effectively with their bayonets. At this point the Texans should have been able to destroy the infantry. They had longer reach, after all. That a lancer should be beaten by a bayonet hints that the Texans hadn't trained with their weapons much. A fellow history buff over at the RenWars Yahoo group told me the Texans, disgusted at their performance in battle, ended up using their lances as firewood!

Another RenWars user pointed out an interesting article on pikes used by soldiers in Georgia. None actually saw combat, which was probably a good thing as far as the Georgians were concerned.

I couldn't find a public domain image of the Texan lancers. There's a good modern painting of them here.

Civil War Missouri: a great setting for a novel

2011-11-23T10:40:00.000-06:00

For my next stop on my virtual book tour I'm over at historical fiction author Minnette Meador's blog writing on the subject of why Civil War Missouri is a great setting for a novel. Hop on over and check it out!

Minnette and I go way back. I can't actually recall when exactly I met her online. We've been chatting for years. I've been watching her list of historical novels grow and grow. Strange to say, I got onto Twitter today to retweet some of her posts and found I wasn't actually following her! We chat on Facebook and via email and for some reason I always assumed I was following her on Twitter too. All this social networking is frying my brain. . .

Starting my virtual book tour for A Fine Likeness

2011-11-22T04:41:00.000-06:00

Now that my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness is out, I'm starting a virtual book tour. My first stop was yesterday over at fellow author and medievalist A.J. Walker's blog. I blogged about Medieval Weapons in the American Civil War.

I've created a page on this blog for my online appearances. I already have several stops scheduled on my virtual book tour and more are on the way, so check back often as I hop around the web blogging about writing, horror fiction, the civil War, Missouri history, Jesse James, and more!

Edward "Stu" Bailey (1949-2011)

2011-11-21T10:13:00.000-06:00

In the busy days after the release of my latest book, I want to take some time out to remember a good friend. A Fine Likeness is dedicated to my wife and son, as usual, and it's also dedicated to Edward "Stu" Bailey, who died earlier this year. Stu lived in Columbia, Missouri, and one of the highlights of my visits there was hanging out with him.

I first met him at Osama's, a popular downtown cafe. He and Tyree Byndom were playing chess and had a little sign up announcing that this was the first meeting of the Kneighborhood Knightz, a new chess club. I sat down and played. I'm not sure who I played but I'm pretty sure I lost. I could only beat Stu one game in three and I've only ever beaten Tyree once.

Several years later and the Kneighborhood Knightz has grown from its initial three members to dozens. It's a place where minds meet and friendships are made. It's one the the good things Stu helped bring into the world. My little boy even became a member without ever making it to Missouri. He played Stu online.

Stu was the kind of guy I immediately like. He lived in public housing but his apartment was full of books. He loved to party but one of his best friends was a devout Bahai who never touches drugs or alcohol. He was proud to be black but didn't give a shit what color you are.

Stu lived a full life. He spent time in the army in Germany, worked down in Jamaica, and had a variety of different jobs and homes. A few years ago he suffered a stroke that left him in a wheelchair. The depression this caused didn't last long. He soon rallied and took up wheelchair soccer. This earned him new friends and he got to travel across the country. Nothing could keep him down long.

But the end came as the end always does. Tyree emailed me the news in March while I was in Harar, Ethiopia. I intended on writing this memorial then but found I could not. Neither could Tyree. Eight months hasn't made it any easier.

So long, Stu.

A Fine Likeness is out now!!!

2011-11-20T08:56:00.001-06:00

My Civil War horror novel A Fine Likeness is finally out! It's available at Amazon, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, and Amazon FR. In the next couple of days it will become available at Barnes & Noble and Smashwords. A print edition will appear in a couple of weeks.

Thank you all for your encouragement and for following this blog. I'll be hosting some giveaways in coming days as well as some guest posts and the usual blogging about the American Civil War west of the Mississippi. For those of you unfamiliar with my novel, the blurb is below:

A Confederate guerrilla and a Union captain discover there’s something more dangerous in the woods than each other.

Jimmy Rawlins is a teenaged bushwhacker who leads his friends on ambushes of Union patrols. They join infamous guerrilla leader Bloody Bill Anderson on a raid through Missouri, but Jimmy questions his commitment to the Cause when he discovers this madman plans to sacrifice a Union prisoner in a hellish ritual to raise the Confederate dead.

Richard Addison is an aging captain of a lackluster Union militia. Depressed over his son’s death in battle, a glimpse of Jimmy changes his life. Jimmy and his son look so much alike that Addison becomes obsessed with saving him from Bloody Bill. Captain Addison must wreck his reputation to win this war within a war, while Jimmy must decide whether to betray the Confederacy to stop the evil arising in the woods of Missouri.

Civil War Photo Friday: The sinking of the General M. Jeff Thompson

2011-11-18T04:58:00.001-06:00

The Confederate navy was outnumbered and outgunned from the start of the Civil War. Despite this, they put up a spirited fight right until the end. One of the more interesting naval theaters of the war was on the Mississippi River, where North and South fought for control of this vital waterway.

The engraving above shows Battle of Memphis on June 6, 1862. The rebels were soundly beaten, losing almost all the ships they then had on the river. One of them was the General M. Jeff Thompson, shown sinking on the left. Actually it ran aground under heavy enemy fire and a blaze on board set off the magazine, blowing the ship to pieces.

The General M. Jeff Thompson was a side-wheeled steamboat converted into military use by fortifying it with a double layer of pine beams. The space between this layer was stuffed with bales of cotton. "Cottonclads" were warships made cheap, but cotton bales could stop bullets and even cannonballs. Sometimes only bales of cotton were used in a pinch, especially on troop transports. There were also "tinclads" made with thin sheets of metal (not always tin) and of course the more fearsome "ironclads".

The General M. Jeff Thompson was commissioned in April 1862 and fought with distinction at the Battle of Plum Point Bend on May 10. The Battle of Memphis was its second and last engagement. Although like many ships it was fitted with a ram, it never got to use it.

The ship was named after the Confederate Brigadier General of the same name, who became famous as the "Swamp Fox of the Confederacy" for his hit-and-run actions in southeast Missouri. The region there was mostly swamp before being drained by the Army Corps of Engineers in the 20th century, and his little army hid in "Swampeast Missouri", popping out at unexpected times and places to hit the Union forces.

Thompson was no stranger to steamboats. He briefly commanded some Confederate rams in 1862 and like other commanders in the Trans-Mississippi theater, often targeted enemy shipping. On this day 150 years ago, he seized the steamer Platte Valley at Price's Landing, MO.

Both photos courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Shrunken heads and preserved human flesh: mixing travel and horror

2011-11-15T04:05:00.000-06:00

I've realized that I've been overlooking the horror genre on this blog. My Civil War novel A Fine Likeness is technically historical horror, although it's also been called paranormal, action/adventure, even mystery. It being between genres is one of the reasons I decided to self-publish with Kindle Direct Publishing. Now that we're in the final days leading up to its release, I'll be mixing horror in with my history posts.

As most of you know, part of my writing career is travel writing. I've seen some things that wouldn't look out of place in a horror novel, and so of course I've written about them. For example, I did an article on Five Places to See Shrunken Heads. More recently I examined the Preserved Human Flesh at Amsterdam's Tattoo Museum. When I was conducted historical research in Rome earlier this year, I took time out to write a whole series titled Vacation with the Dead: Exploring Rome's Sinister Side.

So there you go, some horror along with the history! There will be more to come. If you're more into the days of black powder and pistoleros, check out the news about my latest book project over on my personal/writing blog.

Photo courtesy Joe Mabel.

Another five-star review for Armies of the Adowa Campaign

2011-11-14T02:32:00.002-06:00

Another review of Armies of the Adowa Campaign has appeared on Amazon. This one is by R.A. Forczyk, an Amazon Top 500 reviewer. It's my second five-star review. I also have a four-star review where the reviewer's only beef is that the book is too short! Forczyk's review is below:

"If You Liked the Movie Zulu, You'll Love This Book

"Osprey's Men-at-Arms series, which has nearly 500 titles in print, has been gradually devolving into a litany of military uniform trivia and has seemingly run out of new or original titles. Then along came Sean McLachlan's Armies of the Adowa Campaign 1896, which is both original and focused on the kind of content that the MAA series used to deliver.

"Despite the fact that the Battle of Adowa was a large-scale action, it has received far less coverage than the smaller battles of the earlier Zulu War but it is fair to say that if you liked the film Zulu, you are likely to enjoy this volume. In short, in 1896 the Italians committed an army of 14,000 troops into an invasion of Ethiopia, but ran into an Ethiopian army near Adowa that was five times as large. In the resulting battle, the Italians were defeated piece-meal and were routed with more than 50 percent casualties. This is an excellent volume, with just the right mix of order-of-battle data, uniforms, weapons, campaign narrative and discussion of tactics.

"The volume begins with an introduction to the creation of the Italian colonies in East Africa and then moves into a campaign narrative that traces the beginning of the Italian confrontation with Ethiopia in 1895. A total of 18 pages are spent discussing the actual Battle of Adowa and includes a tactical sketch map. The author then details the composition, tactics and weapons of each army. The volume has useful B/W photos as well as eight color plates depicting uniforms. Overall, this is a very satisfying volume and provides a great introduction to the worst colonial defeat of the Nineteenth Century. Armies of the Adowa Campaign is very well written and well researched."

Tough times for the Confederacy in Missouri

2011-11-12T05:19:00.000-06:00

General McCulloch

As winter set in for the first year of the Civil War, Brig.-Gen. Ben McCulloch, commanding the Arkansas forces in Missouri, wrote to J. P. Benjamin, the Confederate Acting Secretary of War:

"My forces are at present near the main road from Springfield to Fort Smith, the infantry and artillery in Arkansas, and three regiments of mounted men in this State. General Price has fallen back to Pineville, some 25 miles west of this. . .

"The Missouri force is getting weaker daily by men leaving for their homes. The time for which many of them enlisted will expire in a few days. Nothing but a battle within the next ten days will keep together over 4,000 or 5,000 out of the 13,000 they now have. This battle cannot be fought without the enemy should advance. For us to attack them in their present position would be to lose a battle. Our troops, being mostly mounted men, are unfit to attack a strong position or to be of great use in a general engagement with heavy forces.

The Missouri Army is composed of some 5,000 infantry and artillery, 8,000 horsemen, with all sorts of arms, and without discipline. This force, if possible, should be taken into the Confederate service and reorganized this winter. It is now under the control of politicians, who know not the value of discipline, and consequently can never make an army that would be but little better than a city mob. There is excellent material out of which to make an army in Missouri. They only want a military man for a general. . .

"As for myself, it would never to do place me in command of them. I have made myself very unpopular by speaking to them frequently about the necessity of order and discipline in their organizations. There is unfortunately but little cordiality of feeling between the two armies; hence it would not answer a good purpose to place any man now in either army in command of both."

Although McCulloch and Price had defeated the Union army at Wilson's Creek that summer, they did not like one another and their rivalry seriously hampered their cooperation. McCulloch's full letter can be read in the Official Records.

Remember them

2011-11-11T04:22:00.001-06:00

High Wood cemetery, France. Photo courtesy Tinelot Wittermans

Book Review: Cole Younger, Last of the Great Outlaws

2011-11-09T02:48:00.000-06:00

Cole Younger: Last of the Great Outlaws by Homer Croy

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Cole Younger was one of the most successful outlaws who got their start as Confederate bushwhackers. Like Frank and Jesse James and a whole crowd of lesser names, Younger learned to ride and shoot and steal in Missouri's bitter Civil War. He became a legend, and tales of his exploits made fireside conversation in Missouri and other states for generations.

Homer Croy (1883-1965) grew up on those tales. He grew up not too far from the James farm so he heard a lot of them. Reading this book is a bit like sitting by a fire in a little cabin in the woods, hearing some oldtimer spin stories. It's hugely entertaining, but it's not history.

Croy writes in a homey, informal sort of way, often slipping out of the narrative to talk about his own experiences researching this book. He talked to many people who knew Cole Younger, and this adds a huge amount of value to his work.

He's weak on the facts, though. For example, he has Quantrill dying a few months after the Lawrence Massacre, when in fact he lived until 1865. He has Jim Younger getting shot through the jaw during the Northfield holdup, when actually he received that injury two weeks later when cornered by a posse. He also says the film Under the Black Flag was about Cole. I've seen it and it's about Jesse James, played by his son Jesse James, Jr. Croy obviously didn't see the picture, which is good for him because it was terrible.

Croy also repeats the legend of Cole Younger and Belle Starr being lovers. This has been disproved. It was Cole's uncle who had a brief affair with Belle.

But legends are what this book is about. Croy spins a fun tale, and as long as you don't take it as history, or at least reliable history, it's a highly entertaining read.

View all my reviews

Two announcements: Facebook page and new Civil War article

2011-11-08T05:24:00.001-06:00

I've been getting several friend requests on Facebook from readers. While I want to interact with everyone, I also want to keep my profile for people I actually know. To solve this, I've set up a public Facebook page. Feel free to Like me over there so you can keep up to date on all my latest publications and what's happening with A Fine Likeness. I'll also be featuring some giveaways exclusive for FB followers.

In other news, I've posted an article on Gadling related to the Trans-Mississippi Theater. The Honey Springs battlefield in Oklahoma may become a national park. This is promising news for everyone interested in preserving the legacy of the Civil War. Check out the link for more details.

Ulysses S. Grant proves his worth in Missouri

2011-11-07T06:25:00.000-06:00

Ulysses S. Grant was one of the greatest generals of the Civil War. While he's most famous for his campaigns in the East, he actually got his start in Missouri. On this day 150 years ago, he fought his first battle at Belmont, Missouri.

Grant has steamed down the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois, with 3,150 men under orders to make a demonstration against Columbus, Kentucky. Instead he decided to attack General Pillow's Confederate camp at Belmont, directly across the river in Missouri.

Pillow had about 2,700 men at Belmont and another 2,000 or so across the river at Columbus. A determined Union attack and a shortage of ammunition on the rebel side soon gave the field to Grant. His men plundered their camp. Grant, flushed with victory and still pretty green, allowed his men to descend into disorder and Confederate troops from Columbus crossed the river and cut off his retreat. Grant had to fight his way back to the steamboats, leaving some of his plunder more than a hundred of his men behind.

Both sides claimed victory. The rebels said they were left in possession of the field, which is true. The Union pointed out that they defeated both forces sent against them, which is also true. Whatever way you slice it, the real victor was Grant himself. While other Union generals stayed in camp training their troops and begging Lincoln for more supplies and men, Grant went out and sought the enemy. That got him noticed. A few more stunts like that and his career was made.

For more on the battle, there's a long description here. The Civil War Daily Gazette has also done a good coverage of the preparations for the battle and the battle itself. If you're interested in the Civil War (and why else would you be reading this?) I heartily recommend the Civil War Daily Gazette. I read it every day. Just don't forget to come back here for more detailed coverage of the Trans-Mississippi Theater and the Civil War in Missouri!

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Armies of the Adowa campaign gets a four-star review!

2011-11-06T06:35:00.000-06:00

I recently mentioned that my book Armies of the Adowa Campiagn 1896: Italian Disaster in Ethiopia got a five-star review on Amazon. Well, I just got another review. This time it's four stars, and the reasons for losing a star are just fine with me. The review follows:

"I am very surprise that this subject matter, the Adowa Campaign, never made to the Osprey Campaign series. It would have made a great addition. Instead, we are treated with short verison of Men at Arms Series instead. I must ask why the author did not see fit to write an Osprey Campaign book and why he settled on this short version format instead?

"I wrote that because I found this book to be highly interesting reading material, there are a lot of facts packed into this book and it definitely deserves a longer treatment then what this series could afford. The narrative is short but well written, obviously the author did his research and provided many colorful plates on the uniforms and outfits of the two opposing sides. There are quite a few interesting photographs included including one where Italians and their African allies were being released, most of the African allies are missing some limbs of their bodies. Another interesting photo was one of two Italian survivors of the battle barely reaching back to their home base, looking more like escaped slaves then soldiers.

"Overall, its a pretty informative book that deserves a longer format of a Campaign series. Why the author settled for less is mysterious to me. Adowa campaign is a highly interesting campaign where an African power inflicted the greatest military defeat on an European power during the 19th century. Far greater defeat then Islandlwana which was British's smaller version of what Adowa turnout to be for Italy."

So his only complaint is that there wasn't more of it? I can live with that! To answer the reviewer's question, there are a couple of reasons why it wasn't part of the Campaign series. The main reason is that Osprey requires a topographic battle map for each title. I wasn't sure I could get a topo map for the Adowa battlefield. After visiting the Ethiopian Mapping Agency in Addis Ababa, my worries proved to be correct. Another reason it was in Men-At-Arms and not Campaign is that I've been working closely with the editor from the Man-At-Arms series and he offered me the title to do for his line.

So yes, Adowa deserves a longer treatment, but a couple of factors prevented me from doing it. Still, it was a fun book to write, and certainly not my last book on Ethiopia.

An interesting Civil War letter about treatment of civilians

2011-11-05T04:39:00.001-05:00

Here's an interesting letter from the Official Records that shows how quickly the war was degenerating in Missouri. Union officers were threatening to burn towns, rebel bushwhackers derailed civilian trains, and now this. The Confederate Captain Freeman mentioned in the letter was the object of a large Union manhunt. He got away.

HEADQUARTERS POST, Rolla, Mo., November 4, 1861.

Colonel GREUSEL,
Commanding Southern Expedition:

COLONEL: If the men who are away from home are in the rebel army, or if their families cannot give a good account of themselves or their whereabouts, take all they have got. They have aided and abetted Freeman in all ways, and most of them are now in the rebel army. You had not been gone long before the enemy were signaled from this vicinity by firing and beacon lights. They could only guess your destination, as no one knew it except you and myself.

Keep account of everything you take and who it is taken from. I think your idea is a good one about dividing your forces. Let the infantry, on returning, visit the Pineys and look out for affairs there. Be careful in taking contraband negroes that their owners are aiding the enemy.

Your obedient servant,

G. M. DODGE,

Colonel, Commanding Post at Rolla, Mo.

Civil War Video Friday: Rapping about the 54th Massachusetts

2011-11-04T05:49:00.000-05:00

This is usually Civil War Photo Friday, but I just heard about this great video about the famous black regiment, the 54th Massachusetts. It's very professionally done even though the rappers look like they're in high school. Nice to see kids who know their history! Thanks to Jimmy Price over at the Sable Arm for bringing this to my attention.

Creative foraging in the Civil War

2011-11-03T06:52:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in a previous post on weapons shortages during the Civil War, both sides had to deal with constant shortages of essential equipment. While the Confederates suffered more, Union troops were not immune, as this dispatch from the Official Records shows. It's from Major Frank J. White (Union) and dated 24 October 1861, but recounts events from two weeks before. It's addressed to acting Brig.-Gen. Whyman.

"On the 5th instant I received your orders to organize a scouting cavalry squadron for special service, and organized one by making the following details: Company L, First Missouri Cavalry, Captain Charles Fairbanks, 65 men; Company C, First Missouri Cavalry, Captain P. Kehoe, 65 men; the Irish Dragoons, independent, 51 men. We left Jefferson City on the 5th instant, and after a severe march reached Georgetown, our men in good condition, on the afternoon of the 8th. Our horses being all unshod, and consequently unfit for travel, we procured a few shoes and a quantity of old iron, called for blacksmiths from our ranks, took possession of two unoccupied blacksmiths' shops, and in five days shot our horses and mules, 232 in number.

"Our scanty supply of ammunition having been destroyed by the rain, and having two small bullet-molds in our possession, we procured lead and powder, and turning a carpenter's shop into a manufactory, made 3,000 cartridges for our revolving rifles."

Major White doesn't mention if these items were given up voluntarily, or why the villagers had so much powder in their possession. The soldiers' hard work, however, would soon be rewarded.

"On the 15th instant Colonel Hovey, commanding at Georgetown, received a dispatch from Lexington, stating that a valuable baggage train had left the vicinity of Lexington destined for Price's rebel army; also a private dispatch from Colonel White, stating that if he and his fellow-prisoners were not relieved within twenty-four hours they would be assassinated by the rebel marauders infesting Lexington. As Colonel Hovey's command was under marching orders, and therefore could not go to their relief, my command volunteered for the service, and Colonel Eads, of Georgetown, tendered me 70 men from his regiment. Accompanied by Colonel Eads, I started at 9 p. m. on the 15th instant, my whole force being 220 strong. By a severe forced march of nearly 60 miles we reached Lexington early the following morning, drove in the rebel pickets without loss, and took possession of the town. We made from 60 to 70 prisoners, 60 stand of arms, 25 horses, 2 steam ferry-boats, a quantity of flour and provisions, a large rebel flag, and other articles of less value. The rebels fled in every direction."

The next day the Union troops captured another steamer and left Lexington because the rebels were massing against them. With wry humor White added that, "As soon as the rebels were satisfied of our departure they attacked our deserted camp with great energy."

"We then proceeded to Warrensburg, making a few captures on our route. The evening of our arrival at Warrensburg we easily repulsed a slight attack, and by threatening to burn the town if again attacked, remained two days unmolested. We next proceeded to Warsaw, and are now on our route to Stockton. . .I have no casualties to report, and my men are all in good health, anxious for further service."

Threatened to burn the town if you got attacked? Nice. The war was getting ugly in Missouri.

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons. It's actually a blacksmith's shop in Pinal, Arizona, in 1882, but I liked the picture.

Back from another trip

2011-11-02T15:38:00.000-05:00

As I'm sure you've noticed and I hope you care, I haven't blogged for more than a week. That's because I was traveling in Belgium and The Netherlands to write a series for Gadling. I'm four articles in with several more to go. One post that fans of military history might find interesting is my visit to a series of German bunkers from World War Two.

A couple of weeks ago I was chatting online with a Dutch man from the Gouda region. He told me that the farmers there were fascinated by the American Civil War and many invested in Confederate war bonds. I kept an eye out for them when prowling through the antique stores in Antwerp but sadly I didn't find any. Strange that they threw money at the Confederate government. The Dutch are usually pretty shrewd in their investments!

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Civil War Book Review: General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West

2011-10-24T09:42:00.001-05:00

General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West by Albert Castel

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a thorough study of an important (although not very good) Confederate general in the Trans-Mississippi. General Price was a major figure in leading Missouri into rebellion and continued the fight after the rebel armies were pushed into Arkansas. After the South was defeated, he was one of the rebel leaders who fled to Mexico to start a new life.

This book covers his entire Civil War career, including the period when he was transferred east of the Mississippi. Books on Civil War Missouri and Arkansas skip this part of his career and books on the war east of the Mississippi tend to give him short shrift, so these chapters are of interest.

Of main interest to me were the chapters on Missouri, especially his 1864 invasion that serves as a backdrop to my novel, A Fine Likeness. These are very detailed and give a lot of insight into Price's strengths and many weaknesses. Always brave, always determined, he was not always competent and led his army to disaster on more than one occasion.

The maps are well done as well. All too often, military histories fall down on the maps. Luckily the author and publisher did a good job on simple yet detailed maps of the region in general and specific battles.

If you're interested in the war west of the Mississippi, you should definitely read this book.

View all my reviews

Civil War Photo Friday: hardtack

2011-10-21T08:10:00.002-05:00

Hardtack was one of the staples in the diet of both armies in the Civil War. It was supposed to last longer than regular bread and be more portable. Maybe it was, but that didn't stop soldiers from complaining about it. They had various names for it, from "tooth breakers" to "sheet metal crackers" to "worm castles." Judging from that last one I'm thinking it wasn't so long-lasting after all.

Hardtack was rarely eaten straight. The men dunked it in any liquid available in order to soften it up. Mixed with salt pork and dried vegetables, the other two army staples, it would make a reasonably balanced but unsavory meal.

Early in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness, the protagonist and his band of bushwhackers ambush a Union supply wagon. Once they send the soldiers running, they steal a barrel of gunpowder but leave the salt pork and hard tack. They're being fed by local secessionists so they see no reason to fill up their stomachs with bad army food when a home-cooked meal is waiting for them!

This Wikimedia Commons image shows some hard tack preserved in the Wentworth Museum in Pensacola, Florida. If you want to try making your own hardtack, check out this hardtack recipe.

Tell my boss to send me to Afghanistan

2011-10-20T03:47:00.000-05:00

As many of you know, I'm a travel blogger for Gadling, the world's most popular travel blog. I've done several series on adventure travel, including one on taking a road trip around Ethiopia, and another on living in an African city. I did another on visiting Somaliland.

In my more than 20 years of adventure travel, I've never been to Afghanistan, and it's always been at the top of my list. I visited Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province in the 1990's and spent several pleasant weeks among the Afghan communities there. Afghanistan's long history and varied cultures would make a great Gadling series. . .

. . .but I can't afford it. So I need your help. If you'd like to see a boots-on-the-ground series on Afghanistan written by yours truly, tell Gadling to be my sugar daddy. I'll write about culture, history, and daily life, all the things the news ignores. I already know an adventure travel company that can take me there. If enough people vote, maybe Gadling will send me!

Please leave a comment at this link, telling Gadling they need a series on Afghanistan.

[Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons]

Booker Prize vs. Literature Prize: how self-appointed guardians of "art" just don't get it

2011-10-19T09:25:00.002-05:00

As the entire literary world knows by now, Julian Barnes has won the Man Booker Prize. I haven't read any of the Booker shortlist this year so I can't judge whether his was the best, but he's a damn good writer and many pundits are saying this is more of a lifetime achievement award for him.

Also in the news is the whole kerfuffle over a rival prize being launched, The Literature Prize. Backers of the new prize claim this needed to be done because the Booker "now prioritises a notion of 'readability' over artistic achievement".

The Booker people fired back that they don't see how those two things are mutually exclusive.

The Literature Prize people said that, "a space has opened up for a new prize which is unequivocally about excellence - even if that sometimes means shortlisted books are more challenging and don't necessarily fall under the easy description of readable."

OK, while I may not write for the TLS or be on the Booker shortlist, let me just weigh in here. The purpose of writing is communication! Too much self-styled "literature" these days is overly elaborate prose with no center, no meaning. It's tinsel, pretty but essentially worthless. MFA programs are churning out writers by the thousand every year who have no real idea what makes a good novel, so they emphasize style or substance. They're poseurs, almost exclusively upper middle class, with little or no real-world experience. Trust me, I've met plenty. I've been to the readings. I've read the books and journals. I gave that whole world a chance. Really, I tried.

One successful travel writer and author I know graduated from a leading MFA program and complained that they never discussed plot in her classes! She had to learn how to do that by actually (gasp!) reading and writing a lot.

I don't care how much your prose shines, if you don't have a story, you don't have a novel. And if you can't make a reasonably intelligent reader understand what the fuck you're trying to say, you're not a writer.

The third interesting thing about the Booker Prize this year was the first Western to make a shortlist. The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt, a fellow Canadian. I'm glad to see a genre I love being accepted by the publishing elite. Here's hoping more great Westerns will be noticed by them in the future. The Sisters Brothers is now on my own personal shortlist of books to read. Expect a review here when I do.

Ride Around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863 out now!

2011-10-18T11:16:00.001-05:00

Today Osprey Publishing released Ride Around Missouri: Shelby's Great Raid 1863, my latest in a series of Civil War books. This one's nonfiction, but my Civil War novel will come out next month!

This book focuses on one of the Civil War's longest cavalry raids--Confederate cavalryman J.O. Shelby's ride up from Arkansas and through Union-held Missouri. His raiders destroyed infrastructure, skirmished with Union detachments, captured small forts, and led thousands of bluecoats on a merry chase that almost ended in disaster for Shelby at the Battle of Marshall.

This raid secured Shelby's reputation as one of the greatest raiders of the Civil War, yet it is often overlooked like so many other exciting events in the Trans-Mississippi Civil War. Two earlier raids he was on, led by General Marmaduke, are also covered.

Shelby was on Price's 1864 invasion of Missouri and is mentioned briefly in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Shelby makes an appearance in the as-yet-unnamed sequel. One of the protagonists in that book is in Shelby's Iron Brigade, but deserts in order to fight the war within the war, the supernatural battle between Order and Chaos. The second book will be out sometime in 2012.

Welcome all new followers!

2011-10-17T14:48:00.001-05:00

Participating in the Pay it Forward blogfest was lots of fun. I got a bunch of new followers and found some cool blogs I'd never heard of. It also turns out that one of the bloggers I picked, David over at Guerrilla Explorer, has just published his novel, a thriller filled with conspiracies and cryptids. So hit the link and check it out.

In a further attempt to make this blog more visible, I'm registering with Technorati, which explains the claim code that follows. T44E5PJRF3PX

That means nothing to my readers. Back with some more Civil War tomorrow!

Guest blogging about Ethiopia on the Osprey Publishing blog

2011-10-15T07:39:00.002-05:00

I have a guest post over at the Osprey Publishing blog about the city wall in Harar, Ethiopia. As regular readers of this blog know, I spent two months living in Harar earlier this year and wrote a series of posts about it.

Osprey being a military history publisher, this post focuses on how the medieval city wall helped preserve Harar's unique culture from outsiders. Head on over there and check it out! I'll be doing some more guest posts over there soon.

Pay it forward blogfest: my three picks

2011-10-14T05:34:00.000-05:00

Today I'm skipping my usual Civil War Photo Friday to participate in the Pay it Forward Blogfest. We're all supposed to pick three blogs that deserve more attention. So here we go. . .

A daily dose of the Civil War
The Civil War Daily Gazette tells you all the latest news, 150 years after it happened. That's right, this tireless blogger is going the distance and posting every day until 1865, um, I mean 2015. I found this blog a couple of months ago and quickly got addicted. It's one of the few blogs I visit daily.

Grumpy writer tells all
Dean Wesley Smith may already be known to you. He is a hardworking midlister like yours truly and has decided to mix traditional publishing with self-publishing via Kindle. Because he's chosen a similar career path, I read his regular rants about the publishing industry and where it's headed. I do find him overly negative about publishers and agents and don't agree with his analysis all the time. That's a good thing. There would be no point in reading him if I always agreed with him!

Lost Treasure! Mysteries of History! Cryptids! Conspiracies!
Guerrilla Explorer takes on the shadowy areas of the world and history. Did Hitler fake his death? Probably not, but there's some intriguing evidence that makes this less silly than it sounds. I'm not convinced those Russian scientists will find anything on their Yeti hunt though. Oh, and the post on the Student Loan Conspiracy was downright depressing.

Head on over to these blogs and see if you like them. If you do, give them some love and leave a comment. tell them I sent you!

Weapons shortage in the Civil War

2011-10-13T08:57:00.001-05:00

Flipping through Carolyn Bartels' The Civil War in Missouri Day by Day I found an interesting entry for the skirmish at Linn Creek on October 14. I'll tell you about it today because tomorrow I'll be participating in the Pay it Forward Blogfest.

Union Major Clark Wright had heard that the town of Linn Creek in south central Missouri was occupied by rebels, so he sent two of his men in civilian clothing to check it out. They didn't come back and fearing the worst, Wright advanced with his entire regiment towards town. Local rumor said there were 200 rebels there. He surrounded the town and ordered the rebels to surrender. Instead they tried to shoot their way out. The Union troops immediately returned fire. The fight was brisk for a short time but because both sides had good cover only one man was wounded, on the rebel side.

As Major Wright noted in his report, "The scene was a wild one. The activity of the cavalry in guarding the avenues of the place, arresting the citizens, and the rebels running to and for; the screams of secesh wives, daughters, and children; the firing from both sides echoing back form the bluffs on either side, made the whole thing look somewhat frantic."

After half an hour the rebels realized they weren't going to escape and surrendered. At this point Major Wright discovered he wasn't facing 200 rebels, merely 37. Along with the Confederates he captured, "horse, 5; mules, 2; guns, 26; holster-pistols, 2; 1 keg powder; 1/2 bushel of bullets."

It's interesting that for 37 rebels he only got 28 guns. Assuming nobody had more than one gun, that still leaves 9 rebels unarmed. Supply was a serious problem for the Confederates in the Trans-Mississippi throughout the war. Numerous Union reports from Missouri in 1861 state that the captured arms were shotguns, squirrel guns, or antique muskets. It was a lucky rebel who had an Enfield like the one pictured above, and few had more modern weapons such as the Springfield rifled musket or Sharps rifle. As the war dragged on, the rebels managed to take better weapons off dead or captured Union soldiers. They would never get enough.

Wright never said what happened to those two missing men. They weren't listed as casualties or desertions, so I assume they came out OK.

Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Book review: A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration and Use of Arms and Armor in All Countries and in All Times

2011-10-12T02:40:00.001-05:00

A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration and Use of Arms and Armor in All Countries and in All Times by George Cameron Stone

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A flawed but classic study.
My high school library had a copy of this book and I spent many hours poring over the descriptions of odd weapons and staring at the hundreds of photographs. When I grew up and started researching and writing military history, I consulted it again. What a disappointment! This book is filled with mistakes. Stone was an expert on Asian arms and armor but makes countless errors when he writes outside his area of expertise. He should have had a coauthor!

That said, you can still learn a lot about Asian militaria from this book, and the photos are a goldmine of information no matter what region you study. I suggest buying The Complete Encyclopaedia of Arms and Weapons, edited by Tarassuk and Blair, instead of Stone's work. If you have deep pockets, buy both.

NOTE: This review is of the original 1961 edition. I haven't seen the later facsimile edition. Another reviewer said the photos are poor quality in the facsimile. They weren't too good in the original, although they were clear enough. I suppose they may have lost some quality in the reprint.

View all my reviews

I've added an RSS feed for Civil War Horror

2011-10-11T07:47:00.000-05:00

On the upper right-hand side of this blog you'll see a newly added RSS feed. As the publication date of my Civil War novel approaches, I'll be blogging more frequently and will be adding special guest bloggers and giveaways. Be sure to catch all the action by subscribing to my feed!

Civil War Photo Friday: The Fog of War

2011-10-07T02:03:00.000-05:00

"The fog of war". . .we often hear that term to describe the chaos and confusion of the battlefield. Back in the days of black powder, however, it was quite literally a fog. Check out this Wikimedia Commons photos of some Confederate reenactors setting off a volley. Each one gets a little puff of gunsmoke in his face while a big cloud of it shoots out of the end of his rifle.

I use this fact in several scenes in my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Faces are an important element of the plot, and the fact that an enemy soldier literally becomes faceless when he shoots at you gets used for symbolic effect.

Strangely enough, this photo was taken in England. the caption says, "Civil War reenactment at American Museum, Bath The American Museum in Bath is dedicated to showing how our transatlantic cousins lived from the 1680s to the 1860s. Set in Claverton Manor, this gorgeous neo-classical house was bought by two Americans in 1961 to display their collection of American furniture and artefacts. Eighteen period rooms show the development of America, from the time of the earliest English settlers to the eve of the Civil War. Look out for re-enactments and special workshops. These include displays of Native American dancing and a re-enactment of a Civil War battle. The American Museum, Claverton Manor, Bath BA2 7BD."

Armies of the Adowa Campaign gets its first review, and it's five stars!

2011-10-06T08:12:00.000-05:00

My Armies of the Adowa Campiagn 1896: Italian Disaster in Ethiopia has been out less than a month and has already gotten its first review on Amazon. It's a five-star review from one of Amazon's Top 500 reviewers! I've included it below.

"Whenever you order a new book from Osprey, you never know what you are going to get. At worst, the author is an enthusiastic amateur who knows everything about the subject but writes terribly. Other times, the book is from one Osprey's "period experts" and the books reads like someone's masters thesis. Sometimes, the books turn out great and are models of how to cover a complex subject in an easy to read format. Fortunately, "Armies of the Adowa Campaign" is an example of Osprey Publishing at its very best.

"The author Sean McLachlan, is a good writer and it is easy to follow the intricacies of this complex military campaign. As in the best Osprey titles, McLachlan did his research and he obviously loves the subject. In addition, the maps are clear, the photographs are interesting and the illustrations by Raffaele Ruggeri are absolutely first rate. A better introduction to the Italian disaster in Ethiopia cannot be imagined.

"As a final note, for those really interested in this campaign be sure to check out "La Guerre Coloniali Italiane 1885/1900" by Raffaele Ruggeri, the illustrator of the book reviewed. It is a bilingual English/Italian work that follows a format very similar to the one popularized by Osprey Publishing. It is 88 pages long and is filled with great photos and illustrations. It will take a little leg work to find it but it is a great supplement to the "Armies of Adowa""

Book review: The Civil War in Louisiana

2011-10-05T07:50:00.000-05:00

The Civil War in Louisiana by John D. Winters

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In his exhaustive look at the war in Louisiana, Winters examines not only the military aspects of the war, but their political, economic, and to a lesser extent social aspects as well. He goes into great detail and provides a thorough synthesis of the war in that state.

I had two complaints, though. First was the lack of an overall map of Louisiana. This would have helped with the large number of place names, many of which are unfamiliar to anyone not from there.

The second problem was Winters' coverage of the black population. A white author writing in 1963, his attitudes are a bit antiquated. He can't seem to understand why slaves would rebel if given the chance, and considers this to be nothing but common criminality. He is also overly critical of the ability of black units, many of which were given scanty training and scantier provisions.

These two problems do somewhat lessen the value of the book, yet it is still important reading for anyone studying the Trans-Mississippi theater of the war.

View all my reviews

Studying the page proofs for A Fine Likeness

2011-10-04T10:10:00.000-05:00

The ebook design company 52 Novels has sent me the page proofs for A Fine Likeness. I haven't looked through the whole thing yet but so far I'm very satisfied with the result. Since my cover is simple two-tone with a black and white photo, it transferred to black and white very well. And now that the new color Kindle is out, readers will be able to see my brother-in-law's design in all its glory.

While I still have a fair amount of close examination to go through before I give the final thumbs up, it looks like my novel is one step closer to completion!

I chose 52 Novels on the recommendation of several fellow midlisters and because their rates are reasonable. I looked at the programming and formatting end of the operation and figured that with a couple of days of hair pulling I could do it myself, but decided that a little extra work for Gadling would more than cover the cost. Lots of Kindle and Smashwords authors are formatting their own ebooks. For me, though, it made financial sense to get someone else to do it.

Civil War Photo Friday: A Union blockhouse

2011-09-30T03:49:00.000-05:00

In the Civil War, both sides quickly realized the importance of fortification. Blockhouses like this one could be made from logs quickly and cheaply, and provided protection from bullets. They were especially useful in Missouri against bushwhackers, who didn't have artillery and therefore couldn't take such simple fortifications.

There was a famous incident in Missouri in 1864 when the bushwhacker gang of Bloody Bill Anderson, which included Frank and Jesse James, attacked a blockhouse in Fayette. They were bloodily repulsed. One of the protagonists in my Civil War novel has unwillingly joined up with Bloody Bill and he and his friends don't fare too well during this attack.

One of the fun things about researching a historical novel is pairing up fiction with real history. For example, my other protagonist is a fictional Union captain named Richard Addison who is charged with protecting Columbia, Missouri. I knew there was a blockhouse at the intersection of 8th St. and Broadway. It was put there because it was one of the town's main intersections, but I also add the detail that Captain Addison's drygoods store is on that corner and so the blockhouse was put there to keep the local secessionists from burning his store down.

I talk more about the use of blockhouses to ward off guerrilla attacks in my book American Civil War Guerrilla Tactics.

Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Copperheads: hated by both sides in the Civil War

2011-09-29T05:35:00.000-05:00

I recently finished reading The Lyon Campaign in Missouri: Being A History of the First Iowa Infantry. This book is filled with interesting anecdotes such as how to shoot squirrels. It also gives insights into the politics of the war in Iowa. The author says about a third of his fellow Iowans were for the South. The main issue was slavery and what to do about it, and one of the main arguments against getting rid of slavery and making black people citizens was "Would you let a Negro marry your daughter?"

Sad to say, I've heard this same argument used as recently as the 1980s.

Even if a third of Iowans were for the rebels (an astonishing figure for such a northern state) most didn't go fight. They were the so-called Copperheads. The author states, "They were perhaps the most numerous and most contemptible lot of scoundrels that appear in history. They wanted the South to win, but would not fight for it. After the war was over the soldiers of the North and South, having gotten acquainted with each other, fraternized. Neither side ever afterwards fraternized much with the Northern 'copperhead' or 'doughface'"

Photo of Copperhead pamphlet courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

What does it take to be a successful author on Amazon?

2011-09-28T08:18:00.000-05:00

Over at the Kindle Direct Publishing Forum I've been involved in a discussion of what it takes to be a successful author on Amazon. Marti Talbott provided this concise list of good advice. While the list could go on for a lot longer, this is certainly a good start. Thanks to Marti for permission to repost this.

1. A summary/blurb/description that is exciting enough to sell the book
2. A well written book people will tell others about.
3. Fairly decent cover art.
4. Using your real name in your promotions, or at least the same name over and over again. Name recognition is very important. If you have a common name, try a nick name.
5. Networking works. Golden promotion is when someone else recommends your book to others.
6. Polish it, get an editor, even if you think you have done your best. A bad first review is very hard to overcome.
7. Read, read, read everything you can on publishing, both in Kindle and other versions.
8. Never miss a chance to promote

So when's the book coming out?

2011-09-27T04:47:00.001-05:00

I've been getting this question a lot lately. I was originally planning on having A Fine Likeness come out in late September but had to push it back because the layout people who are getting the ebook ready for Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords have a long list of customers and won't get it to me until October 5. I was planning on bringing out immediately afterwards but now I'm buried in a deadline for my next Osprey Publishing book.

The Osprey book is on the James-Youger gang's ill-fated Northfield raid. I have to get the art references in by the end of this month and will not have time to do a proper marketing blitz for my novel. I also need time to get the layout done for the print version of A Fine Likeness.

So what I'm thinking is having it come out very late in October. This puts it close to Halloween (always good for a horror novel) and allows me to get my paid projects out of the way first. Stay tuned for more news once I have an exact release date, and thanks to all of you who asked!