Gottfried's efforts to study and illustrate the major campaigns of the Civil War's Eastern Theater. This is his fifth book in the ongoing Savas Beatie Military Atlas Series. The previous four were The Maps of Gettysburg (2007), The Maps of First Bull Run (2009), The Maps of Antietam (2012), and The Maps of the Bristoe Station and Mine Run Campaigns (2013).This latest magisterial work breaks down the entire campaign (and all related operational maneuvers) into 24 map sets or "action-sections" enriched with 120 original full-page color maps. These spectacular cartographic creations bore down to the regimental and battery level. The Maps of the Wilderness includes an assessment of the winter of 1863-1864, the planning for the campaign, the crossing of the Rapidan River, and two days of bloody combat and the day of watchful stalemate thereafter.At least one--and as many as eight--maps accompany each "action-section." Opposite each map is a full facing page of detailed footnoted text describing the units, personalities, movements, and combat (including quotes from eyewitnesses) depicted on the accompanying map, all of which make the story of the first large-scale combat of 1864 come alive. Each cartographic snapshot also serves to unlock everything ever written on the subject. This detailed coverage also includes an order of battle, interview with the author, bibliography, and an index.This original presentation leads readers on a journey through the epic battle that would prove to be the opening salvo in a prolonged fight that would not end until the Confederates surrendered at Appomattox in April 1865. The Wilderness Campaign has two unique characteristics. First, although he did not command the Army of the Potomac, the battle was Ulysses S. Grant's first against General Robert E. Lee. Second, the Wilderness fighting--prolonged, bloody, and inconclusive--is widely viewed as the most confusing action of the entire war. The dense thickets and deep smoke obscured much of what occurred during the two days of combat. Gottfried's book cuts through the confusion to deliver a clear account of the horrendous struggle.Perfect for the easy chair or for walking hallowed ground, The Maps of the Wilderness is a seminal work that, like his earlier studies, belongs on the bookshelf of every serious and casual student of the Civil War, or in the hands of an avid enthusiast out walking the Hallowed Ground.

    Federal commander Ulysses S. Grant had resolved to destroy his Confederate adversaries through attrition if by no other means. He would just keep at them until he used them up.Meanwhile, Grant s Confederate counterpart, Robert E. Lee, looked for an opportunity to regain the offensive initiative. We must strike them a blow, he told his lieutenants.The toll on both armies was staggering.But Grant s war of attrition began to take its toll in a more insidious way. Both army commanders operating on the dark edge of exhaustion, fighting off illness, pressure-cooked by stress began to feel the effects of that continuous, merciless grind in very personal ways. Punch-drunk tired, they began to second-guess themselves, began missing opportunities, began making mistakes.As a result, along the banks of the North Anna River, commanders on both sides brought their armies to the brink of destruction without even knowing it.Picking up the story started in the Emerging Civil War Series book A Season of Slaughter: The Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse, historian Chris Mackowski follows the road south to the North Anna River. Strike Them a Blow: Battle Along the North Anna River offers a concise, engaging account of the mistakes and missed opportunities of the third and least understood phase of the Overland Campaign.REVIEWS A fascinating account of just one battle during the American Civil War. -Books Monthly"

    Lee's Army of Northern Virginia encompasses the defense and evacuation of the Confederate capital of Richmond, the horrific combat in the trenches of Petersburg, General Robert E. Lee's withdrawal toward the Carolinas in his forlorn hope of a rendezvous with General Joseph E. Johnston's Army of Tennessee to carry on the fight, the relentless pursuit of Union forces, and the ultimate realization that further resistance against overwhelming odds was futile.The Army of Northern Virginia was the fighting soul of the Confederacy in the Eastern Theater of the Civil War. From its inception, it fought against overwhelming odds. Union forces might have occupied territory, but as long as the Confederate army was active in the field, the rebellion was alive. Through four years of bitter conflict, the Army of Northern Virginia and its longtime commander, General Robert E. Lee, became the stuff of legend. By April 1865, its days were numbered.There are many stories of heroism and sacrifice, both Union and Confederate, during the Civil War, and Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia wrote their own epic chapter. Author Michael E. Haskew, a researcher, writer, and editor of many military history subjects for over twenty years, puts the hardship and deprivation suffered by this Army's soldiers while defending their home and ideals into proper perspective.