The Seven Days : The Emergence of Lee

Rating:
Summary: A well-written account of the Seven Days Battles
Review: A wonderful break from the usual, with Dowdey displaying an absolute mastery of the material. McClellan (heroically) dominates the early parts, with Johnston and Magruder as fools and Lincoln and Stanton as MacBeth's witches. The author's appreciation of the North's and South's politics is outstanding and adds a livid dimension to this oft-told tale. His single failure is in the matter of comparative (numerical) strengths. Don't miss it.

Rating:
Summary: A well-written account of the Seven Days Battles
Review: Clifford Dowdey's work, "The Seven Days: The Emergence of Lee," is a well-written, detailed and informative record of the series of clashes between Union and Confederate forces known as the Seven Days Battles that occurred near the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia in late June 1862.

Dowdey describes, in rich detail, the initial Union planning and preparations for the amphibious landing on the York Peninsula (between the James and York Rivers). He details the Union Army of the Potomac's successful landing on the York Peninsula in May 1862 and its methodical advance up the peninsula towards Richmond led by its commanding officer, Major General George B. McClellan. The Confederate forces, commanded by General Joseph E. Johnston, are seen by Dowdey as ill-led as they continually retreated in successive fashion towards the outskirts of the Confederate capital and prepared themselves for a siege. Finally, with the Union Army divided north and south of the Chickahominy River, Dowdey chronicles Johnston's decision to turn on the Union forces at Seven Pines on May 31, only to fight an inconclusive battle. Johnston himself was wounded in the late hours of the battle, and his replacement was General Robert E. Lee, until that moment the military advisor to Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Upon assuming command, Lee immediately devised a series of offensive strikes against the still-divided Union forces, but Dowdey argues that Lee's ultimate failure to crush the Union Army was due to a combination of many factors. Poor Confederate staff planning was in clear evidence from the beginning to the end of the Seven Days Battles. General Lee failed time and again to assume direct operational control of ever-changing battle situations where his subordinates failed to drive forward against the enemy (for example, "Stonewall" Jackson's failure to push forward his drive on the Confederate northern and left flank at the Battle of Mechaniscville). Lee was also hampered by the uneven quality of his subordinate commanders, particularly the deaf and old Theophilus Holmes, the inept Benjamin Huger and the mentally exhausted Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson (who suffered, according to Dowdey, from stress fatigue). Last, but certainly not least, the surprisingly well disciplined, hard-fighting and well-led (at the brigade, divisional and corps levels) Union troops frustrated Lee's strategic and tactical battle plans at virtually every turn.

Dowdey's work provides wonderfully detailed descriptions of all of the major battles: Seven Pines, Fair Oaks Station, Mechanicsville, Gaines's Mill, Savage's Station and Malvern Hill. In addition, he also aids the reader by providing a series of detailed maps and descriptions of the complex web of major and minor roads and country lanes that were fundamental to the movement of the armies - Union and Confederate - during the Seven Days Battles. I found, however, one very annoying aspect about the work. I strongly disagreed with Dowdey's one-sided and dismissive view of Confederate General Joseph Johnston as a defeatist general who possessed no redeeming personal or military abilities. Johnston was clearly one of the most effective of all the Confederate generals, one whose primary concern was the care and welfare of the men under his command. He never took unnecessary risks in battle, for he knew that the Confederacy had a limited pool of available manpower with which to fight the Union.

Despite this one point of disagreement, I found Dowdey's work to be an excellent study of the Seven Days Battles. His insistence on "visual history" - that a historian must visit the battlefield that he is studying in order to more effectively understand the movements of the opposing armies, thereby aiding him in writing a work that the reader will follow clearly - is very much in evidence in this book.

Rating:
Summary: Somewhat Muddled.
Review: Dowdey is a Southerner writing about the South's Civil War view of God, Robert E. Lee, so this effort is biased from the get go. But it is a reasonable summation of the final days of the Peninsula Campaign when George B. McClellan frittered away an early, life threatening blow to the Confederacy. So close to the Confederate Capital his troops could see Richmond's church spires, McClellan retreats despite winning the majority of the battles fought during these seven days. Lee, thrust into command after the wounding of Joe Johnston, has no strategic alternative. He has no choice but to attack. This he does with gusto.

In the face of these consistent attacks which decimate the South's army, McClelland, believing himself outnumbered, retreats and Lee's only course of action, attack, bluffs the Union commander into submission. Today most people recognize that Lee had no alternative. Equally important, most observers, North and South, are aghast at McClelland's horrific performance which he would repeat against the same antagonist at Antietam.

There is no doubt that Robert E. Lee rose to the occasion and did his very best under the most difficult circumstances. But before we deify Lee, it must be remembered that he all but destroyed his army facing a general who simply would not fight. This is an overview of those battles.

Rating:
Summary: 7 Days Misses the Mark
Review: This is a serviceable account of the 1862 Peninsular campaign. Despite all the huge amont of literature on the Civil War (a lot of it redundant), there is surprisingly little on this pivotal aspect of the conflict. Mr. Dowdey writes in the talkative style of the old school historian. The supposed strength of this book is its attention to geographical detail. At times I found that the authors attention to roads and trails did not match the attention that should have been payed to the battles described. Like most Civil War historians Dowdey does not get into much detail about the tactics employed by either side. We never learn in what formations (or lack thereof) any of the troops were fighting in. The battles themselves are frequently described in rather muddled fashion. Dowdey frequently digresses in his descriptions, which further confuses the narrative flow. As a Southener Dowdey pays most attention to Southern activities. Thus we get all sorts of mini-bios on Confederate generals, but little on their Union counterparts. The chronology of events is also a bit confused. What Dowdey does well is provide a good overall description of the campaign, and he provides good insight into MacClellan's vague plans for his capture of Richmond. Dowdey is a bit hard on Joe Johnston's style of command before Lee takes over. Also the book points out well the complete lack of staff work on the part of Civil War armies in this period. European observers oftern laughed at the slip-shod attempts to provide this esstential service. None of the so-called great Civil War commanders ever appreciated this vital aspect of command. Hence the reason why armies often blundered into each other, and why the battles of the 7 Days lacked any decisive results. Dowdey's work is perhaps a bit dated, but is well written, and worth a casual read.

Rating:
Summary: 7 Days Misses the Mark
Review: This is a serviceable account of the 1862 Peninsular campaign. Despite all the huge amont of literature on the Civil War (a lot of it redundant), there is surprisingly little on this pivotal aspect of the conflict. Mr. Dowdey writes in the talkative style of the old school historian. The supposed strength of this book is its attention to geographical detail. At times I found that the authors attention to roads and trails did not match the attention that should have been payed to the battles described. Like most Civil War historians Dowdey does not get into much detail about the tactics employed by either side. We never learn in what formations (or lack thereof) any of the troops were fighting in. The battles themselves are frequently described in rather muddled fashion. Dowdey frequently digresses in his descriptions, which further confuses the narrative flow. As a Southener Dowdey pays most attention to Southern activities. Thus we get all sorts of mini-bios on Confederate generals, but little on their Union counterparts. The chronology of events is also a bit confused. What Dowdey does well is provide a good overall description of the campaign, and he provides good insight into MacClellan's vague plans for his capture of Richmond. Dowdey is a bit hard on Joe Johnston's style of command before Lee takes over. Also the book points out well the complete lack of staff work on the part of Civil War armies in this period. European observers oftern laughed at the slip-shod attempts to provide this esstential service. None of the so-called great Civil War commanders ever appreciated this vital aspect of command. Hence the reason why armies often blundered into each other, and why the battles of the 7 Days lacked any decisive results. Dowdey's work is perhaps a bit dated, but is well written, and worth a casual read.