Rating: 
Summary: An indispensable guide to musketry and tactics
Review: As a long-term Civil war buff and miniature wargamer, I found Brent Nosworthy's "The Bloody Crucible of Courage" to be thought-provoking and stimulating, forcing me to relook at some of my long-held perceptions regarding Civil War combat tactics. As with his previous work om the Napoleonic period, the author carefully examines the wepons, tactics, and combat methods. Often, authors who tackle this subject tend to take a strictly North American viewpoint, isolating ACW events, strategy, and battlefield tactics to a nationalistic perspective. Mr. Nosworthy properly examines how global military tactics and international advances in weapons and killing power significantly influenced Civil War thinking (well beyiond the trite and conventional comments often seen that Civil War officers used Napoleonic tactics). Nosworthy correctly points out that the mid-19th Century American officers were much moire in tune with more recent tactivs being used in Europe and elsewhere (perhaps reminiscent of Napoleon in spome aspects, but certainly not to the extent that other writers have claimed). As a tour guide and frequent speaker at Gettysburg, I am so tired of the cliches that Pickett and Lee were trying to recreate some grand assualt at Borodino or Waterloo on Day 3 at Gettysburg. Brent Nosworthy helps keep the Civil War in its proper context, and offers some fresh ideas that are well-worth strong consideration. A must read for any serious Civil War enthusiast!
Rating:
Summary: An indispensable guide to musketry and tactics
Review: As a long-term Civil war buff and miniature wargamer, I found Brent Nosworthy's "The Bloody Crucible of Courage" to be thought-provoking and stimulating, forcing me to relook at some of my long-held perceptions regarding Civil War combat tactics. As with his previous work om the Napoleonic period, the author carefully examines the wepons, tactics, and combat methods. Often, authors who tackle this subject tend to take a strictly North American viewpoint, isolating ACW events, strategy, and battlefield tactics to a nationalistic perspective. Mr. Nosworthy properly examines how global military tactics and international advances in weapons and killing power significantly influenced Civil War thinking (well beyiond the trite and conventional comments often seen that Civil War officers used Napoleonic tactics). Nosworthy correctly points out that the mid-19th Century American officers were much moire in tune with more recent tactivs being used in Europe and elsewhere (perhaps reminiscent of Napoleon in spome aspects, but certainly not to the extent that other writers have claimed). As a tour guide and frequent speaker at Gettysburg, I am so tired of the cliches that Pickett and Lee were trying to recreate some grand assualt at Borodino or Waterloo on Day 3 at Gettysburg. Brent Nosworthy helps keep the Civil War in its proper context, and offers some fresh ideas that are well-worth strong consideration. A must read for any serious Civil War enthusiast!
Rating: 
Summary: Stirring up the Devil's Den
Review: First, this is a difficult book to place - I found it while browsing in a bookstore, and it fully met my expectations, but it's not for the general audience, and probably not even the general Civil War reader. Two key groups who would most benefit from this book are Napoleonic and Civil War re-enactors and gamers. The latter would include both computer, board and miniatures players, and the book directly addresses problems each of those genres faces in verisimilitude. For example, the discussions of placement of artillery and types of ammunition bring forth considerations that are ignored by most games on the market, especially the psychological effects.
Nosworthy sets out to write the definitive book, but falls short; but it's certainly the best attempt yet. He starts with the decades before the war, examining practices in Europe, and finishes with several excellent chapters which stand alone as essays. These discuss the place of the Civil War in military history and thinking. The discussions of tactical doctrine are enlivened by vivid anecdotes. This relieves the potentially dreary theoretical passages, but the jumps can be disorienting. Sometimes the anecdotes are on point, other times, their usefulness is questionable. It needs better editing, both on this scale and to fix the numerous smaller typos and editing problems.
Despite these misgivings, I'd highly recommend this book -- he examines many 'myths' of the Civil War, such as the diminished role of cavalry; the effectiveness of edged weapons; the rifled versus smoothbore controversy for both artillery and small arms. (If these topics don't pique your interest, the book's probably not for you). The bayonet discussions in particular are novel - while agreeing with the consensus view that bayonet wounds were rare, he makes the stronger argument that bayonet ATTACKS played a key role in many actions. The rifle-smoothbore discussions also provide an excellent view of the historical transitions and adjustments from the French Revolutionary army thru Napoleon and the Civil War to the German domination in 1870. He tries to overturn many long held truisms about the Civil War, but the evidence he presents varies in its persuasiveness. At the least, though, he provides alternatives for what is often by hindsight thought of as obvious -- e.g., the long discussions of rifled and breech loading weapons are shown to have many more considerations, such as difficulty of aiming (muskets fire at the level, while rifles fire on a parabolic curve and require more precise attention). Of sidebar interest too, is the dominance of Scientific American in the military debates of the 1840-60's. Its current emphasis on theoretical and cutting edge advances in pure science obscures thee fact that it in the 19th century a much stronger emphasis was on the engineering and mechanical arts. This book is both larger and smaller than it seems at first glance and heft -- it's 750 pages long, but the print is larger than average and the paper is thick, making for a pleasant tactile feel. In content, the book wanders, sometimes dealing in broad strategic and tactical analysis, other times dropping down to the minutiae of combat anecdotes.
Rating:
Summary: A superlative study of Civil War combat
Review: I will start out by admitting a personal interest in Brent Nosworthy's "The Bloody Crucible of Courage: Fighting Methods and Combat Experience of the Civil War". For several years I have aided Mr. Nosworthy in researching this book and by reading various drafts as it evolved. He delved deep into standard material such as personal memoirs and the Official Record's (CD-ROM searches in those 100,000-plus pages proved of immense value in the course of the research, allowing for a completeness of inquiry simply not possible before), and also into seldom-used sources such as "Scientific American" and the Fall River, Massachusetts, "Manufacturer and Farmer's Journal" for a mid-Ninteenth Century perspective as he examined weapons technology and tactical theory, implementation, and evolution. It is no wonder that Joseph Bilby says: "This is a landmark work that establishes a new standard of excellence. No future Civil War campaign or battle study will be written without extensive reference to The Bloody Crucible of Courage." Gordon Rhea states it "deserves an honored place on the shelf of every Civil War scholar and buff." And Paddy Griffith writes;" The Bloody Crucible of Courage" is indeed the book we have long been waiting for! It is essential reading, not least for the wider European perspective that it casts upon a war that has too often in the past been viewed through very parochial spectacles. And beyond that refreshing historiographical perspective, this work also offers us a truly magnificent quarry of facts, explanations and pertinent interpretations that every student of the Civil War will surely want to keep constantly at hand." Often I take such dust jacket blurbs with a grain of salt, but this is one case where I will gladly support the opinions expressed. This is not a dry, encyclopedic recounting of weapons specifications or tactical minutiae of how the third sergeant should move when a company changes from line of battle to a column of fours by the left flank. Rather, it is a highly readable work that ranges far and wide across infantry, artillery, cavalry and even naval forces, exploring how combat was really conducted and how that came about, looking at the roots of the weapons and tactical systems in Europe as well as in the US, and following the lengthy and often heated debates that were waged during the 1850's and well into the war over these matters. These discussions are illuminated by numerous battlefield examples of the use of these weapons and tactics, vividly described. Probably no such debate was more crucial than that over the best shoulder weapon to be issued to infantry: rifled versus smoothbore, muzzleloading versus breechloading. And contrary to modern assumptions, the choice was not at the time altogether straightforward and obvious, even given the experience of recent European wars. One of the intriguing elements that arises from Nosworthy's analysis of these matters is that he tentatively concludes that, for reasons still not entirely understood, in general American troops appeared to achieve better results (i.e., inflicted higher numbers of losses) than their European counterparts, whether using smoothbores or rifle-muskets. This book has been a long time coming. The very first time I contacted Brent Nosworthy, whose name I knew from his excellent book on Napoleonic warfare, was to ask him whether some day he might write a similar one on American Civil War tactics. Little did I know where this simple question would eventually lead. "The Bloody Crucible of Courage" is a book I am proud to have helped in any fashion to come into being. There has never been a comparable work published about the Civil War, and I am confident that it will do much to shape our future perceptions and study of that conflict. It gets my highest recommendation.
Rating:
Summary: A superlative study of Civil War combat
Review: I will start out by admitting a personal interest in Brent Nosworthy's "The Bloody Crucible of Courage: Fighting Methods and Combat Experience of the Civil War". For several years I have aided Mr. Nosworthy in researching this book and by reading various drafts as it evolved. He delved deep into standard material such as personal memoirs and the Official Record's (CD-ROM searches in those 100,000-plus pages proved of immense value in the course of the research, allowing for a completeness of inquiry simply not possible before), and also into seldom-used sources such as "Scientific American" and the Fall River, Massachusetts, "Manufacturer and Farmer's Journal" for a mid-Ninteenth Century perspective as he examined weapons technology and tactical theory, implementation, and evolution. It is no wonder that Joseph Bilby says: "This is a landmark work that establishes a new standard of excellence. No future Civil War campaign or battle study will be written without extensive reference to The Bloody Crucible of Courage." Gordon Rhea states it "deserves an honored place on the shelf of every Civil War scholar and buff." And Paddy Griffith writes;" The Bloody Crucible of Courage" is indeed the book we have long been waiting for! It is essential reading, not least for the wider European perspective that it casts upon a war that has too often in the past been viewed through very parochial spectacles. And beyond that refreshing historiographical perspective, this work also offers us a truly magnificent quarry of facts, explanations and pertinent interpretations that every student of the Civil War will surely want to keep constantly at hand." Often I take such dust jacket blurbs with a grain of salt, but this is one case where I will gladly support the opinions expressed. This is not a dry, encyclopedic recounting of weapons specifications or tactical minutiae of how the third sergeant should move when a company changes from line of battle to a column of fours by the left flank. Rather, it is a highly readable work that ranges far and wide across infantry, artillery, cavalry and even naval forces, exploring how combat was really conducted and how that came about, looking at the roots of the weapons and tactical systems in Europe as well as in the US, and following the lengthy and often heated debates that were waged during the 1850's and well into the war over these matters. These discussions are illuminated by numerous battlefield examples of the use of these weapons and tactics, vividly described. Probably no such debate was more crucial than that over the best shoulder weapon to be issued to infantry: rifled versus smoothbore, muzzleloading versus breechloading. And contrary to modern assumptions, the choice was not at the time altogether straightforward and obvious, even given the experience of recent European wars. One of the intriguing elements that arises from Nosworthy's analysis of these matters is that he tentatively concludes that, for reasons still not entirely understood, in general American troops appeared to achieve better results (i.e., inflicted higher numbers of losses) than their European counterparts, whether using smoothbores or rifle-muskets. This book has been a long time coming. The very first time I contacted Brent Nosworthy, whose name I knew from his excellent book on Napoleonic warfare, was to ask him whether some day he might write a similar one on American Civil War tactics. Little did I know where this simple question would eventually lead. "The Bloody Crucible of Courage" is a book I am proud to have helped in any fashion to come into being. There has never been a comparable work published about the Civil War, and I am confident that it will do much to shape our future perceptions and study of that conflict. It gets my highest recommendation.
Rating: 
Summary: Review of the Bloody Crucible of Courage
Review: In writing the "Bloody Crucible of Courage" Mr. Nosworty undertook a comprehensive study of interrelated subjects that are not well represented in the plethora of literature on the War. While presenting a large amount of carefully-researched and well-documented information, the author has not written a good book. Content is of major importance in any book, but presentation, balance, accuracy and many other factors affect the quality and value of the work. It is in these supporting factors that "The Bloody Crucible..." falls short. The subtitle of the book "Fighting Methods and Combat Experience in the Civil War" is inaccurate. It would have been far more accurate to to have subtitled it "Fighting Methods and Combat Experiences of the Union Army in the Civil War" for the text is so heavily weighted toward the Union Army that the reader is left wondering if there were significant differences in the Confederate approach or if the conditions under which the Confedrates fought or cultural differences led to other methods. There is little comparison or contrast between the two armies or between the Eastern and Western theaters. This reader felt short-changed. A notable example is the short shrift given to the Confederate cavalry of the early war years. There appears to be a bias toward the Union that is not appropriate with the historical perspective we now have. The bias is reflected in the anecdotal material which is so filled with accounts of stunning Union victories and routs of Confederates that a reader could be hard-pressed to understand how the war lasted four years. Perhaps his personal military experience influences the author to take regimental histories and first hand accounts at face value. To put this type of material in perspective I suggest he at least reread "Battles and Leaders..." and consider the self-serving nature of much of the material therein. In the Introduction the author criticizes Ian Drury and Tony Gibbons for not using anecdotal material in their excellent "The Civil War Machine". In the "Crucible..." he gives a vivid demonstration of the hazards of doing so by presenting the reader with:(1) Large--in my opinion excessive--amounts of anecdotal material (2) Anecdotes too lengthy for the minor points they make, and (3) Anecdotes not sharply focused on the point. The overall impression is that the anecdotes are being used as filler. In fact there is so much material that is not clearly related to the theme of the book that it appears the contract called for 650 pages and that's what they were going to get.
The penultimate chapter "Tactical Development in European Warfare 1859-71" and the final chapter "Conclusions" which is primarily devoted to "The Impact of Systematic Biases on Military History" and "What Must be Done' exemplify material that is far away from the theme of the book. A great part of the value and utility of a book like "The Bloody Crucible..." lies in careful editing to focus the book on its subject and to repair or remove those sentences and paprgraphs that don't work. This book would have benefitted greatly from one more time through. I often found myself rereading turgid or confusing material to get the sense of it. I was not always successful. Equally important is the attention to such things as foot- or endnoting and indexing. The endnote system in this book uses no numbering system and thus no number on the page where the note applies. It is obviously cheaper to produce the book with this system, but this system is hard to use and does not lend itself to additional expository or anecdotal material that breaks the flow of the text. It is not a system worthy of serious historical writing. The index contains errors--a serious fault and one that can easily be corrected by attention to detail. Index errors seriously degrade the books use as a reference. The overall impression is that rushing the book into production was more important than producing a book of high quality and utility This book will gather dust, unlikely to be reread or frequently referred to.
Rating:
Summary: Review of the Bloody Crucible of Courage
Review: In writing the "Bloody Crucible of Courage" Mr. Nosworty undertook a comprehensive study of interrelated subjects that are not well represented in the plethora of literature on the War. While presenting a large amount of carefully-researched and well-documented information, the author has not written a good book. Content is of major importance in any book, but presentation, balance, accuracy and many other factors affect the quality and value of the work. It is in these supporting factors that "The Bloody Crucible..." falls short. The subtitle of the book "Fighting Methods and Combat Experience in the Civil War" is inaccurate. It would have been far more accurate to to have subtitled it "Fighting Methods and Combat Experiences of the Union Army in the Civil War" for the text is so heavily weighted toward the Union Army that the reader is left wondering if there were significant differences in the Confederate approach or if the conditions under which the Confedrates fought or cultural differences led to other methods. There is little comparison or contrast between the two armies or between the Eastern and Western theaters. This reader felt short-changed. A notable example is the short shrift given to the Confederate cavalry of the early war years. There appears to be a bias toward the Union that is not appropriate with the historical perspective we now have. The bias is reflected in the anecdotal material which is so filled with accounts of stunning Union victories and routs of Confederates that a reader could be hard-pressed to understand how the war lasted four years. Perhaps his personal military experience influences the author to take regimental histories and first hand accounts at face value. To put this type of material in perspective I suggest he at least reread "Battles and Leaders..." and consider the self-serving nature of much of the material therein. In the Introduction the author criticizes Ian Drury and Tony Gibbons for not using anecdotal material in their excellent "The Civil War Machine". In the "Crucible..." he gives a vivid demonstration of the hazards of doing so by presenting the reader with:(1) Large--in my opinion excessive--amounts of anecdotal material (2) Anecdotes too lengthy for the minor points they make, and (3) Anecdotes not sharply focused on the point. The overall impression is that the anecdotes are being used as filler. In fact there is so much material that is not clearly related to the theme of the book that it appears the contract called for 650 pages and that's what they were going to get.
The penultimate chapter "Tactical Development in European Warfare 1859-71" and the final chapter "Conclusions" which is primarily devoted to "The Impact of Systematic Biases on Military History" and "What Must be Done' exemplify material that is far away from the theme of the book. A great part of the value and utility of a book like "The Bloody Crucible..." lies in careful editing to focus the book on its subject and to repair or remove those sentences and paprgraphs that don't work. This book would have benefitted greatly from one more time through. I often found myself rereading turgid or confusing material to get the sense of it. I was not always successful. Equally important is the attention to such things as foot- or endnoting and indexing. The endnote system in this book uses no numbering system and thus no number on the page where the note applies. It is obviously cheaper to produce the book with this system, but this system is hard to use and does not lend itself to additional expository or anecdotal material that breaks the flow of the text. It is not a system worthy of serious historical writing. The index contains errors--a serious fault and one that can easily be corrected by attention to detail. Index errors seriously degrade the books use as a reference. The overall impression is that rushing the book into production was more important than producing a book of high quality and utility This book will gather dust, unlikely to be reread or frequently referred to.
Rating:
Summary: Bloody Crucible of Courage
Review: Nosworthy studies Civil War tactics and weaponry, particularly in their connection with earlier European practice and in their theoretical development.
This study has some interesting points to make, particularly that under some circumstances attacks, including sabre charges, were highly successful -- an argument that goes against the oversimplified idea that Civil War defenders always got the upper hand. Nosworthy seems to emphasize Union sources, especially in his discussion of cavalry attacks which cites no Confederate successes at all, but uses some Confederate accounts as well throughout the text. At times he seems a bit trusting of single primary sources, particularly memoirs, but overall the use of sources and the arguments are convincing. Another intriguing discussion centers on the massive amount of lead that had to be fired to cause a casualty, and the reasons why that was the case.
The book does rather little to address soldier mentalities and the physical experience of battle -- some material is discussed but not as much as expected. I was also disappointed with its lack of discussion of any intelligence-gathering activity -- particularly when analyzing the cavalry, it seems strange to leave out scouting and the screening of army movements, as well as raiding. Perhaps Nosworthy felt these activities were beyond his battlefield-centered scope.
Overall, this was a useful and pleasantly un-positivist study.
Rating: 
Summary: Subject matter expert badly needs an editor
Review: The author's mastery of the subject is unquestionable, and his research is beyond reproach. Nevertheless, the book is plagued by poor organization and repetition. Nosworthy tried to organize by topic, chronology and theater of operations, but the result is a meandering mess that does touch and go landings on the same territory again and again and again; e.g the recurring discussion of the effectiveness of rifle muskets. Consolidation of topics would have made more sense. Spelling errors are numerous, and there are no signs that any editorial work was done on the manuscript. None at all. The book could easily be a third shorter without deleting a single fact. The lightest of editorial hands could have shaped up the author's shortfalls in style. Much more work would have been needed to compell him to develop his ideas in a systematic manner and ensure that his supports really added up to his conclusions, much less arrived there in a timely manner. Its hard to believe that anybody looked at the final chapter before the book got shoved out the door. It might be reworked to connect with the rest of the book, but, as published, it is almost incomprehensible and a bonafide embarrassment to the publisher. The author's fatigue - to the point of mental fog - rises almost palpably from the last ten pages. Much of the conclusion is really a misplaced forward rather than a summation. The long slog to that conclusion is unecessarily delayed by masses of tangential information, such as European tactics during the 1860 and 1870s, that ought to have been relegated to appendices. Even an historical work has to consider pacing, at least in the last third. It's a shame to see what is clearly a first draft rushed to publication. That said, I would put down money for a revised edition purely for the information content, which is first rate.
Rating:
Summary: Subject matter expert badly needs an editor
Review: The author's mastery of the subject is unquestionable, and his research is beyond reproach. Nevertheless, the book is plagued by poor organization and repetition. Nosworthy tried to organize by topic, chronology and theater of operations, but the result is a meandering mess that does touch and go landings on the same territory again and again and again; e.g the recurring discussion of the effectiveness of rifle muskets. Consolidation of topics would have made more sense. Spelling errors are numerous, and there are no signs that any editorial work was done on the manuscript. None at all. The book could easily be a third shorter without deleting a single fact. The lightest of editorial hands could have shaped up the author's shortfalls in style. Much more work would have been needed to compell him to develop his ideas in a systematic manner and ensure that his supports really added up to his conclusions, much less arrived there in a timely manner. Its hard to believe that anybody looked at the final chapter before the book got shoved out the door. It might be reworked to connect with the rest of the book, but, as published, it is almost incomprehensible and a bonafide embarrassment to the publisher. The author's fatigue - to the point of mental fog - rises almost palpably from the last ten pages. Much of the conclusion is really a misplaced forward rather than a summation. The long slog to that conclusion is unecessarily delayed by masses of tangential information, such as European tactics during the 1860 and 1870s, that ought to have been relegated to appendices. Even an historical work has to consider pacing, at least in the last third. It's a shame to see what is clearly a first draft rushed to publication. That said, I would put down money for a revised edition purely for the information content, which is first rate.
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