Thunder Along the Mississippi: The River Battles That Split the Confederacy

The squat river gunboats of the Civil War may have lacked the sleek majesty of oceangoing frigates, but undoubtedly they helped hammer home the North's victory as they successfully blasted their way up and down the Mississippi River. Jack D. Coombe presents the definitive account of these ironclad and wood-hulled warriors in the young country's western waterways, including the campaigns against Fort Donelson, New Orleans, and Vicksburg. The Union essentially built an inland navy, which pounded the Confederacy's heavily fortified towns and tried to dodge its mines. (Interesting piece of trivia: the Star of the West, the merchant ship attacked by Confederate batteries as it tried to reinforce Fort Sumter in January 1861 [the first hostile shots of the war], was later captured by Texans and converted into a rebel river steamboat.) Coombe argues that Federal control of the Mississippi made the South's defeat inevitable. His case is convincing, and his book is attractive--it includes dozens of black-and-white photos, plus several maps. It's one of the best naval histories of the Civil War available. --John J. Miller