The Rut, the Pendulum, and the Rock of Chickamauga
A guest post by Christopher J. Einolf, University of Virginia. Einholf’s new biography of Maj. Gen. George H. Thomas will be published this fall by University of Oklahoma Press.
In his post entitled “Here We Go Again…” Brooks Simpson described the scholarship on George H. Thomas as a “rut” or a “flawed pendulum,” in which scholars engaged in a recurring debate on whether Thomas was a better general than Grant and Sherman. I agree with Simpson that biographers of Thomas have been overly biased in favor of their subject, and that their discussion of Thomas focuses too narrowly on a direct comparison of Thomas with Grant and Sherman. In writing my own biography of Thomas , I tried to avoid letting the “formulaic and predictable set of controversies” that Simpson identifies limit the book.
In writing the book, I had access to a number of sources not available to Thomas’ earlier biographers, Francis McKinney and Freeman Cleaves, including some personal letters to family members, friends, and military colleagues. McKinney wrote in 1961 and Cleaves in 1948, so I also benefited from the tremendous increase in quantity and quality of scholarship about the Civil War and Reconstruction over the last 50 years, and this alone, as Ethan Rafuse wrote, would be enough to justify a new biography. Here are the themes of the book:
1. Thomas the general: Thomas, Grant, and Sherman were all successful generals, and each had different strengths and weaknesses. As each general commanded in different situations, a direct comparison is impossible. Examining Thomas’ military leadership on its own terms, I found him to be an excellent but by no means perfect military leader. I also present Thomas’ own opinion of his campaigns, from personal letters written during and after the Civil War William Rosecrans, James Garfield, and Dennis Hart Mahan. I do compare him to Grant and Sherman, particularly in regards to Thomas’ role in the Atlanta campaign, but this is not the main focus of the book.
2. Thomas’ personal side: Thomas did leave a few personal papers and correspondence. The Virginia Historical Society has his and his family’s pre-Civil War plantation account books. I was able to find about twenty pre-Civil War personal letters from Thomas to his family, and a few letters he wrote in the 1850’s to his friend William T. Sherman. These letters show a side of Thomas that other biographers have not been able to access, including his concern for his family, his interest in Southampton County gossip, his contempt for electoral politics, his interest in the plants, animals, and geography of the American frontier, and even a pretty good sense of humor.
3. Thomas the Southern Unionist: Like Robert E. Lee, Thomas made his choice of sides in the Civil War out of a sense of duty. Unlike Lee, he decided his duty to his country and oath as a military officer to protect the Constitution overrode his duty to family and home state. Like most other white Southern Unionists, Thomas fought to preserve the Union as it was in 1861, with slavery intact. He supported the Emancipation Proclamation and the recruitment of African-American soldiers as a way to win the war, not out of a desire to end slavery. A slave owner himself, he had a paternalistic attitude towards blacks, viewing them with kindness but considering them inferior to whites in both intellect and moral character. His conservative views pre-war views on race make his post-war career all the more striking.
4. Thomas the defender of civil rights: The heroic performance of African-American soldiers at the Battle of Nashville caused Thomas to reevaluate his views of blacks. As blacks showed themselves capable of the highest levels of duty, honor, courage, and discipline, the virtues that Thomas most valued, Thomas decided that blacks were fully deserving of the rights and protections of citizenship. He spent his Reconstruction career trying to protect blacks from the depredations of the Ku Klux Klan, using military arrests and military trials to intervene where local authorities refused to help. This aspect of Thomas’ career has received very little attention from historians. John Cimprich has written about this (and was generous in helping me with my own writing), but nobody else has paid much attention to what I think is the most interesting and important aspect of Thomas’ career.
5. Thomas in historical memory: Thomas’ reputation ranked with that of Grant, Sherman, and Sheridan in 1870’s and 1880’s, but he sank into obscurity afterward. This was partly due to the fact that the other three generals wrote memoirs, left personal papers, and had long and prominent post-Civil War careers. But part of Thomas’ obscurity results from the rise of the reconciliationist school of Civil War history. In the decades immediately following the war, Northerners held up Thomas as the model of the loyal Southerner, who made the “right” choice where most other Southerners went wrong. As the nation reconciled, Northerners conceded that white Southerners’ decision to secede and to fight was morally defensible, even honorable. Thomas’ role as the loyal Southerner became unimportant, and his reputation declined.
Thomas was a military man, and military concerns take up the bulk of my biography. But the non-military aspects of Thomas’ life are in many ways the most interesting, particularly his change of views on race. As far as I know, his conversion from slave owner to civil rights defender is unique in American history, and as much as his military leadership gives him a claim to hero status.
Finally, I agree with Jim Epperson that Thomas “deserves better fans.” Most writers on Thomas seem interested only in his military career and only in praising Thomas at the expense of Grant and Sherman. It is not necessary to disparage Grant and Sherman to praise Thomas, nor is it necessary to neglect the non-military aspects of Thomas’ life and career. As David Powell wrote, showing “a few cracks in the pedestal” doesn’t detract from Thomas’ greatness. A balanced and humanizing treatment makes Thomas seem even more admirable than the one-sided hagiographies that have defined Thomas scholarship up until now.
Jim Epperson wrote:
Mr. Einolf, you just sold a book, and it has nothing to do with your agreeing with me at the end of your post. Your bio of Thomas sounds like a very nice piece of work on a very interesting man, and I look forward to reading it.
JFE
Posted on 19-Apr-07 at 6:37 pm | Permalink
Dave Smith wrote:
I would absolutely agree with Jim Epperson’s comments. Many of us have long wanted to see a new bio on Thomas – especially having lived through the electronic age of burgeoning Thomas fans who indeed seem to focus on the wrong things. Very much looking forward to the book!
Posted on 20-Apr-07 at 10:31 am | Permalink
Brooks D. Simpson wrote:
Well, of course Ulysses S. Grant owned a slave, so I’d argue that Thomas’s position isn’t all that novel. But in the end, the success or failure of a new Thomas biography will rest upon its assessment of Thomas as a military commander, including his actions as part of a command team. How has the scholarship that has appeared in the last three or four decades caused us to change our assessment of Thomas as a military commander? I’ll be interested to find out: the article that helped spur my initial post did not seem to benefit in any significant way from recent scholarship in terms of its interpretive thrust.
Posted on 23-Apr-07 at 1:22 pm | Permalink
Terry Walbert wrote:
You just sold another copy of your forthcoming biography. Since I’m reading Sherman’s Civil War correspondence (the Simpson-Berlin edition), I’ll be curious about his relationship with General Sherman.
Posted on 24-Apr-07 at 8:39 pm | Permalink
Donald W. Plezia wrote:
“In his post entitled “Here We Go Again…” Brooks Simpson described the scholarship on George H. Thomas as a “rut” or a “flawed pendulum,” in which scholars engaged in a recurring debate on whether Thomas was a better general than Grant and Sherman.”
Well, “here we go again!” A supposed Thomas biographer starts his career by immediately deferring to a Grant partisan, who inserts the comment “Well, of course Ulysses S. Grant owned a slave, so I’d argue that Thomas’s position isn’t all that novel.” Seems to me that, that smacks of tearing down Thomas to build up Grant or did I misunderstand? But, I’ll give you that. Grant was a slave owner.
Then the Thomas biographer states: “I agree with Simpson that biographers of Thomas have been overly biased in favor of their subject, and that their discussion of Thomas focuses too narrowly on a direct comparison of Thomas with Grant and Sherman.”
Can you please name the biographer(s)? Please point out the narrow focus (or at least define it) of the comparison? Why would you agree with Simpson? He’s biased!
I can’t imagine a more disturbing statement. How does one write a sincere book about any subject without developing an interest in the subject? Why would anyone write a book that denigrates their subject? Particularly a sympathetic subject like Thomas. Does Mr. Simpson write derogatorily about Grant? I don’t think so. Did Perrett? Did Badeau? Not even McFeely, whose Bio of Grant is the most honest I have seen, didn’t. Only recently have I seen Simpson admit that Grant drank to excess on occasion. John Y. Simon’s epic collection of the “Papers of Ulysses S. Grant” was very honest and published apparently all the extant information of Grant, including his imbibing. Has Mr. Simpson written about Julia Grant, who illegally and dishonestly played the gold market, during Ullys Presidency? Of course, not having read any of Mr. Simpson’s material I don’t know, maybe he did.
I’m also sorry to see you adopt the Grant/Sherman caviling claim “why do you have to tear down Grant (Sherman) to build up Thomas”? The answer is because it’s easy! Did Thomas drink to excess, ever? Did Thomas engage in the wholesale destruction of his own forces? Did Thomas ever lose a battle? Did Thomas plan the destruction of the opposing forces? (Yes, Thomas planned to destroy Johnston’s army at Resaca/Dalton, by using an overwhelming force. Sherman didn’t. Did Thomas plan the Army of the Cumberland’s part in the Atlanta Campaign correctly, while the only army Sherman and McPherson were responsible for (The AOTT), had no cavalry, were short on entrenching tools, fodder and food. Normally, I believe, one plans a diversionary tactic using a small part of his force (Like Steedman’s at Nashville) and hitting the enemy with overwhelming force (Like Thomas’ right wing at Nashville). Not, as Sherman did at Resaca, using 3/4th’s of his troops as a diversion and hitting them with 1/4th.
“In writing my own biography of Thomas , I tried to avoid letting the “formulaic and predictable set of controversies” that Simpson identifies limit the book.”
I still don’t understand? Why must you defer to Simpson’s prejudices? He is not the be all and end all! Who made him the final arbiter and supreme authority? What are the “formulaic and predictable set of controversies” he warns you against?
“In writing the book, I had access to a number of sources not available to Thomas’ earlier biographers, Francis McKinney and Freeman Cleaves, including some personal letters to family members, friends, and military colleagues. McKinney wrote in 1961 and Cleaves in 1948, so I also benefitted from the tremendous increase in quantity and quality of scholarship about the Civil War and Reconstruction over the last 50 years, and this alone, as Ethan Rafuse wrote, would be enough to justify a new biography.”
I don’t know how you connect the “tremendous increase in quantity and quality of scholarship about the Civil War . . .” as justification for a new biography of Thomas? Thomas fought mostly in the west. The quantity you speak of has been primarily in the eastern theater. The quality is suspect. How does one uncover “original” material when writing the five thousandth and first book about Gettysburg? The same for the four thousand two hundred and forty third book about Grant? How about the Army of the Potomac? A reviewer of Beatties new book claimed a fifty page bibliography for that ill-starred unit. Yet, after 142 years, his creation is claimed as the end all and be all (until the next creation).
Since you trashed McKinney and Cleaves and didn’t mention Van Horne, Piatt, Coppee, Palumbo, Thomas (W.), O’Conner, Johnston, and Buell, I assume you won’t be building on their research? Your’s will be a truly unique conception apparently comparable to Beatties.
Later you criticize Thomas’ “Fans.” I’ll admit I’m one of the top Thomas fans in that universe, but, where would all the “Pop” historians be without “Fans?” Or don’t you plan on selling to that group?
Well, as a Thomas supporter, I wish you the best and look forward to your new creation as the definitive study on Thomas, replacing McKinney and Van Horne. If I can be of any, any help, please don’t hesitate to call.
Don
Posted on 27-Apr-07 at 10:25 am | Permalink
Brooks D. Simpson wrote:
Don says:
“Only recently have I seen Simpson admit that Grant drank to excess on occasion.”
Don also says:
“Of course, not having read any of Mr. Simpson’s material I don’t know, maybe he did [Don's referring in this case to the Black Friday scandal, but the sentence lacks qualification].”
Hmmm.
Posted on 27-Apr-07 at 11:11 am | Permalink
Jake Reynolds wrote:
“I’m also sorry to see you adopt the Grant/Sherman caviling claim “why do you have to tear down Grant (Sherman) to build up Thomas”? The answer is because it’s easy!”
Wow, now that’s a real scholarly statement! If you can’t talk about someone’s generalship without bashing other people’s generalship and personal lives you might as well not say anything at all. And don’t start bashing some other historian if you haven’t even read any of their books.
Posted on 27-Apr-07 at 5:06 pm | Permalink
Donald W. Plezia wrote:
“Wow, now that’s a real scholarly statement!”
Hows about “Why do you have to tear down Grant to build up Thomas?”
And this arguement has been going on for several years with the same whine!
Besides, Grant and Sherman started it way back in 1863. And like I said, it’s easy!
Now wipe your nose and do your homework if you want to get in on the arguement.
Don
Posted on 27-Apr-07 at 5:30 pm | Permalink
Jake Reynolds wrote:
I just don’t get what is up with you Thomas people. I mean was Thomas a better tactician than Grant or Sherman? Probably in my opinion. Was he an overall better general? Probably not in my opinion. But all three of them participated in vastly different types of military situations that should not be compared. I just don’t see why you can’t manage to compliment and analyze someone based on their own experiences and capabilities without having to bring down others in the process. During the war Thomas encountered his own unique set of circumstances and experiences and he should be evaluated and judged in how he performed under those circumstances. No attention should be paid, either positive or negative, as to how Grant or Sherman reacted to their own cirmcumstances and experiences that they faced, as they are their own and not Thomas’.
Posted on 27-Apr-07 at 5:54 pm | Permalink
Brooks D. Simpson wrote:
I think Don’s posts speak for themselves, and let’s move on. Should these discussions deteriorate, it’s easy to fix the problem.
Don, your personal insult to Jake is noted. If you persist, well, that’s easy to handle as well.
Posted on 28-Apr-07 at 2:41 am | Permalink
Mark Grimsley wrote:
All aboard for alt.war.civil.usa!
Posted on 28-Apr-07 at 7:13 am | Permalink
Brooks D. Simpson wrote:
Sad but true, but of course that all can be prevented here.
Posted on 28-Apr-07 at 10:32 am | Permalink