Camp Pope Publishing news

It's been a long long while since the last Camp Pope newsletter but it's always great to get one because it means that a new Trans-Mississippi related release or two is in the immediate future. This new notice did not disappoint.

For December:

THE MARCH TO THE RIVER: FROM THE BATTLE OF PEA RIDGE TO HELENA, SPRING 1862. By Robert G. Schultz. 454 pages, 6 x 9 paperback, illustrations, maps, appendix, notes, bibliography, and index. $25.95. (Should be available before Christmas)

This is the first detailed study of the campaign of Samuel R. Curtis’s Army of the Southwest following its important victory at the Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas (March 7-8, 1862). After the withdrawal of Earl Van Dorn’s Confederate army from northwest Arkansas, General Curtis’s next obvious move was to capture Little Rock, the state capital. Poor roads, raging rivers, tenuous supply lines, and harassing Rebel partisans made for a meandering march back up into Missouri, then down into Arkansas along the White River. For the first time a Union army had to depend largely on foraging off the enemy’s resources for its sustenance—a feat repeated more famously two years later in General William T. Sherman’s “March to the Sea.” Bob Schultz has thoroughly researched his book in private archives, period newspaper accounts, published and unpublished soldiers’ diaries, letters, and memoirs, and the Army and Navy Official Records. Published for the first time are maps drawn by Lyman G, Bennett of the 36th Illinois Infantry.

Coming Soon:

CONFEDERATE "TALES OF THE WAR" IN THE TRANS-MISSISSIPPI, Part Four: Spring 1864: From Winter Camp to Pleasant Hill and Jenkins’ Ferry. Edited by Michael Banasik. 245 pages, 6 x 9 paperback, illustrations, maps, notes, appendices, bibliography, index. $17.95.(Maybe late 2014, but January 2015 for sure.)

In 1885, the St. Louis Missouri Republican began a Saturday series of articles on the Civil War by the participants, from the lowliest private to the most exalted general. The series ran for two years, comprising in all 94 articles, which dealt with all theaters of the war, including the high seas, from both the Northern and Southern perspectives. Being the home of most readers of the Republican, Missouri figures prominently in the series. Due to the number of pieces on Missouri and the Trans-Mississippi, editor Michael Banasik has grouped them by year. Part Four of CONFEDERATE "TALES OF THE WAR" contains only those articles dealing with events of 1864, specifically Pleasant Hill, the Camden Expedition, and Jenkins’ Ferry, from the Confederate perspective. Appendices include detailed orders of battle for Pleasant Hill and the Camden Expedition, plus biographies of significant individuals. Subsequent volumes in the series will include articles covering the rest of the war, also those from the Northern point of view.