Hood’s Texas Brigade in the Civil War

Of the many infantry brigades in Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, John Bell Hood’s Texas Brigade earned the reputation as perhaps the premier unit. From 1862 until Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, the brigade fought in most of the major campaigns in the Eastern Theater and several more in the Western, including the Seven Days, Second Manassas (Second Bull Run), Sharpsburg (Antietam), Fredericksburg, Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Chattanooga, Knoxville, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, Cold Harbor, the siege of Richmond and Petersburg, and Appomattox.
Distinguished for its fierce tenacity and fighting ability, the brigade suffered some of the war’s highest casualties. This volume chronicles Hood’s Texas Brigade from its formation through postwar commemorations, providing a soldier’s-eye view of the daring and bravery of this remarkable unit.

Edward B. Williams (Ph.D., Texas A&M) is a military historian. He is the author of Rebel Brothers: The Civil War Letters of the Truehearts and has published articles in America’s Civil War, Aviation History, Southwestern Historical Quarterly, and Quarterly Journal of Military History. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps and holds the rank of Captain, U.S.N.R., (Ret).

Edward B. Williams
Format: softcover (7 x 10)
Pages: 350
Bibliographic Info: 26 photos, 10 maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2012
pISBN: 978-0-7864-6860-7
eISBN: 978-0-7864-9064-6
Imprint: McFarland

Acknowledgments     ix
Preface     1
Introduction: “An example of daring and bravery”     3

1. “You have treated me most shamefully”: Texas Leaves the Federal Union     5
2. “We were in earnest, terribly so”: On to Richmond, Texas Style     14
3. “It is astonishing how such a splendid spirit was so long maintained”: An Anatomy of the Brigade     25
4. “Those Texians are number one men”: From the Potomac to the Peninsula,
July 1861–June 1862     45
5. “Soldiers indeed”: The 4th Texas and 18th Georgia at Gaines’ Mill,
Virginia, June 27, 1862     59
6. “The 5th Texas Regiment was a flame of terror”: The 5th Texas at Second
Manassas, Virginia, August 29–30, 1862     74
7. They fought bravely, and unflinchingly faced a terrible hail of bullets and artillery”: The 1st Texas at Sharpsburg, Maryland, September 16–17, 1862     95
8. “As … invited guests … to witness that grand … panorama of splendid murder”: Fredericksburg, Virginia, December 13, 1862     117
9. “O, my, ain’t we in it? We just swim in bacon”: Campaigners and
Commissaries on the Nansemond, Spring 1863     130
10. [T]hese men were tried and seasoned soldiers, … yet they were not made of iron”: The Pennsylvania Campaign, June-July 1863     142
11. “[T]he meanest, most unsatisfactory place I struck during the whole war”: Operation “Westward Ho” to Chickamauga, September 1863      167
12. “We had been detached from home … family, Virginia and from Lee to go down to Tennessee”: Chattanooga to Knoxville, September–December 1863     185
13. “Oh! Carry me back to ole Virginny”: The Brigade’s Tortuous Road Home, December 1863–April 1864      201
14. “Texas Brigade! The eyes of General Lee are upon you!”: The Wilderness, May 5–7, 1864      212
15. “[T]he most painful and excruciating scenes of suffering and death”: Spotsylvania Court House to Cold Harbor, May 8–June 3, 1864     228
16. “No troops … fought us with more bravery than did those negroes”: James River to Forts Harrison and Gilmer, June–September 1864     244
17. “The Texas Brigade is always ready”: Darbytown Road to Five Forks, October 7, 1864–March 30, 1865     261
18.“[F]rom first to last the most dependable brigade of the Army of Northern Virginia”: Retreat to Appomattox, April 2–April 9, 1865     271
19. “[T]he Texas Brigade … the most renowned of all”: Advance into Legend, April 12, 1865, and Beyond     286
Epilogue—“Home at last”: Captain Ike N. M. Turner, Co. K, 5th Texas, Comes Home to Texas, 1995      297
Appendices
A: Companies in Hood’s Texas Brigade, A.N.V., Including Local Designations, Original Captains and Where Raised      301
B: “Oh! This is a dreadful war”: Representative Mortality Figures     302
C: Deaths by Disease in the Texas Regiments     305
Chapter Notes     306
Bibliography      325
Index     333

“Williams has chronicled the exploits of this valiant fighting unit from its formation to its surrender and beyond in almost mind-numbing detail”—The Civil War Round Table; “peppered with numerous anecdotes relating how common soldiers experienced the ebb and flow of war”—Southwestern Historical Quarterly; “clearly a labor of love”—America’s Civil War; “this book is a first rate contribution to Confederate historiography, and it is likely to stand the test of time as the definitive, single-volume history of Hood’s Brigade”—Civil War News; “this is a labor of love…Williams has provided an entertaining narrative”—Civil War Book Review.