A thorough and readable history of the Army of Northern Virginia. There were, however numerous instances when the reader is beset with some rather copious statistics which while illustrating the erudition of the author would, in my opinion better be served by appearing in an appendix rather than the text. That being said, the overwhelming body of the work offers good insight to not only Robert E. Lee, but also to the soul of the ANV. ( )

Superb social and historical study of a modern army with a premodern attitude. ( )

Combining classic military history with a wealth of social history insights, Joseph Glatthaar details the exploits and experiences of the Army of Northern Virginia in the aptly titled "General Lee's Army: From Victory to Collapse." Drawing from a wealth of material, including countless letters and diaries from soldiers of all ranks, the University of North Carolina professor offers a comprehensive view of the Confederacy's most-storied fighting force.

While never skimping on descriptions of overall tactics in battle, Glatthaar is as interested in offering a broad picture of the makeup and general experiences of the soldiers in Lee's army. Alongside details of the Gettysburg Campaign and the massive trench warfare of 1864, there are chapters on such day-to-day issues as medical care, quartermaster supply, religion, and general camp life.

Perhaps the greatest contribution of this volume is the attention to the make-up of the army, extrapolated from careful analysis of a 600 soldier sample. This analysis allows Glatthaar to describe the divergent backgrounds of the fighting men, including family wealth and relationship to the institution of slavery. The findings suggest that while the army initially was a mostly representative group of the southern population, as the war progressed replacement soldiers were overwhelmingly drawn from non-slaveholding families of little wealth.

This changing demographic makeup of the army is one of the challenges that led to the ultimate collapse and defeat of the Army of Northern Virginia, alongside other better known issues as increasingly limited manpower and the persistent problems of arms, ammunition, and food supplies. Glatthaar also highlights the difficulties in advancing qualified people into officer positions that Lee struggled to overcome, with some success, throughout the war.

While the focus of this book is on the common soldier, it is clear that Glatthaar holds Robert E. Lee is great esteem. The surprising implicit argument of this book is that Lee was really the guiding force behind the army, not only in generally aggressive tactical decisions, but as importantly in improving nuts and bolts matters of supply, training, and officer selection. This makes the book's title quite apropos indeed.

On the whole, this well-researched volume is an excellent resource on the famed Army of Northern Virginia. While some expecting heavily detailed campaign analysis might be disappointed, those hoping for a more complete portrait of this fighting force will greatly appreciate this book for its scope, its research, and its unexpectedly pleasant prose. ( )

This book is worth reading. It is a military, social and political history of the Army of Northern Virginia, and a well written story. I feel that it has too much of a tang of the Lost Cause about it, but perhaps as a Canadian that might be my foreignness to this so American of wars. At any rate, worth reading if you are a Civil War buff. ( )

A history of the USA Civil War, exclusively from the perspective of the men who fought on the losing side. The author really digs into the mentality of the people who served in the Confederate army, relying on letters written by those men to get a sense of what motivated them.

The dynamic of this civil war was fascinating to me: a smaller army made up of volunteers extremely motivated to defend their way of life fighting largely a defensive war against a much larger and better armed, but less motivated enemy. I was particularly interested in the way Southerners' cultural habits and sense of honour often clashed with their military objectives -- because of the independent spirit prized by Southern culture, their undisciplined behaviour negated their advantage in motivation, for example.

This is going to sound stupid, but I had no idea that slavery was such a central issue -- I thought that was one of those myths that grew up around the war, because I couldn't believe that anyone would be motivated to defend slavery on moral grounds (economic grounds, I can see). But Glatthaar shows that slavery was a focal point in the culture of the south, not only by reproducing soldiers' letters that frequently make mention of their "negroes", but by producing a demographic sample that shows how many people benefited from slavery: one-third of the people who served in the army or their families had slaves, and almost half lived in a household that had slaves. Moreover, slave owners frequently "lent" slaves to many of the poorer Southerners who couldn't afford slaves themselves.

(In several passages Glatthaar writes about slaves who had been brought into the army by some soldiers to serve as servants -- who then took the first opportunity to run away to the Northern lines, actions that surprised absolutely nobody. Nobody, except for their perplexed ex-owners: some of the rare amusing moments come when the author produces letters home from these Southerners, who couldn't imagine why their slaves had run away, After all, hadn't they always treated them right?. The level of denial is unbelievalble.)

The major battles are described in detail, along with the commanding officers. I could have used more maps (a major help in a military history), but since the focus of the book is not on the fighting itself, but the fighters, it wasn't necessary.

I really enjoyed the format of the book, which relies heavily on the soldiers' own words to flesh out the picture of the men who fought and why they fought. It was a good introduction to a period in history I knew nothing about. ( )

This book is quite a thorough social history of The Army of Northern Virginia. The focus is on the Army not the military history. There is some material on the battles but very little as a percentage of the book. It is evident that the author has done a tremendous amount of research using primary sources. The excerpts from letters would probably amount to 25% of the text. Those excerpts illustrate the differing levels of literacy among the soldiers and are sometimes difficult to understand because of the creative spelling. In addition there is a large amount of statistical research on all aspects of the Army. The author explains in an appendix how he created the sample and did the statistical analysis.
There were times when I considered not finishing the book. The author's style is dry and there is a good amount of repetition. When I had finished the book I felt I had added a significant amount of knowledge regarding the soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia and all aspects of their experience in the war. The manner in which the material was set forth was necessary to impart the complete experience of the soldiers who fought for Robert E. Lee.
The privations suffered by the soldiers are thoroughly documented. I had read about the problems with lack of shoes but just as great was the lack of pants. During the siege at Petersburg the soldiers were paid to scour the battlefield for lead to be used in making bullets. The courage and confidence showed by the soldiers in these conditions is remarkable.
They were a heck of an Army. Almost always outnumbered, under equipped, lacking basic supplies they took on the Army of the Potomac and with rare exceptions defeated them. They fought with a confidence in themselves and their generals that compensated for their material shortcomings. Up until the end of 1864 they were confident that they would not be defeated. They became the heart of the Confederacy and embodied the best and worst of the people for whom they fought.
Their destruction proved the efficacy of Grant's strategy beginning in May of 1864. His tenacity wore them out while the destruction wrought by Sherman destroyed the support of the Confederate people for their fight. Families wrote letters to soldiers begging them to desert and come home to help the family.
All of the repetition and the statistics made reading the book a total immersion experience in the life of the Army. It is not the book to read for entertainment to get through it does take a bit of work. It is the book to read to gain a unique understanding of General Lee's Army. If you can make the commitment you will be rewarded by this excellent contribution to the scholarship on the Civil War. ( )