The War In The West Was More A Disorganized Skirmish

The other book I managed to finish while I was away was Albert Castel's General Sterling Price and the Civil War in the West. There's a chapter at the start about what Price did prior to the Civil War, and a couple about his life afterward at the end, but most of the book is exactly what the title says it will be.

Generally, Price seems to have cared greatly about the men under his command, and in the earlier stages of the war, if they weren't the most disciplined lot, you couldn't doubt their fighting spirit. At the same time, Price wasn't much of a tactician, and Castel suggests he would have been best suited as a division commander, where his ability to inspire the men would have great impact, but their would be better minds higher up the ladder deciding how to position those forces. Part of the problem was Price had many friends loudly campaigning for his being a general, and the South needed soldiers badly enough they weren't quite willing to risk the men he brought from Missouri leaving if Price was sent away.

The other problem was there don't seem to have been any generals available who were better. Not near the Mississippi, anyway. The trans-Mississippi region is where both sides started to dump commanders they deemed lousy. Too cautious, too reckless, too old, whatever. Castel details most of the major engagements Price was involved in, and typically, one sides wins because the leader on the other side was incompetent in some way. General A splits his numerically inferior force, and figures he can coordinate simultaneous advances in different locations. That never works, and so the forces that are under attack deal with first one, then the other of the advancing groups. Or the troops available are lousy, and they stop in the middle of battle to loot*, rather than continuing to advance.

In one case, Price is supposed to stop Rosencrans' forces from joining with Grant's. He requests another general, Earl van Dorn, bring up his troops and they'll work together. Price even agrees to relinquish overall command to van Dorn, who has more experience. Price and Bragg are both receiving orders from Bragg, who is telling them to work together and that yes, van Dorn will be the one in charge. Meanwhile, van Dorn does nothing, except send letters farther up the chain requesting that if he and Price work together, that Price be the subordinate of the two. Even though Bragg has already said that's how it's happening, and Price was making the offer even before Bragg issued orders to that effect. It's a miracle any of them could tie their shoes.

For all that Price was well-liked by his soldiers, he wasn't particularly well-liked by most of the other people in the military. The commanders who attended West Point tended to look down on him and disparage his tactical mind (a fair complaint, not that most of them were any better), Jefferson Davis didn't like that every time something didn't go Price's way, he'd show up in the capitol, complaining about it, demanding this or that, threatening to resign if he didn't get what he wanted. If Price himself didn't do this, some of his friends probably would. Nobody likes the guy who always runs crying to the boss (or teacher) when they don't get what they want.

Price's primary beef was all these soldiers who joined on to follow him did so because they wanted to liberate Missouri from the Union. After some early fighting, that's not how they were used. They were sent east, and took part in various battles over there. Price was eventually given leave to go back to Missouri, but his troops had to stay, placed under a new commander. They were focused on their personal concerns, and either didn't see, or didn't care that if the Johnny Rebs fell east of Mississippi, it wasn't going to matter if they freed Missouri. That didn't stop price from demanding more resources be devoted there, to the annoyance of the people receiving these complaints.

Castel's writing is fine. It's not a wildly engaging style, but it's not overly dry, either. There's enough going in Price's life, intrigues, disputes, rumors, battles, that it's interesting reading. Castel's willing to call out Price, though that seems restricted to points where it's obvious Price made errors in judgment, tactics, tact. Perhaps that's a credit to Castel's delivery of information, that when he criticizes Price, it doesn't feel as if there's a way he could have avoided doing so, as his description of the events has made the errors clear. When blame for failures - or credit for successes - on the battlefield starts being tossed about, Castel is ready to break down the arguments point-by-point as to why one is valid or not. I appreciate the orderliness of that, and it helps as a sort of summary of the battle being discussed.

* Which isn't something new. The Persians did that in a battle against Alexander the Great once. Their forces were running wild through the Greeks' camp, but stopped pressing the advantage to hoard some stuff for themselves.

** As it stands, it seems considerably more of Missouri wanted to stay in the Union than leave, anyway.