front cover of The View from Officers' Row
The View from Officers' Row
Army Perceptions of Western Indians
Sherry L. Smith
University of Arizona Press, 1990
A Choice Outstanding Academic Title

Capturing military men in contemplation rather than combat, Sherry L. Smith reveals American army officers' views about the Indians against whom they fought in the last half of the nineteenth century. She demonstrates that these officers—and their wives—did not share a monolithic, negative view of their enemies, but instead often developed a great respect for Indians and their cultures. Some officers even came to question Indian policy, expressed misgivings about their personal involvement in the Indian Wars, and openly sympathized with their foe.     
 
The book reviews the period 1848–1890—from the acquisition of the Mexican Cession to the Battle of Wounded Knee—and encompasses the entire trans-Mississippi West. Resting primarily on personal documents drawn from a representative sample of the officer corps at all levels, the study seeks to juxtapose the opinions of high-ranking officers with those of officers of lesser prominence, who were perhaps less inclined to express personal opinions in official reports.   
 
No educated segment of American society had more prolonged contact with Indians than did army officers and their wives, yet not until now has such an overview of their attitudes been presented. Smith's work demolishes the stereotype of the Indian-hating officer and broadens our understanding of the role of the army in the American West.
 
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front cover of A Volunteer in the Regulars
A Volunteer in the Regulars
The Civil War Journal and Memoir of Gilbert Thompson, US Engineer Battalion
Mark A. Smith
University of Tennessee Press, 2020

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Massachusetts native Gilbert Thompson joined the regular army, which assigned him to the engineer battalion, a unit that provided critical support for the Union military effort in building bridges and roads and surveying and producing maps. While serving, Thompson kept a journal that eventually filled three volumes. The author’s early education in a utopian community called Hopedale left him well read, affording a journal peppered with literary allusions. Once the war ended, Corporal Thompson added some postwar reflections to create a unified single volume, which editor Mark A. Smith has carefully arranged so that the reader can clearly distinguish between Thompson’s contemporary accounts and his postwar reminiscences. An accomplished artist and topographer, Thompson illustrated his journals, adding depth to his narrative with portraits of key figures, drawings of ordinary scenes such as soldiers playing chess, and sights of the war. Additionally, he collected photographs both during and after the war, many of which are included.

Thompson’s wartime musings and postwar recollections have much to offer. Few diaries contain glimpses into the workings of a highly specialized unit such as the engineer battalion, and Thompson’s skills in depicting daily camp life in both words and pictures provide a distinctive look at the Union Army during the Civil War as well as an insightful look into the human condition. In his 1879 introduction, Thompson writes, “I wonder how I wrote as much and as well, and am thankful I was so fortunate as to have the opportunity to do so.” Students of the Civil War will feel fortunate he did.

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