Research Catalog

Title

Mother, may you never see the sights I have seen : the 57th Massachusetts Veteran Volunteers in the last year of the Civil War / Warren Wilkinson.

Author

Wilkinson, Warren.

Publication

Mechanicsburg, PA : Stackpole Books, 2015.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

xvii, 399 pages : illustrations, maps; 23 cm

Summary

"This comprehensive, muster-to-disbandment account of a regiment involved in Ulysses S. Grant's Overland campaign is an unusually detailed study of men at war, as well as a superb unit history. In the thick of the battles of Spotsylvania, the Wilderness and Petersburg, the 57th Massachusetts probably suffered more casualties than any other in the Army of the Potomac. Wilkinson, a long-time student of the Civil War, quotes diaries and letters in which soldiers discuss weapons, uniforms, rations, sanitation, the enemy, rumors, battles, wounds, spiritual crises, and their diminishing chances of returning home alive. One wonders if any other regiment in history contained so many articulate writers. The book includes a fresh look at the Crater incident during the Petersburg siege, in which black soldiers were massacred by Confederates. An appendix includes mini-biographies of each member of the 57th--more than 1000 men"--Publisher's weekly.

Subject

• United States. Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, 57th (1864-1865)
• United States. Army of the Potomac > History
• United States. Army of the Potomac
• American Civil War (1861-1865)
• Overland Campaign (Virginia : 1864)
• Petersburg Crater, Battle of (Virginia : 1864)
• Siege of Petersburg (Virginia : 1864-1865)
• 1861 - 1964
• Overland Campaign, Va., 1864
• Petersburg Crater, Battle of, Va., 1864
• Armed Forces > Military life
• Military campaigns
• Regimental histories
• Massachusetts > Regimental histories. > Civil War, 1861-1865
• United States > Regimental histories > Civil War, 1861-1865
• Massachusetts > History > Civil War, 1861-1865 > Personal narratives
• United States > History > Civil War, 1861-1865 > Personal narratives
• Petersburg (Va.) > History > Siege, 1864-1865
• United States > Campaigns > Civil War, 1861-1865
• Massachusetts
• United States
• Virginia
• Virginia > Petersburg

Genre/Form

• History
• Personal narratives

Note

• "Previously published in hardcover in 1990 by Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc."--Title page verso.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 382-387) and index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

Camp John E. Wool -- Forming the line -- The girl I left behind me -- Storm across the Rapidan -- Hellfire ... -- ... And the fires of hell -- My soul to keep -- Mother, may you never see the sights I have seen -- To go to your cupboard, Hannah -- The brave amongst the bravest -- Shelter without fire -- The Cockade City -- You leg it like the devil -- Black interlude -- To just endure -- A continual rattle of musketry -- Rumors -- Bury them if they won't move -- Thirty men -- This damnable place for a dog -- Hard seasons -- To have this business closed up -- One last desperate effort -- The ladies they will all turn out -- Epilogue -- Appendix 1: Battle statistics -- Appendix 2: The thirty combat soldiers remaining after Weldon Railroad -- Appendix 3: Men in every battle of the regiment -- Appendix 4: Demographics of nativity -- Appendix 5: Company statistical summaries -- Appendix 6: Table of organization (infantry) : May to September, 1864 -- Appendix 7: Regimental general orders -- Appendix 8: Medical advice -- Abbreviations in the rosters and appendixes -- Rosters.

ISBN

• 9780811716659
• 0811716651

LCCN

^^2015021894

OCLC

• 921821702
• SCSB-10517617

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library