Book Review: Vicksburg: The Campaign that Opened the Mississippi

The second history book that I read this year year was on a topic I've been wanting to read more about for a while - Vicksburg. I had picked up Michael Ballard's book on Vicksburg over the summer, after reading and comparing reviews of it with the other Vicksburg title on the shelf - Winston Groom's Vicksburg, 1863. I started thinking of reading this one next while reading Bonekemper's book, and he mentioned William Shea's work on the same topic, and highly recommended it. I'm interested enough in Grant and the Western front that I expect I'll ultimately end up reading all three, but I'm not sorry to have started with this one.

Review

Ballard, Michael B. Vicksburg: The Campaign that Opened the Mississippi. The University of North Carolina Press. 2004. 490p. Photographs, bibliography, maps, index. ISBN: 9780807871287.

Ballard (Congressional and Political Research Center at Mississippi State University) sets out to give an in-depth description of the events leading up to, during, and after the Vicksburg Campaign. Towards that end, he draws on a very impressive range of sources, and places the campaign in to it's geographical, historical, political and military contexts. The most interesting and unusual thing about this work is the use of local Vicksburg sources to paint a picture of what the town of Vicksburg was like before the war reached it's doorstep, how people there felt about the war, and about their cities changing role in it. Ballard also does an excellent job tracing how Vicksburg came to assume it's war-time position as the key to free navigation of the Mississippi River. In a clear, thorough, and incisive way, he also analyzes the actions and behavior of the many historical figures involved, using his extensive research to assess the effectiveness of the decisions made by key participants. He reserves his most harsh judgement for Joseph E. Johnston, and raises the question of how differently events might have gone had Johnston not remained so timid throughout the campaign. He also raises many insightful issues related to the difficult alternatives of abandoning or defending the city, and suggests that abandoning the defense of the physical location would have been a more effective way of preserving Pemberton's army to fight another day for the Confederacy. While there is little new in these analyses, they are here brought together very effectively with high-quality scholarship and clear writing.

In the end, this lucid account leaves the reader with a very clear idea of the importance of the Battle of Vicksburg, the personalities of the people involved in the conflict, and some ideas of how to critically assess the decisions made by the parties involved. While this is very helpful, Ballard is definitely presenting a point of view, and that has to be kept in mind while reading his assessments. Also, the prose is very thorough and detailed, but at times it gets to be dense reading, and the work will at times likely be more information than a non-enthusiast would find interesting or accessible. However, for those with an interest in the events that led to, as Abraham Lincoln said, to "The Father of Waters again [going] unvexed to the sea," Ballard's comprehensive work is an excellent source.

Rating: 4 out of 5.