I am on the 250-some page in McPhearson. They should stop mucking
around and go at each other already.

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I am on 400-some page in McPherson - he needs maps. The maps are too
scarce, and more images. Surely, there is plenty of visual material on
civil war.  The battles are awe-inspiring -- a thousand people dead on
each side in a medium-size engagement (I am thinking the battle of
Shiloh). Half of the engaged regiments killed and wounded.  I was
surprised German immigrants fought at all on the Union side -- with the
(somewhat) volunteer army, I would not think that they cared so much
about their homecountry. Nice descriptions of naval battles.

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The book ends abruptly at Appomattox. For the amount of time he spent
on parliamentary bickering before the war, he could have had at
least a passing mention to reconstruction. I think he just ran out of
steam. I agree, the conclusion is a letdown. Local amusement park area
(Sandusky) was the site of the Union POW camp. How quaint. It was no
Andersonville though - it was an officers camp with decent lodging,
amateur theater and the like amenities. One thing about McPherson --
after the book all the civil war battles seem to look alike. My
favorite general is (my fellow Ohioan) Bill Sherman. He was reluctant
to do frontal assaults and waste his soldiers lives. He was always
into flanking maneuvers. And if that did not work, he would not fight
at all. On the other hand, Scherman was probably successful only
because there was Grant who was willing to put his (and his soldier's)
shoulder-pads down. Grant was ordering frontal assaults at Petersburg
all the way until the union finally broke through.  Afterword is
pretentious.