“The Civil War, THE ATLANTA CAMPAIGN, 1864, Peach Tree Creek to the Fall of the City”, byDavid A. Powell. CASEMATE PUBLISHERS, Military/Civil War: 2024, 128 pages, 6 ¾” x 9 ½”,softcover, Casemate Illustrated, MEN, BATTLES, WEAPONS, $24.95. Visit,www.casematepublishers.com. In short, David A. Powell, a graduate of the Virginia MilitaryInstitute in 1983, is well known to Civil War “student-scholars” fascinated with the epic Battleof Chickamauga. David’s reputation, as one of the three best ever on the subject, was sealed inhis room when he wrote his three -volume set on that bloody fighting. His most recent worksare “The Tullahoma Campaign” and “Grant at Chattanooga”. As for the two “Atlanta Campaign,1864” titles, you can be certain they are as heart-wringing, highly informative, well narratedwith good maps and photographs, as are all his other Civil War articles and books.Of course, to grasp and interpret their full design and meaning, “The Atlanta Campaign,1864”, Volume One, must be read first. Since Casemate’s “page design” department deemed itunnecessary to label somewhere on the covers, “Vol. 1”and “Vol.2”, the reader’s only hint ofwhich is which are the final four words of each volume’s subtitle, “. . . the Outskirts of Atlanta”,the first half of the attack, and “. . . the Fall of the City”, portraying the final months of thestruggle for the metropolis. Chapter after chapter, from mid-July to September 1864, authorDavid Powell covers the battles after the occupation of Atlanta by Union troops around itsoutskirts, Peach Tree Creek, Decatur, and Ezra Church, then operations east of Atlanta, Unioncavalry raids south and slightly beyond, and the fierce fighting for Jonesboro and its surrender.The Civil War’s first historians and authors reaching back into the mid-1800s can only tremblewith envy how David arranged historic images, the camera young and undependable, to depicthis narratives, page by page, chapter by chapter for the real stuff: placing you in the sad pivotal
heart of it all.
