Featured battle : Stones River (Murfreesboro)

Part of American Civil War

Date : 31 December 1862 - 03 January 1863

Rosecrans' Union army of the Cumberland faced Bragg's Confederate Army of Tennessee at Murfreesboro on the 30th. The Confederates attacked at dawn on the 31st, catching much of the Union force at breakfast as they had before, and drove them back in dissarray into a hooked position 3 miles away. On the 2nd, the Confederates attempted to dislodge Union positions on the important high ground east of the river. The rebels fought hard, routing the Union troops but were then caught in the enfilading fire from the guns across the river and cut down. When the 3rd dawned, with Rosecrans sitting tight, Bragg had no choice but to withdraw. Thought of as a marginal Northern victory, in practice both side suffered in excess of 30% casualties and were crippled for some time after.

Battle of the Bulge. The German View

Danny S Parker Ed.
A book both enjoyable and frustrating. Enjoyable because of its insights into the complexity of planning the campaign and for the remarkable different view one gets of Hitler. In my view worth reading for that alone. The content is all meat, no padding, and rich in depth and width. A thoroughly worthy piece of work. The frustration comes with the paucity of maps for which I had to compensate with a much larger scale map. If I were Prime Minister I would make it a law that in any work of fact every place named in the text must appear on a map in the book. Also frustrating was the lack of a glossary. Many German general staff ranks are mentioned in abbreviated form and lots of formation initials are used which one has to reference elsewhere. This detracts from the enjoyment and makes reading in bed difficult.
Even with those criticisms I would commend this book to anyone interested in a fuller understanding of how wars/battles are planned or with an interest in the Battle of the Bulge.
Frontline Books. Pen & Sword Books \ltd., 2016