No disgrace to my country
Subtitle: the life of John C. Tidball
By: Eugene C. Tidball.
Publisher: Kent State University Press
Published: 2002
Place of publication: Kent, Ohio
Language: eng
Number of pages: 564
Subjects: Tidball, John C. 1825-1906.; United States. Army -- Officers -- Biography.; Soldiers -- United States -- Biography.; Generals -- United States -- Biography.
Genres: Biography.
Description: "From his start as a West Point graduate - Class of 1848 - to his retirement as a brigadier general more than forty years later, John C. Tidball saw much that shaped the United States and its army. Having protected President Lincoln during his First Inaugural, he served with the Army of the Potomac as a battery commander, a horse artillery brigade commander, and a corps artillery commander.

Beginning with the First Battle of Bull Run, Tidball saw action in nearly all the major engagements in the Eastern Theater, including Chancellorsville, Yorktown, Williamsburg, Gettysburg, Antietam, and Petersburg.".

"Using previously unpublished wartime letters and memoirs, Eugene C. Tidball captivates the reader with the story of his most famous relative's years in service to his country. The descriptions of battles and skirmishes offer first-person accounts of the action as well as the men he served with - men such as Irvin McDowell, Ambrose Burnside, and Henry Hunt.

Tidball's account extends beyond the Civil War to include his recounting of the Supreme Court's delivery of the Dred Scott decision; his command of the military District of Alaska; his traversing the Southwest in 1853 as a member of the 35th Parellel Pacific Railroad Survey; and his service as aide-de-camp to General-in-Chief William Tecumseh Sherman."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 546-553) and index.
Table of contents: title: Pt. 1. The Old Army. 1. Growing up: "I became my own preceptor." 2. Getting through West Point: from "thing" to plebe: "There was nothing in my rustic appearance..." 3. Getting through West Point: from plebe to graduate: "I had gone to the academy with the determination of staying." 4. First experiences in the Old Army: "He then fairly frothed at the mouth..." 5. A visit to antebellum Georgia: "I was charmed by the openhearted hospitality with which I had been received." 6. Florida: "I had the pleasure of 'trampoodling' through the swamps between Indian River Inlet and the Kissimmee." 7. Artist of the great reconnaissance: "During the last days mule meat sufficed to get us through." 8. An office job in Washington: "It was the Dred Scott decision ... that I had heard Chief Justice Taney delivering." 9. Training for war: "We went out at four o'clock in the morning and drilled like fury." 10. Guarding the president: "From it emerged a tall, lanky, awkward figure..."; title: Pt. 2. The war of the rebellion. 11. The Fort Pickens relief expedition: "Everything had to be done on the jump..." 12. First Bull Run: "In the minds of the South it confirmed them in its much vaunted boast that one Southerner was equal to two Yankees." 13. Up the peninsula: "We have had a good many little skirmishes." 14. Down the peninsula: "They fight like fiends." 15. Bloody Antietam: "I always managed to have the last shot." 16. Waiting for a promotion: "I have no spirit nor life left in me." 17. Chancellorsville and Gettysburg: "Never ... has such arduous service been required of batteries." 18. From the wilderness to Spotsylvania: "In this delightful little recreation called war we are sometimes liable to have our heads knocked off." 19. From Cold Harbor to Petersburg: "Where we have to fight such bloody battles for every inch gained, the miles appear very long." 20. Commandant of cadets: "I felt much wounded in pride." 21. Fort Stedman and the grand assault: "Never since the invention of gunpowder has such a cannonade taken place."; title: Pt. 3. Peacetime and retirement. 22. Up the Pacific coast to Alaska: "Take it all in all, it is the sorriest country that I have yet ever seen." 23. Chasing moonshiners and training artillerymen: "Among such lawless people..." 24. Aide-de-camp to General Sherman: "The general was a man of striking personality." 25. Odd jobs for the commanding general: "The cold became still more biting..." 26. General Sherman's last march: "The chief justice fell heavily to the ground." 27. The last campaign: "As to my mental and moral qualifications, I am content to stand on my past record."