Mark A. Lause (1) (1950–)

While I have to agree with the reviewers at "Goodreads" who marked down this book for the relatively few maps, the author is to be highly commended for their no-nonsense analysis of an inherently confusing event. This is as what is usually recalled as a "raid," which suited all the parties embarrassed by this event (both "blue" and "grey"), but which glosses over the higher operational goals of Sterling Price, which included the disruption of the 1864 national election. That this whole exercise failed is less a commentary on the mutual generalship of Price and William Rosecrans (both of whom were inept), and more on how the wider population of Missouri still wanted no part of secession. Probably the emblematic incident of the whole affair is the death of "Bloody Bill" Anderson in a volley of Union gunfire, having left a trail of atrocities in his wake; call it symptomatic of the "eliminationist" strain of the American Way of War.… (mehr)