Military biography of Lt. Gen. Richard H. Anderson, whose career led him from West Point to Mexico, Charleston to Appomattox
Richard H. Anderson excelled as a soldier. Including his time at West Point, he was in uniform continuously from the age of sixteen. He knew little else but a life in the saddle. When the canons rang out over Charleston harbor, signaling the start of America's Civil War, Anderson resigned his US Army commission and joined his native South Carolina in rebellion against the United States.
Soldier of the South is the first comprehensive examination of Anderson's life, providing a view of an officer's experiences on the frontier, in Mexico, and during the American Civil War. Anderson led Confederate soldiers first in Florida, then from the Peninsula Campaign to Sailor's Creek, where his patchwork corps disintegrated. Edward J. Hagerty considers both the strategic details of Anderson's failures and successes on the battlefield and his personal struggles off it. One of Robert E. Lee's corps commanders, Anderson was the most senior ranking soldier from South Carolina, yet he fell into relative obscurity after the war. Hagerty examines the causes for Anderson's postwar decline and makes the case for his continued significance.