Admiral David Farragut eyed a potentially lethal minefield guarding the entrance to Mobile Bay, Alabama, as his attack column of ironclad monitors rushed forward, opening the assault against the Confederate citadels on shore.
One vessel, the U.S.S. Tecumseh, looked every inch an invincible monster. As the sleek, turreted warship drew close to its Rebel enemies, a geyser of water shot up on its starboard side followed by a muffled rumble. The ship heeled over and sank in seconds, carried to its watery doom by its own war-speed and momentum.
Crewmen aboard the rest of the Union ships...

Even though he defeated Robert E. Lee in the Civil War's greatest battle, George Gordon Meade has never enjoyed a prominent place in the pantheon of Union war heroes. To most students of the Civil War, he is merely the man who was lucky enough to benefit from Confederate mistakes at Gettysburg, but whose shortcomings as a commander compelled Abraham Lincoln to bring in Ulysses S. Grant from the West to achieve victory.
In this, the first book-length study of the general to appear in a generation, Ethan S. Rafuse challenges the notion that Meade was simply the last in a long line of...

Winfield Scott Hancock gained his greatest fame for his crucial contributions to the Federal victory at Gettysburg. Union veterans remembered Hancock as a general who led from the front and whose forceful presence could change the course of a battle.
In addition to the Civil War, Hancock's military service included dramatic experiences during the Mexican-American War, Reconstruction, and the Indian wars. He also pursued a national political career, which ended in an unsuccessful try for the presidency in 1880.
This lively biography introduces readers to an American soldier who put...