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Hood's Texas Brigade: Lee's Grenadier Guard.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1970
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 9, 2014
Outstanding history of Hood's Texas Brigade. It is the definitive history of the famous brigade.
May 14, 2024
Phenomenal history of one of the most famous units in American military history. The Texans were the only major unit from that State serving in the Eastern Theater of the War Between the States, and Simpson takes the reader all the way from the recruiting grounds, to the long marches, the camp life, the skirmishes, battles, and sieges, and the shenanigans that this great unit partook in, and got into.
Part of what made this book such a joy to read was that Col. Simpson (US Air Force, I do believe, I have since put the book in one of my read boxes, so I don't have it at hand to check...) went out of his way to show the human side of this Brigade of Texans, and Arkansans, and occasional South Carolinians, and Georgians, and Mississippians (all henceforth, honorary Texans, of course). And man, what a group these men were.
Texas was still largely a frontier State, and so discipline, and proper military decorum was always a problem for these guys, or rather, always a problem for anyone attempting to force it on them (think the Cossacks from the Russian Imperial Army, just in infantry form, with brimmed hats). As such they took traditional American individualism (which is never as outrageous as anti-Americans would have you believe), and turned it up about two notches...possibly five.
The anecdotes, liberally infused, throughout the overarching narrative of the culture of fun these guys lived were often laugh out loud hilarious. A couple of my favorite ones below.
Firstly, a Confederate General, early in the 1862 Peninsula Campaign, is riding through the encampments of his Division, on an inspection tour. Everything's going well until he reaches the sentry posts of the Texas Brigade.
It's one guy, already a violation of SOP, and he's laying down...that's like a triple violation of several SOP's just there, so...
The General demands to know what outfit this is. Without getting up the man lazily drawls: Hood's Texas Brigade. When reminded that he is, in fact, laying down on his job, the man testily demands to know who the hell it is that's talking to him. When informed its General so and so, the Texan smiles, stands up, and holds out his hand.
"Well then, pleasure to meet you Mr. So and so, may name is..."
And thus the Confederate Army was introduced to both their largest gaggle of problem children they would ever possessed, and one of their greatest battlefield assets.
The second story I love is of the Texans being rather annoyed that Richmond wasn't outfitting them with better hats, or hats at all in some cases (apparently the Texans made no distinction between types of hats, and generally did not show any fondness for the standard issue, French style kepi both sides wore...) so they decided to go on an impromptu route march along a rail line.
They knew that civilian trains ran through the area routinely, so they marched slow and waited. Their tactic was to stand at attention, near the tracks, and as the trains slowed, the civilians, always eager to see soldiers, would hang out the windows and wave at, and greet their soldiers. America in the 19th century was a hat wearing culture, so every man had a hat on, as per unwritten social law..
As the men in the cars, many of them high society with "fancy hats on" leaned close enough, Texas man would snatch them for their own. Thus procuring, albeit not militarily regulated, headgear.
This got to be such a problem that Richmond grew more diligent about providing the Texans with headgear...except they were kepis, which the Texas boys weren't none too fond for, and so the hat raids continued, until Richmond, in frustration, both supplied wide brimmed hats, and rerouted civilian train traffic.
In two nutshells, these were the South's very own Cossacks.
And yet, in like Cossack fashion, they were the terror of the battlefield. From the Seven Days, were they broke the Federal lines in a bloody frontal assault at Gaines Mill, to 2nd Manassas where they swept the field, Antietam where they sacrificed themselves to stabilize Jackson’s crumbling Corps, Gettysburg where they came within an ace of breaking the Federal left flank, the Wilderness where they earned their greatest glory and rescued the entire Army of Northern Virginia, permanently turning the tide of battle, to the trench lines around Richmond and Petersburg where they held fast in some of the most lopsided actions of the entire War, and numerous other fields in several States.
The Texans were a truly amazing outfit in a fight, and a truly irritating one to have in camp, as numerous accounts attested to.
Oh, one final thing to mention: as per Texas standard, they went into battle primarily under the Lone Star flag of Texas, despite Confederate regulations prescribing the use of the St. Andrew's Cross. The Texans, while using the Southern Cross, as it became known as, preferred the Lone Star of Texas. It was a fight the Confederate Army never won.
From stories of battles, to long marches, the harrowing tales of the wounded and their dreadful experience in mid 19th century hospitals, to the unshakeable good humor, and biting wit of the Texans (they had nicknames for all of the men from different States, North and South. My personal favorite is their nickname for Arkansans, who hail from the Razorback State: Porkers. God, that's funny,) this book deserves to be more widely known. It's a shame it's never been reprinted, it really needs to be. It is also now easily one of my favorite volumes in my library, very highly recommended.
Part of what made this book such a joy to read was that Col. Simpson (US Air Force, I do believe, I have since put the book in one of my read boxes, so I don't have it at hand to check...) went out of his way to show the human side of this Brigade of Texans, and Arkansans, and occasional South Carolinians, and Georgians, and Mississippians (all henceforth, honorary Texans, of course). And man, what a group these men were.
Texas was still largely a frontier State, and so discipline, and proper military decorum was always a problem for these guys, or rather, always a problem for anyone attempting to force it on them (think the Cossacks from the Russian Imperial Army, just in infantry form, with brimmed hats). As such they took traditional American individualism (which is never as outrageous as anti-Americans would have you believe), and turned it up about two notches...possibly five.
The anecdotes, liberally infused, throughout the overarching narrative of the culture of fun these guys lived were often laugh out loud hilarious. A couple of my favorite ones below.
Firstly, a Confederate General, early in the 1862 Peninsula Campaign, is riding through the encampments of his Division, on an inspection tour. Everything's going well until he reaches the sentry posts of the Texas Brigade.
It's one guy, already a violation of SOP, and he's laying down...that's like a triple violation of several SOP's just there, so...
The General demands to know what outfit this is. Without getting up the man lazily drawls: Hood's Texas Brigade. When reminded that he is, in fact, laying down on his job, the man testily demands to know who the hell it is that's talking to him. When informed its General so and so, the Texan smiles, stands up, and holds out his hand.
"Well then, pleasure to meet you Mr. So and so, may name is..."
And thus the Confederate Army was introduced to both their largest gaggle of problem children they would ever possessed, and one of their greatest battlefield assets.
The second story I love is of the Texans being rather annoyed that Richmond wasn't outfitting them with better hats, or hats at all in some cases (apparently the Texans made no distinction between types of hats, and generally did not show any fondness for the standard issue, French style kepi both sides wore...) so they decided to go on an impromptu route march along a rail line.
They knew that civilian trains ran through the area routinely, so they marched slow and waited. Their tactic was to stand at attention, near the tracks, and as the trains slowed, the civilians, always eager to see soldiers, would hang out the windows and wave at, and greet their soldiers. America in the 19th century was a hat wearing culture, so every man had a hat on, as per unwritten social law..
As the men in the cars, many of them high society with "fancy hats on" leaned close enough, Texas man would snatch them for their own. Thus procuring, albeit not militarily regulated, headgear.
This got to be such a problem that Richmond grew more diligent about providing the Texans with headgear...except they were kepis, which the Texas boys weren't none too fond for, and so the hat raids continued, until Richmond, in frustration, both supplied wide brimmed hats, and rerouted civilian train traffic.
In two nutshells, these were the South's very own Cossacks.
And yet, in like Cossack fashion, they were the terror of the battlefield. From the Seven Days, were they broke the Federal lines in a bloody frontal assault at Gaines Mill, to 2nd Manassas where they swept the field, Antietam where they sacrificed themselves to stabilize Jackson’s crumbling Corps, Gettysburg where they came within an ace of breaking the Federal left flank, the Wilderness where they earned their greatest glory and rescued the entire Army of Northern Virginia, permanently turning the tide of battle, to the trench lines around Richmond and Petersburg where they held fast in some of the most lopsided actions of the entire War, and numerous other fields in several States.
The Texans were a truly amazing outfit in a fight, and a truly irritating one to have in camp, as numerous accounts attested to.
Oh, one final thing to mention: as per Texas standard, they went into battle primarily under the Lone Star flag of Texas, despite Confederate regulations prescribing the use of the St. Andrew's Cross. The Texans, while using the Southern Cross, as it became known as, preferred the Lone Star of Texas. It was a fight the Confederate Army never won.
From stories of battles, to long marches, the harrowing tales of the wounded and their dreadful experience in mid 19th century hospitals, to the unshakeable good humor, and biting wit of the Texans (they had nicknames for all of the men from different States, North and South. My personal favorite is their nickname for Arkansans, who hail from the Razorback State: Porkers. God, that's funny,) this book deserves to be more widely known. It's a shame it's never been reprinted, it really needs to be. It is also now easily one of my favorite volumes in my library, very highly recommended.
July 10, 2025
Fair warning for those who have the 1994 reprint by Olde Soldier Books Inc.: My copy had a major pagination error. Page 322 was followed by page 291 and repeated the text until page 322. Then it was followed by page 343. I effectively lost 21 pages of the narrative. Otherwise, the book was excellent and I’ll be looking for an error free copy in the future.
November 18, 2022
After over 50 years, still the definitive history of the Texas Brigade. A pioneering work in unit history. Be sure to scan the footnotes for interesting anecdotes that today are usually inserted into the text of such books. Highly recommended as well is Simpson's previous work "From Gaines' Mill to Appomattox", which covers a single company of the 4th Texas regiment in great detail.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews