Omg yes!!!
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I recently saw his video on a someone with whom ive been fascinated for quite a while, Daniel Morgan. It was a decent overview of Morgan’s life, but sometimes i felt like he was being too “hollywood” if that makes sense? Like exagerating some things to appeal to younger audiences. Which im not really opposed to if it gets more people interested in history, just annoying at times. I get it though.
I think of it as the “Tragedy plus time = comedy” approach.
Ill be dragging my family to this in a couple weeks.
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Oh yeah, I totally forgot about him, he’s really good too. The way he lays out stories is funny af
His video on Wake Island and the 450 Marines was amazing
I have been reading a lot of history lately. So much so my friend bought me a novel. I have not picked that up yet.
Yesterday I finished Lincoln’s Lieutenants by Stephen Sears. It dove tails quite well with his history Gettysburg.
Reading it, it makes one wonder how the generals of the Army of the Potomac did not lose the war during the first two years. McClellan is a guy I hated, then had empathy for, then hated, and so on. He did organize that army, and prepare it for what was to come, but his field generalship suffered. Plus his politics were an issue. That is not a secret. But, following up on Gettysburg, Sears gives a lot of credit to George Meade. The Meade and Grant partnership starting in 1864 continued to solidify the strategy on the Eastern Front, but even then Grant came close to running that army into the ground. Meade was nearly transferred several times during the summer of 1864 but Grant kept him in the lead of the Army the the Potomac. Lincoln’s generals often failed at the corp and division level. The Overland Campaign was brutal. Hancock the Superb was another hero of the East as well as Sheridan (eventually).
Meade’s overall issue was, he did not play politics well, and Dan Sickles subverting him, not just during the war, but during Sickles’ following 50 years. (He lived to 94.) Meade never wrote memoirs, and other than a trove of letters to his wife, did not leave much in his self defense post war. Though Allen Guelzo and Victor Davis Hanson downplay Meade, Sears gives him (Meade) his due. I believe historian Jennifer Murray has a full biography of Meade coming out this year, I am looking forward to that.
Robert E. Lee, unlike most histories, stays in the background. Not as an insult, but this is a history of Lincoln’s generals.
So, another book is waiting for me to finish, Dr. Caroline Janney’s Ends of War.
I recommend Lincoln’s Lieutenants and it is free on Kindle at the moment.
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There’s a lot of history. I understand why folks are attracted to the Civil War and WW2. But for some folks that is their only interest.
Lincoln’s early lieutenants were pretty problematic. But the North had so many more resources. The South had better generals, who only made a few bad decisions, but in the long term the odds were pretty stacked.
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Ehhhh, that’s debatable. I know ive posted his videos before, but its literally the topic discussed.
Also just started a new book
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Certainly more successes in the first half of the war. I am amenable to the debate over the second half, or even overall. But Lincoln had good reasons to demand action.
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I go down rabbit holes. My Stalin rabbit hole included 5-6 (maybe more) biographies. The Gettysburg/Civil War rabbit hole I have dug was unintended. I might take up Charlemagne real soon.
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Since we’re on the topic of the Civil War, I thought this excerpt would tie in nicely. The comparisons are pretty interesting.
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Grant was crowned “The Butcher” as most know. After Cold Harbor he and Meade tried avoiding traditional, mass, head on assaults. The Crater disaster was a potential breakthrough lost. Shock troop strategies were developed, and successful at first. But lack of follow through, or out right dereliction of duty at the division or brigade levels often lead to Northern failures. Fredericksburg is an example. George Meade had actually pierced, and was beginning to turn the Southern line against Stonewall’s division. However, when Meade sent messages for reinforcements, he was refused, his division had to pull back. With all of that, Robert Bonekemper’s studies (and possibly others) indicated that Lee should have earned the Butcher title over Grant. What you had were two generals who were immovable colliding and developing a new kind of warfare.
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I’m finishing up a book I wasn’t expecting to read for the writing project about Lewiston I’m currently working on. With all of the talk about Nazis flying around here, I wanted to make sure I had a good grasp on what they were.
I highly recommend Ranier Zitelmann’s Hitler’s National Socialism if you’d like to understand Hitler’s entire political career. He tackles the rather enormous task of analyzing everything that Hitler said or wrote that has been reliably documented to answer the question “What in the hell was that guy even talking about?”.
It isn’t the most gripping read at times and it is a very academic work, but I found it to be an overall compelling read. It challenges a lot of the simplified narratives I grew up learning about the Nazis, and clearly lays out the case for Hitler’s anti-capitalism and how National Socialism ideologically distinguished itself from Marxist-Leninism.
It also illustrates just how much of what people my age and older learned about WWII was shaped by unreliable sources like imprisoned Nazis, Franz Halder long after the war, communists, and propaganda taken at face value.
Current history books are almost always more reliable than decades-old history books. The field of study seems to be making real strides.
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Next up on the list to make sure I understand the Nazis better than anyone calling me one.
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I’ve been listening to/ watching more history content recently and some of the speakers have funny little quips
“The formations were destroyed, but men with guns are still dangerous”
“Technology was expensive and somewhat unreliable so a significant portion of air defence in the beginning still relied heavily on the good old mark 1 eyeballs”
“They missed a generation of upcoming officers. Think about it, if Fritz goes off to the front and doesn’t see Gertrude for 4 years from 1914 to 1918, little Hans won’t be graduating from officer college by 1939”
“The British plan for the offensive relied on the Germans, who were the defenders, to not be on the defensive.”
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I started watching Chernobyl last night. I don’t know much about what happened, so I have no idea how accurate it is but it seems pretty good.
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@anna_5588 I’m about 1/2 way through Hitler’s Beneficiaries and it seems RIGHT up your alley. I’m learning all about the financial instruments used to extract and transfer wealth to keep the Germans happy.
@jshaving That is right up with Band of Brothers as my favorite miniseries. IIRC, it is pretty historically accurate except for the female scientist character, who serves as an amalgamation of many Soviet scientists.
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Its pretty accurate
Thanks for the rec! I’ll check it out
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