Book Review - The Cavalry of the Army of the Ohio, A Civil War History

While this has been posted on Emerging Civil War, it was edited for brevity. Here is the full review:

The Cavalry of the Army of the Ohio, A Civil War History. By Dennis W. Belcher. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2024. Softbound, 389 pp. Bibliographic Info: 62 photos, 16 maps, notes, bibliography, index. $49.95.

The Army of the Ohio, as an entity, has received limited scholarship from Civil War historians. In 1994, Richard J. Reid published The Army That Buell Built, a small booklet that touched on Buell’s period of command. In 2001 Gerald J. Prokopowicz authored the exceptional All for the Regiment – The Army of the Ohio 1861-1862, which focused on soldier experiences in the early portion of the war. Dennis W. Belcher, author of several books that focus on the cavalry forces in the Western Theater, has added The Cavalry of the Army of the Ohio, A Civil War History, to the small number of focused works on this important and overlooked field force.

The Cavalry of the Army of the Ohio is a straightforward accounting of the mounted arm for both iterations of the Army of the Ohio. The first version of this army was formed in the fall of 1861 from units within the Department of the Ohio and commanded by Major General Don C. Buell until Buell was relieved of command in late October 1862. This first iteration of the army was involved such actions as Mill Springs, Shiloh, and Perryville.

The second version of the Army of the Ohio was created by May 1863 and placed under the command of Major General Ambrose E. Burnside. Made up of the newly formed XXIII Corps and two divisions of the IX Corps, this army was tasked to secure east Tennessee, and particularly Knoxville, which Federal forces entered on September 1. Burnside, upon his own request, was relieved of command, and the army went through a series of commanders such as John G. Foster, John M. Schofield, Jacob D. Cox, and then Schofield again. The army saw fighting around Knoxville, during the Atlanta Campaign, at Franklin, Nashville, and the Carolinas Campaign.  

Belcher blends a no-nonsense style of information sharing interspersed with first person accounts, to bring the reader a month by month, week by week, and in some cases a day-by-day accounting of the Federal mounted arm. As regiments and units are added to the army, he provides background on each and spread throughout the book are organizational charts showing the various cavalry arrangements as they moved through the war. About forty percent of the book is dedicated to the first Army of the Ohio, the remainder of the chapters focus on the latter version of the army. As the reviewer has a great familiarity with the army under Buell’s command, the second portion of the book was of great interest as the author details many actions that occurred in 1863 and 1864 that will be unfamiliar with most Civil War buffs.  

The author also provides details on the several raids, both Confederate and Federal, that fell within the Army of the Ohio’s area of responsibility. Not only are the better-known Morgan raids discussed, but also smaller actions such as William Sander’s 1863 Tennessee and John Pegram’s 1863 Kentucky raids are included. Here again these details bring greater learning of topics not known to most readers, particularly from the Federal perspective.

However, the book does suffer from several, albeit fairly minor, errors. This was a major distraction for the reviewer as these errors should have been easily preventable. A few examples follow:

Page 43 – A description of noted Confederate raider John H. Morgan is provided. The author states that “Initially, he was promoted colonel of the 2nd Kentucky Cavalry.” Morgan was not a colonel when he joined the Confederate cause – he served as a captain of his Kentucky squadron and did not receive a promotion to colonel until after the Battle of Shiloh, seven months later (although the promotion was dated to April 4, 1862).

Page 129 – The author writes “Rousseau placed Lytle’s Seventh Brigade on the right flank and Harris’s Ninth Brigade on the left.” At the Battle of Perryville, Brigadier General William H. Lytle led the Seventeenth Brigade, not the Seventh.

Page 156 – “even before the regiment was fully organized, a company under the command of Captain Richard Rankin participated in a fight at Augusta, Kentucky, and aided in driving Morgan’s troops away from the town.” The Seventh Ohio Cavalry was not present in any form at the Augusta engagement on September 27, 1862. The primary source, as listed in the author’s notes, is Rankin’s History of the Seventh Ohio Volunteer Cavalry (Ripley, Ohio, 1881), cited as pages 2-3, which states:

In the meantime, Co. E. Capt. R. C. Rankin’s Company, quartered at Ripley, Ohio, rendered valuable service to the city of Maysville, Ky., in defending her against John Morgan’s command, and on the night of September 20th, 1862 (actually September 26th), crossed the river and marched to Brook[s]ville, Ky., a distance of twenty-five miles, and participated in the attack and the driving from the place, the rebels of Basil Duke, who was engaged in paroling the citizens carried by him [Duke] from Augusta, which place he had captured and burned the day previous. Capt. R. C. Rankin, with Co. E and a squad of mounted citizens from Ripley, Ohio, made a charge on the place [Brooksville], capturing one rebel as they went in, and having one man killed by the retreating rebels. The gallant Duke did not stand upon the order of his going, but just “went.” This may be recorded as the first blood the Seventh saw in Battle.

There are, unfortunately, several minor errors such as presented above. However, these minor errors aside, I am pleased with The Cavalry of the Army of the Ohio. Regardless of this reviewer’s pedantic obsession with the most minute details, this book brings to light a facet of  the Civil War not often discussed or studied by Civil War buffs and adds a great amount of detail to the Federal mounted arm in the Western Theater.

For more on the skirmish at Brooksville, see the reviewer’s The “Battle” of Brooksville, Kentucky, September 28th, 1862, on the Western Theater in the Civil War website (westerntheatercivilwar.com).