Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Pages: 272
Trim: 6¼ x 9⅜
978-1-5381-7427-2 • Hardback • February 2023 • $110.00 • (£85.00)
978-1-5381-7428-9 • Paperback • February 2023 • $39.00 • (£30.00)
978-1-5381-7429-6 • eBook • January 2023 • $37.50 • (£30.00)
Earl J. Hess, Emeritus, Lincoln Memorial University, Harrogate, Tennessee, is the author or editor of twenty-six books on Civil War history. They include Civil War Logistics: A Study of Military Transportation (Louisiana State University Press, 2017), Civil War Supply and Strategy: Feeding Men and Moving Armies (Louisiana State University Press, 2020), and Animal Histories of the Civil War Era (Louisiana State University Press, 2022). Hess’s study of Civil War Infantry Tactics: Training, Combat, and Small-Unit Effectiveness (Louisiana State University Press, 2015), received the Tom Watson Brown Book Award of the Society of Civil War Historians.
An important study that helps remedy the general neglect of mines and torpedoes. Significant both for the American Civil War and for our more general understanding of the process of technological innovation in the nineteenth century.
— Jeremy Black, author of Technology and War
Professor Hess has produced yet another exciting book on an understudied aspect of Civil War military history. He examines the history of Civil War land mines and places them within the larger context of nineteenth-century military history. With his analysis of the tactics, technology, and moral ramifications of the use of land mines, Professor Hess has created the definitive book on the subject.
— Kyle S. Sinsi, professor of history at The Citadel, author of Sacred Debts: State Civil War Claims and American Federalism
“Earl Hess continues to produce masterful studies in Civil War history that challenge decades of presumed scholarly wisdom. This booklooks at the expansion of landmine technology and tactics during the sectional conflict, the campaigns in which subterranean mines were employed, and the colorful personalities involved in weapons development. Hess’s work is a triumph of diligent and focused scholarship.”
— Christopher S. Stowe, Professor of Military History, Marine Corps University
— Christopher S. Stowe, Professor of Military History, Marine Corps University
Its wider value further enhanced through situating its topic within the long history of international landmine development, this impressive study rightfully assumes its place as the new standard history of what proved to be the most controversial weapon and mode of warfare that emerged during the American Civil War. Highly recommended.
— Civil War Books and Authors
- A bulleted list of the book’s distinguishing features.
- intensive research in archival institutions, published primary sources, and technical literature
- full covering of all landmine incidents during the Civil War
- coverage of the moral as well as the technical and tactical aspects of landmine warfare in the Civil War
- setting landmine warfare in the Civil War within its wider international context
- clear description of complex technical issues
- analysis of the operational aspects of landmine use in the Civil War
- brief coverage of landmine warfare from the Crimean War to the Cold War as context for the Civil War