In 1862, Ulysses S. Grant achieved what President Lincoln had sought since the start of the War: the first decisive Union victory. Fought on the western edge of the theater, the Forts Henry and Donelson campaign was a gruesome omen of what was to come.
Grant, until then an obscure brigadier general with a reputation for drink, became the fighting man of the hour, earning the nickname "Unconditional Surrender" Grant for his relentless pounding of the Confederates. But he had a match in ruthlessness in Lieutenant Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest. Forrest, cavalry commander in the Henry and Donelson campaign, proved a counterweight to Grant: quick and nimble to the former's steady plodding, a ruthless slaveholder and future KKK Grand Wizard to Grant's abolitionism.
Hurst captures the battle of these two great men and armies in all its destructive glory.
Generals Ulysses S. Grant and Nathan Bedford Forrest both hated to lose. In the battle for Fort Donelson, Tennessee, in February 1892, they fought not only each other but their own fellow generals, back-and-forth warfare, and miserable conditions. Tom Weiner's narration reflects the accuracy and detail of Hurst's research. Weiner has a newscaster's timbre and delivery. He pauses before quotations and gets into the character of whoever is speaking--Southerner, Midwesterner, country boy, officer. Listening is like getting messages from the past. History buffs should love this chronicle of the lesser-known western war. The victorious Grant became president; Forrest went on to help found the Ku Klux Klan. J.B.G. (c) AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine
