The Atlanta Campaign: Volume 2: From the Etowah River to Kennesaw Mountain, May 20 to June 27, 1864
- Current Stock:
- Author:
- David A. Powell
- Pub Date:
- Fall 2025
- ISBN:
- 978-1-61121-757-5
- eISBN:
- 978-1-61121-758-2
- Binding:
- hardcover, d.j.
- Specs:
- 25 images, 21 maps, 560 pp
- Bookplates:
- Available
eBook coming soon!
Click HERE to read the front matter and part of Chapter 1!
The scope, drama, and importance of the 1864 Atlanta Campaign was on a par with Ulysses S. Grant’s Overland Campaign in Virginia. Despite its criticality and massive array of primary source material, the operations in North Georgia have lingered in the shadows. Award-winning author David A. Powell’s first of five installments, The Atlanta Campaign: Volume 1: Dalton to Cassville, May 1–19, 1864, treated the opening phase of the campaign—weeks of maneuver and several days of heavy fighting at Resaca, after which the Confederates slipped out of Sherman’s traps and escaped across the Oostanaula and Etowah rivers. This second volume, From the Etowah River to Kennesaw Mountain, May 20–June 27, 1864, marches with the armies and their leaders deeper into Georgia.
The heavyweight match unfolding between U. S. Grant and Robert E. Lee from the Wilderness to the trenches of Cold Harbor increased the pressure on Sherman to do everything he could to prevent Joe Johnston from sending troops to reinforce the Virginia army. Sherman had closed half the distance to Johnston’s base at Atlanta, but the Army of Tennessee had grown in numbers and the odds that were once 2 to 1 in his favor were now nearly even.
Sherman opened the second phase of the campaign on May 23 by throwing his army across the Etowah. Instead of moving down the railroad to Allatoona, however, he marched west of Marietta to Dallas. The next five weeks were by some measures the hardest of the entire summer as maneuvering gave way to trench warfare, first along the New Hope Line, then Pine and Lost mountains, along the Mud Creek Line, and finally, atop the imposing slopes of Kennesaw Mountain. The daily grind, punctuated by periodic assaults at New Hope Church, Pickett’s Mill, Gilgal Church, Pigeon Hill, and Cheatham Hill took a terrible toll on both armies. The heavy rain through most of June made life in the field a misery, sick lists spiked, and men and horses broke down or died. Neither side could claim victory as June drew to a close. Sherman remained undaunted. He would return to flanking. And this time Atlanta was a mere dozen miles distant.
This multivolume study is based heavily on hundreds of primary accounts (many of which have never been used), 21 original maps, a firm understanding of the terrain, and a keen grasp of military strategy and tactics. Powell’s The Atlanta Campaign is this generation’s definitive treatment of one of the most important and fascinating confrontations of the entire Civil War. And it will stand the test of time.
Advance Praise
“Powell has delivered another gem on the road to Atlanta. His groundbreaking The Atlanta Campaign: Volume 1: Dalton to Cassville, May 1–19, 1864, provided primary accounts from diaries, newspapers, and letters with new insights and interpretations of the fight for Georgia. This installment takes us deeper into Georgia and the battles from the New Hope Line to the heights of Kennesaw Mountain. This invaluable work also provides fresh revelations and interpretations and deepens our understanding of the struggles faced by Sherman and Johnston and their exhausted armies as the war dragged into its fourth summer. This series is a must-read for any student of the Atlanta Campaign.” — Robert D. Jenkins, Sr., author of The Cassville Affairs: Johnston, Hood, and the Failed Confederate Strategy in the Atlanta Campaign, 19 May 1864
“Never before has the Atlanta Campaign had this detail of treatment. Powell’s multivolume series is breaking new ground in terms of depth and analysis, and this second volume adds tremendously to our understanding of those critical events north of Atlanta that led to the climactic battles around the city later that summer.” — Timothy B. Smith, author of Shiloh: Conquer or Perish and The Iron Dice of Battle: Albert Sidney Johnston and the Civil War in the West
“With this second volume, David Powell continues his riveting blow-by-blow description of the fighting in the red clay of North Georgia. The reader gets the story from the vantage of wrenching decisions made at command headquarters down to the sufferings of the soldiers in the rain-drenched trenches. At stake was the soul of the nation. No serious student of the Western Theater can bypass this series; it is simply that important.” — Larry Daniel, author of Richmond Views the West: Politics and Perceptions in the Confederate Capital
David A. Powell is a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute (1983) with a BA in history. He has published many articles in various magazines and more than fifteen historical simulations. For the past decade his focus has been on the epic battle of Chickamauga, and he is nationally recognized for his tours of that battlefield. David is the author of many books including The Chickamauga Campaign trilogy, The Maps of Chickamauga, and Failure in the Saddle. He won the Nevins-Freeman Award given by the Chicago Civil War Round Table and his first installment of The Atlanta Campaign was a finalist for the Army Historical Foundation’s Distinguished Writing Award. David and his wife Anne live with their trio of Bloodhounds in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, Illinois.
