Book Review: Tar Heels in Gray: Life in the 30th North Carolina Infantry in the Civil War
In the past three decades, dozens of Civil war regimental histories have been published covering units North and South but few if any have quite taken the track that historian Dr. John B. Cameron utilized to craft his recent release entitled Tar Heels in Gray: Life in the 30th North Carolina Infantry in the Civil War. In a noteworthy departure from the usual construction of regimental histories, Cameron employed statistical analysis combined with a deft use of primary source material to examine who these men were, rather than just publishing a recitation of soldiers’ letters, battle accounts, and official reports. “I have sought to write the history of the men of the 30th North Carolina as they were,” Cameron notes. “Soldiers in time of war are motivated to fight, kill, and die for many reasons. We need to understand even those whom we now see as deeply flawed or tragically mistaken in their willingness to defend the indefensible.”
Formed in the
late summer of 1861, the 30th North Carolina would see extensive
service in eastern Virginia. “Over the course of three-and-a-half years, 1,506
men, approximately 1,000 volunteers and 500 drafted men, would be part of the
30th North Carolina Infantry,” Cameron wrote. “In June 1862, it was
assigned to what became the Army of Northern Virginia where the regiment would
find itself center stage for many of the decisive events of the Civil War,
fighting under D.H. Hill, Thomas Jackson, Jubal Early, and Robert E. Lee in
nearly all the major battles of that army, surrendering at Appomattox.”
While Cameron gives a brief general
overall history of the regiment’s service with Lee’s army, the focus and thrust
of the work is a deep dive into the character and personal experiences of the
men in the ranks. Chapters cover topics such as conscription and discipline,
attitudes concerning the war, slavery, and religion, but I think the strongest
chapters feature Cameron’s analysis of the medical aspects of the regiment’s
experience: battle related casualties, disease, starvation, and desertion.
Abounding with charts and statistics, the reader learns that of the 1,506 men
in the ranks, 23% died of disease, 20% deserted, 18.6% were discharged or
detailed away from the regiment, 14.3% were killed or died directly from battle
wounds, 7.8% became prisoners of war, and only 10.5% of the men survived to be
present and on the rolls at Appomattox. The text abounds with charts examining
the relationship between survival rates from injury or disease, deaths by
numbers of days in service, etc. Cameron does a fine job threading the needle
between taking an overtly academic approach and keeping the narrative lively,
making the final chapters of the book the most insightful and engaging.
“Disease was the greatest enemy
of both armies in the Civil War,” Cameron argues. “By the time the 30th
suffered its first battle casualty at Gaines Mill on June 27, 1862, 56 men had
already been discharged for health reasons and 47 were dead of disease. The
1860s were the last years in the Western world that produced such terrible
rates of sickness and death. Everything was bad, from the general health of the
men to the poor medical knowledge of physicians and surgeons. Hospitals were
little better than incubation pools for disease.” Quoting extensively from
primary source accounts, Cameron examines the types of diseases that afflicted
the regiment, accompanied by extensive charts showing disease rates, and
discusses how those diseases hampered the regiment’s ability to function
throughout the war. If you ever wanted to know why regiments of a thousand men at
enlistment dwindled down to roughly 300 men by the middle of the war, Cameron’s
book serves as a road map to gaining that understanding.
This is not a long book,
totaling about 130 pages of text, and sparsely illustrated at that, but what
Cameron has written packs a punch. To be honest, it was not at all what I was
expecting in a regimental history, but I enjoyed the book regardless. I think I
enjoyed it in large measure because I appreciated the unexpected approach to
the subject which, combined with Cameron’s detailed analysis, makes this work a
noteworthy addition to the literature, opening a new vista through which to
study the experiences of the common Civil War soldier. Tar Heels in Gray:
Life in the 30th North Carolina Infantry in the Civil War is available
through McFarland Publishing or through Barnes & Noble.
Unfortunately, Dr. Cameron passed away in September of this year at the age of 81. A veteran of the U.S. Army where he was an instructor in the Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, Tar Heels in Gray represents Dr. Cameron’s final published historical work. Cameron’s Civil War-era novel, The Roads of War, was published by TouchPoint Press in 2022, and his historical novel about Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, The Price of Freedom, will be published posthumously by TouchPoint Press in 2023.
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