Overview

Irvin McDowell was a prominent figure during the early months of the Civil War. The West Point graduate was a dutiful, dependable, and diligent military officer. With so much at stake in 1861, he was called upon to lead the Union's most prominent Eastern army. Pressed by the media and President Abraham Lincoln to move into Virginia and defeat the gathering Confederate forces, McDowell led his neophyte army to the plains of Manassas and was soundly defeated after a long day of hard fighting. Thereafter, he held a large independent command in northern Virginia during the 1862 Peninsula Campaign and served in the Army of Virginia under Gen. John Pope during the disastrous Second Manassas Campaign. Despite his significant contributions, a lack of primary materials (and few personal papers) made it seemingly impossible to pen his biography. Authors Frank Simione Jr. and Gene Schmiel used available sources to create a reliable synthesis of the man and his career in Searching for Irvin McDowell: The Civil War's Forgotten General. Unless or until his private papers surface, it will stand as the best treatment of McDowell. AUTHORS: Frank Simione Jr. retired from ATCC (American Type Culture Collection), a bioscience industry non-profit biological resource center located in Manassas, Virginia. During his 42-year career, 25 as a senior manager, he published numerous technical papers, review articles, manuals, and book chapters. Frank's interest in the Civil War spans more than half a century. His first book was Transformation of an Icon: ATCC and the New Business Model for Science. Gene Schmiel is a retired U.S. Department of State Foreign Service Officer who was an Assistant Professor of History at St. Francis University (PA) before joining the foreign service. He holds the Ph.D. degree from The Ohio State University. 20 images, 10 maps

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9781611216202

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The subtitle says it all: Irvin McDowell has been a forgotten Civil War general for too long. Now, thanks to great research and writing by Frank Simione and Gene Schmiel--not to mention Hal Jespersen's incredible maps--readers will better understand McDowell the man and his impact on the Civil War. This is an important book that should open many eyes to McDowell's life, career, and legacy. --Benjamin T. Arrington, author of The Last Lincoln Republican Defeated at First Manassas, the unhappy pawn of Washington strategists who sought to check the influence of George McClellan, and a critical contributor to the second Union defeat at Manassas, Irvin McDowell was rarely far from the center of controversy during the first two years of the Civil War. Curiously, for over a century and a half there has been no full-length biography of this enigmatic, but unquestionably important, officer. In Searching for Irvin McDowell, Frank P. Simione Jr. and Gene Schmiel provide a study of the general, his endeavors during the war, and the controversies that surrounded him that will be useful to anyone seeking to understand the first two years of America's bloodiest war. --Ethan S. Rafuse, author of From the Mountains to the Bay Overall, Searching for Irvin McDowell does a solid job of establishing the significance of the general's role in the war and fairly describing and assessing those considerable leadership flaws and battlefield mistakes that have contributed to his enduring low standing among the war's prominent generals. --Andrew Wagenhoffer, Civil War Books and Authors

"""The subtitle says it all: Irvin McDowell has been a forgotten Civil War general for too long. Now, thanks to great research and writing by Frank Simione and Gene Schmiel--not to mention Hal Jespersen's incredible maps--readers will better understand McDowell the man and his impact on the Civil War. This is an important book that should open many eyes to McDowell's life, career, and legacy.""--Benjamin T. Arrington, author of The Last Lincoln Republican ""Defeated at First Manassas, the unhappy pawn of Washington strategists who sought to check the influence of George McClellan, and a critical contributor to the second Union defeat at Manassas, Irvin McDowell was rarely far from the center of controversy during the first two years of the Civil War. Curiously, for over a century and a half there has been no full-length biography of this enigmatic, but unquestionably important, officer. In Searching for Irvin McDowell, Frank P. Simione Jr. and Gene Schmiel provide a study of the general, his endeavors during the war, and the controversies that surrounded him that will be useful to anyone seeking to understand the first two years of America's bloodiest war.""--Ethan S. Rafuse, author of From the Mountains to the Bay ""Overall, Searching for Irvin McDowell does a solid job of establishing the significance of the general's role in the war and fairly describing and assessing those considerable leadership flaws and battlefield mistakes that have contributed to his enduring low standing among the war's prominent generals.""--Andrew Wagenhoffer, Civil War Books and Authors"

Author Information

Frank Simione Jr. retired from ATCC (American Type Culture Collection), a bioscience industry non-profit biological resource center located in Manassas, Virginia. During his 42-year career, 25 as a senior manager, he published numerous technical papers, review articles, manuals, and book chapters. Frank’s interest in the Civil War spans more than half a century. His first book was Transformation of an Icon: ATCC and the New Business Model for Science. Gene Schmiel is a retired U.S. Department of State Foreign Service Officer who was an Assistant Professor of History at St. Francis University (PA) before joining the foreign service. He holds the Ph.D. degree from The Ohio State University.

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