Sign-In
Cart
To Succeed or Perish: The Diaries of Sergeant Edmund Trent Eggleston, Company G, 1st Mississippi Light Artillery Regiment
Paperback
Series: Voices of the Civil War
Biographies GeneralMilitary BiographiesCivil War Period (1850-1877)
Publisher Price: $24.95
Publisher: University of Tennessee Press
Published: Aug 29 2025
Pages: 227
Weight: 0.74
Height: 0.56 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
With the Conscription Act of 1862, the Confederacy enacted the first military draft in American history. Rather than face duty with strangers in an uncertain locale, twenty-eight-year-old Edmund Trent Eggleston of Warren County, Mississippi, took advantage of a thirty-day grace period and joined his neighbors in volunteering for duty in Company G of the 1st Mississippi Light Artillery Regiment. Throughout his service, Eggleston kept a detailed account of his daily activities and those of his unit, a diary that remains one of the very few primary sources from a Confederate artillerist in the West. In To Succeed or Perish, editors Lawrence Lee Hewitt, Thomas E. Schott, and Marc Kunis present Eggleston's diaries, along with his letters and ledgers, to offer a rare personal perspective on life behind the cannons in the Civil War's Western Theater and a fascinating window into the world of the Confederate soldier.
Eggleston describes garrison duty near Vicksburg, where he enjoyed visits from his wife and children; the battery's first engagement with the enemy at Champion Hill on May 16, 1863; and his service during the 1864 campaigns in Georgia and Tennessee. He offers a significant firsthand account of the Atlanta campaign, including the fighting at Resaca, Cassville, New Hope Church, Kennesaw Mountain, and the Chattahoochee River, as well as the siege of Atlanta. Because of the destruction of Hood's Army, Confederate records of these engagements are extremely rare, and Eggleston's observations are invaluable. In Tennessee, he recounts the action at the Battle of Nashville and the capture of his battery.
Featuring an introduction that traces the wartime actions of Company G as well as a complete roster of the men with whom Eggleston served, To Succeed or Perish provides an important primary account of artillery service in an underrepresented theater of the Civil War.
Also from
Hewitt, Lawrence Lee
Port Hudson: The Most Significant Battlefield Photographs of the Civil War
Hewitt, Lawrence Lee
Hardcover
Confederate Generals in the Western Theater, Vol. 2: Essays on America's Civil War
Hewitt, Lawrence Lee
Bergeron, Arthur W.
Hardcover
Confederate Generals in the Western Theater, Volume 1: Classic Essays on America's Civil War
Bergeron, Arthur W.
Hewitt, Lawrence Lee
Hardcover
Confederate Generals in the Trans-Mississippi, Vol. 3: Essays on America's Civil War
Hewitt, Lawrence Lee
Schott, Thomas E.
Paperback
Also in
Civil War Period (1850-1877)
The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War
Larson, Erik
Paperback
The Ballad of the Fugitive William Parker: A True Tale of Love, Murder, Treason, and Ordinary Folks Who Saved America
Aptowicz, Cristin O'Keefe
Hardcover
The Confederacy Myth: How an Insurrection of Slaveholders Tried to Destroy the United States
Williams, Connor
Hardcover
America's Founding Son: John Quincy Adams, from President to Political Maverick
Crawford, Bob
Hardcover
Centennial: The Great Fair of 1876 and the Invention of America's Future
Bordewich, Fergus M.
Hardcover
Combee: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War
Fields-Black, Edda L.
Hardcover
Getting to Reparations: How Building a Different America Requires a Reckoning with Our Past
Brown, Dorothy A.
Hardcover
Midnight on the Potomac: The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America
Ellsworth, Scott
Hardcover
The Man Behind the Cane: Preston Brooks, Political Violence, and the Road to the Civil War
Quigley, Paul
Hardcover
Lincoln on Leadership for Today: Abraham Lincoln's Approach to Twenty-First-Century Issues
Phillips, Donald T.
Paperback
If I Can Get Home This Fall: A Story of Love, Loss, and a Cause in the Civil War
Alexander, Tyler
Hardcover
Lincoln's Lady Spymaster: The Untold Story of the Abolitionist Southern Belle Who Helped Win the Civil War
Willis, Gerri
Hardcover
Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad 1863-1869
Ambrose, Stephen E.
Paperback
The Road Was Full of Thorns: Running Toward Freedom in the American Civil War
Zoellner, Tom
Hardcover
Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America
Nelson, Megan Kate
Hardcover
The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism
Baptist, Edward E.
Paperback
The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution
Foner, Eric
Paperback
Behind the Scenes: Or Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House
Keckley, Elizabeth
Paperback
The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West
Nelson, Megan Kate
Paperback
We Gather Together: The True Story of Thanksgiving and the Woman Who Fought to Make It an American Holiday
Kiernan, Denise
Paperback
The Memoirs of General William Tecumseh Sherman: The Complete Annotated Edition
Sherman, William T.
Hardcover
Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle
Johnson, Paul
Paperback
Maine's Place in History: Joshua Chamberlain's 1876 Address at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition
Chamberlain, Joshua
Hardcover
The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States During Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896
White, Richard
Paperback
This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War (National Book Award Finalist)
Faust, Drew Gilpin
Paperback
The Rise and Fall of the Second American Republic: Reconstruction, 1860-1920
Sinha, Manisha
Paperback
Everything You Were Taught about the Civil War Is Wrong, Ask a Southerner!
Seabrook, Lochlainn
Paperback
Abolitionists of the Northeast: Black Leaders in the Antislavery Movement
MacDonald, Gail Braccidiferro
Paperback
The Regular Army Before the Civil War 1845 - 1860
Clayton R. Newell
Center of Military History United States
Paperback
Lincoln's Road to War: A Day-by-Day Account of the First 60 Days of Abraham Lincoln's Presidency
Johnson, David Alan
Hardcover
Seeking Freedom in Indian Country: Slavery, Sovereignty, and Resistance Within the Five Tribes, 1790-1861
Oertel, Kristen Tegtmeier
Hardcover
A Promise Delivered: Ten American Heroes and the Battle to Rename Our Nation's Military Bases
Seidule, Ty
Williams, Connor
Hardcover
A Legacy in Brick and Stone: American Coast Defense Forts of the Third System, 1816-1867
Weaver, John R.
Hardcover
Such Troops as These: The Genius and Leadership of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson
Alexander, Bevin
Paperback
The Impeachers: The Trial of Andrew Johnson and the Dream of a Just Nation
Wineapple, Brenda
Paperback
To Rescue the Republic: Ulysses S. Grant, the Fragile Union, and the Crisis of 1876
Baier, Bret
Whitney, Catherine
Paperback
Civil War Camps and Soldier Health: Sanitation and Military Effectiveness in the Union Army
Hess, Earl J.
Paperback
Freedom Was in Sight: A Graphic History of Reconstruction in the Washington, D.C., Region
Masur, Kate
Paperback
The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women's Rights
Wickenden, Dorothy
Paperback
A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin: Presenting the Original Facts and Documents Upon Which the Story Is Founded
Stowe, Harriet Beecher
Paperback
Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow
Gates, Henry Louis
Paperback
Fear No Pharaoh: American Jews, the Civil War, and the Fight to End Slavery
Kreitner, Richard
Hardcover
Reminiscences of My Life in Camp: An African American Woman's Civil War Memoir
Taylor, Susie King
Paperback
Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination That Changed America Forever
O'Reilly, Bill
Dugard, Martin
Paperback
Defending Dixie's Land: What Every American Should Know About The South and The Civil War
Bishop, Isaac C.
Hardcover
Gettysburg Surgeons: Facing a Common Enemy in the Civil War's Deadliest Battle
Franco, Barbara
Hardcover
Scars on the Land: An Environmental History of Slavery in the American South
Silkenat, David
Hardcover
Be Free or Die: The Amazing Story of Robert Smalls' Escape from Slavery to Union Hero
Lineberry, Cate
Paperback
Lincoln's Last Trial: The Murder Case That Propelled Him to the Presidency
Abrams, Dan
Fisher, David
Paperback
Hell's Half-Acre: The Untold Story of the Benders, a Serial Killer Family on the American Frontier
Jonusas, Susan
Paperback
To Purge This Land with Blood: A Biography of John Brown [Updated Edition]
Oates, Stephen B.
Hardcover
Abolitionists of the Northeast: Black Leaders in the Antislavery Movement
MacDonald, Gail Braccidiferro
Hardcover
Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly: The Remarkable Story of the Friendship Between a First Lady and a Former Slave
Fleischner, Jennifer
Paperback
The President and the Freedom Fighter: Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and Their Battle to Save America's Soul
Kilmeade, Brian
Paperback
Ulysses's Odyssey: Ulysses S. Grant's World Tour at the Dawn of American Empire
Picone, Louis L.
Hardcover
Somewhere Toward Freedom: Sherman's March and the Story of America's Largest Emancipation
Parten, Bennett
Paperback
Civil War Photo Forensics: Investigating Battlefield Photographs Through a Critical Lens
Hippensteel, Scott
Hardcover
How Lincoln Won: The 1860 Presidential Election and the Origins of the Civil War
DeWitt, Darin
Schwartz, Thomas
Hardcover
Retreat from Victory: The Battle of Malvern Hill and the End of the Seven Days, July 1, 1862
O'Reilly, Francis Augustín
Hardcover
The Surgeon's Battle: How Medicine Won the Vicksburg Campaign and Changed the Civil War
Privette, Lindsay Rae Smith
Paperback
Sultana: Surviving the Civil War, Prison, and the Worst Maritime Disaster in American History
Huffman, Alan
Paperback
Out of This Strife Will Come Freedom: Free People of Color and the Fight for Equal Rights in the Civil War Era
Milteer, Warren Eugene, Jr.
Paperback
No Common Ground, Second Edition: Confederate Monuments and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice
Cox, Karen L.
Paperback
Death or Victory: The Louisiana Native Guards and the Black Military's Significance in the Civil War
Cade, A. J.
Hardcover
America's Deadliest Election: The Cautionary Tale of the Most Violent Election in American History
Bash, Dana
Paperback
Managing the Union Army: Scott, McClellan, Halleck, and Grant as General-In-Chief
Hess, Earl J.
Hardcover
The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
Delbanco, Andrew
Paperback