Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the First Medal of Honor Paperback – September 15, 2008

Stealing the General covers the story of the first Medal of Honor recipients as a team of soldiers under the command of Andrew Jones, a civilian spy, who undertook a covert mission behind Confederate lines.The plan: Destroy the confederate rail lines (long before the march to the Sea) and telegraph wires. They would escape using a confederate train following the schedule under the idea that they were carrying emergency gunpowder for Confederate troops at Cornith.The Operation: Dozens of soldiers successful sneaked down to Atlanta and selected the train to steal (the General) which was delayed due to heavy rain. The raiders successfully steal the engine and are off cutting cable wires. Little did they know the conductor of the stolen train pursues them on foot, hand car and eventually commandeers the Texas an engine of similar ability and begins a pursuit. The soldiers are delayed by traffic ahead and the pursuers nearly catch them on multiple occasions. Finally the pursuers are able to get a telegraph message to the Confederate forces in Chattanooga sending troops towards the General. The soldiers eventually abandoned the train and went on foot into the wilderness.The Result: The war was brought home to the south and the soldiers spent the next couple of years in southern prisons. Many of them would be hung as traitors and spies while others would escape and make it back to the union or swapped in prison exchanges.Russell Bonds tell the stories of these soldiers very well and keeps the pace moving going into quite a bit of detail. For those who want the real story this is the great way to go and covers all angles of the heist.

I found Russell S. Bonds' "Stealing the General" to be a great disappointment. Upon receiving the book, I eagerly checked the index for references to my ancestor, Ovid Wellford "James" Smith. Then to my chagrin, I found that the author went to great lengths to portray Ovid as an interloper undeserving of the Medal of Honor!Unfortunately, since not a lot is known about this young man, who volunteered to be a soldier at the age of 16 and at age 17 volunteered for the Andrews Raid, the author resorted to conjecture and derogatory statements. Ovid and fellow raider, Samuel Llewellyn, were referred to as "wayward would-be raiders". They WERE raiders, of course. They WERE NOT "wayword" , but had followed orders and joined a Confederate artillary unit when it became necessary.The author notes that Ovid was "missing" from the 1888 Reunion of the Andrews Raiders. That would have been a good place to inform the reader that Ovid died twenty years earlier. Instead, Mr. Bonds begins a new attack; this time on the young man's father, whom he describes as so "seemingly untroubled by his son's lack of involvement in the operation" that he "actively lobbied the War Department for his son to receive the Medal of Honor." The truth is, The Reverend Samuel Smith wrote ONE letter asking that his son be put on " the same footing" as the other men. Samuel Smith was a highly respected ordained Baptist minister who was revered by his fellow citizens in Parkersburg, West Virginia. He would not have asked for something his son did not deserve.The author was so intent on convincing his readers that Ovid was not deserving of the Medal, that he didn't bother to mention that this "young pup" (his words) spent several months in Swims jail in Chattanooga, as did the other raiders. This may have led to his death at the age of 23, but that is only conjecture. Conjecture, over time, can come to be believed as fact. That is something that troubles me about this book:; an abundance of conjecture. It may make the narrative more exciting, but then the reader has to try to sort out the fact from the fiction. In this book, Bonds has done a hatchet job on Ovid Smith's reputation as an Andrews Raider. In the early 1900's all of the Medal of Honor awards were reviewed, including Ovid Smith's . Ovid was found to be worthy of his Medal. And that's a fact!When I read something that I know is not true, I find myself doubting the accuracy of the entire book. And sadly, that is how it is with this book. If you are interested in the Andrews Raid, buy "The General and The Texas" by Stan Cohen and James G. Bogle. Colonel Bogle is the ultimate authority on the subject of the Andrews Raid.

The Stealing of the General is not some stodgy, boring history book. Historical yes, but a very well written book that could easily be read as a novel or action thriller. It has all the accurate and detailed historical facts woven together in a fast paced, page turner fashion. There is the train chase of course, bridge burnings, captures, escapes, trials, hangings, and finally the presentation of the very first Medals of Honor. As a somewhat distant relative of the Confederate hero, conductor W.A. Fuller (my great grandfather Judge Fuller wasWilliam A.'s brother) I never knew all the amazing details of the chase. This book brings alive the life of my relative and let's me live in this time period for a while.Russell S. Bonds has done an incredible amount of detailed research on this book not only on all that occurred before, during, and after the chase itself but also in the current events that shaped the whole story. The book stays true to the mainline story though leaving you no doubt of the bravery on both sides and what the raiders had to endure afterwards.You will take away from this book a much better knowledge of the Civil War era and some of the back drops of one of the most famous of the myriad of stories the war produced. An excellent read!

This account of the great locomotive chase was well researched and written with great detail. My only criticism of it is that it was a bit slow in the beginning. It had more background and detail than I prefer. The early part of the book was slow reading, the chase itself lacked drama (of course, I knew the outcome), but the last part on the exploits of the raiders was totally fascinating. As pure history, this is an excellent book, but as a readable history, it lacked punch. Obviously, the author's purpose was to write history, not to write exciting history. Maybe McCullough has spoiled me! I would recommend this book highly to anyone who is interested in the Civil War or this specific event. I cannot imagine that the author left any thing out. I admire this book a great deal. There is a great, grand film here if someone made it right.

Super buch - super Service!

Very accurate account