Directory of Venture Capital & Private Equity Firms 2004: Domestic & International (Directory of Venture Capital and Private Equity Firms)

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Most VC and PE Companies don't exist anymore.......2006-04-08

Base on the fact that most of the VC and PE companies don't exist anymore the book is too expensive.

Book Description

-- Finalist for the 2006 Peter Seaborg Award for Civil War scholarship --

This biography of the controversial Union general George B. McClellan examines the influences and political antecedents that shaped his behavior on the battlefield, behavior that so frustrated Lincoln and others in Washington that he was removed from his command soon after the Union loss at Antietam. Rather than take sides in the controversy, Ethan S. Rafuse finds in McClellan's politics and his desire to restore sectional harmony ample explanation for his actions. Rafuse sheds new light on the general who believed in the rule of reason and moderation, who sought a policy of conciliation with the South, and who wanted to manage the North's military resources in a way that would impose rational order on the battlefield.

"Rafuse's book . . . offers the most comprehensive account of McClellan's prewar life and military career available, buttressed with a convincing analysis, and is sure to alter current perceptions and future assessments of the general's role in Civil War history." --Providence Sunday Journal

Customer Reviews:

The Smoking Gun on Little Mac.......2007-05-16

Sailing around the world, U.S. Grant sighed that George McClellan was one of the chief enigmas of the war. A century and a half later, most Civil War buffs would agree. McClellan's biographers either considered him a hero or, in the case of say Stephen Sears, a delusioned man who flirted with mental illness. Taking a page from the likes of Daniel Walker Howe, Ethan Rafuse argues that the key to understanding Little Mac is viewing him as an old line Whig of the Clay and Webster tradition who believed in self control, gentility, education and discipline. Rafuse goes into McClellan's prewar career and education and other influences (most importantly, Rafuse stresses how McClellan's jewel of a wife shaped his religious sentiments) and how they shaped his Civil War tenure. Readers may still view McClellan as a failed commander once they read Rafuse but at least they understand where he was coming from. As opposed to being plagued by psychological problems as Sears would have us believe, Rafuse shows that McClellan was man of his times who failed, in many ways, to grow with them. While Rafuse fails to provide a traditional narrative of military history, he provides an excellent political history of McClellan in 1861 and 1862. One wishes that Rafuse had taken his account to the 1864 election and McClellan's rather underappreciated political career after the war. Still, no other book truly offers such an interesting and insightful portrait of McClellan. If you want to understand the Union effort in the Civil War, you have to understand George McClellan's roller coaster ride in the high command. No other book does that as well as Rafuse's splendid "McClellan's War."

Clausewitz was right.......2006-03-23

What a delightful rendering of General George B. McLellan from Ethan Rafuse. I don't know if this treatment will restore Little Mac from the severe wounds history has inflicted on him but it does help us understand why he behaved the way he did. Politicians always slather thick layers of patriotic ardor over the stark brutality of modern war in order to get the hostilities underway; the attendant death & destruction is never full anticipated & always pitifully underestimated. The radical Republicans wanted to unleash the dogs of war right at the Secesh throat not realising the South had hounds of their own. McLellan with his gentile family background & his Whig- Democratic political leanings & his West Point education got in the way. He was mauled nearly to death.

This is an account of the life & generalship of McLellan from his triumphant processional into Washington & anointing up until his dismissal from command after Antietam (& the Emancipation Proclamation) in November, 1862. Rafuse focuses on the moderate political opposition to the radicals who ran Congress after the Whig party had been splintered into oblivion & the Southern Democrats had left the Republicans in a lopsided majority after Lincoln's election. This moderation is McLellan's raison d'etre.

McLellan thought reasonable, unemotional (not radical) professionals should run the war. A decisive set-piece battle & then some mopping up would bring the South back to the Union with their traditions & way of life, including their peculiar institution, intact. Treat the Southerners in a conciliatory sort of way & they would reject the fire-eating slaveholders who brought on the war & return to the fold. How wrong he was. Six hundred thousand dead later & the Union was victorious & slavery was abolished. Victorious Grant became President & McLellan who had presidential aspirations of his own paled into obscurity, the anachronism he was. Little consolation that his scientific way of war with its fortifications & artillery abundance might have strangled the Confederacy in its cradle far quicker than Scott's Anaconda plan eventually did. His hamstrung Peninsula Campaign failed & the radicals took control. Conciliation was dead.

Rafuse's account is a fine one indeed. The prose is a bit turgid to start but get McLellan on the Peninsula & the tale starts to flow. Maps are the windows into military history. The ones included are great. I never understood what McLellan's Urbanna plan was all about until I saw one of the maps & read again of Joseph E. Johnston's pull back from Manassas. All of the maps are pertinent, well done & , behold, contain all the place names mentioned in the text, a rare treat indeed.

Abraham Lincoln comes across as the bewildered military neophyte he was at this stage of the war. McLellan has more spine with little emphasis on the sniveling he did about his estimation of the great multitude of the horde opposing him. He does get credit for his great organizational skills, training ability, & charisma. The Army of the Potomac was the instrument he created but never learned how to wield. Clausewitz was correct: the object of war is not to nick your opponent but to whack him so hard he won't get up again.

A fine piece of scholarship.......2006-02-04

George Brinton McClellan's legacy since the Civil War has been largely criticized by historians and the general public. Hundreds of books generated notions that the Union high command prior to U.S. Grant's arrival was full of generals who could not win battles or take the initiative in destroying Robert E. Lee's army. McClellan served as the primary victim of these rants because he held the longest tenure as commander of the Army of Potomac. Even though McClellan had earned the respect of his men, he certainly did not get that same respect from Washington or from future historians. Thankfully, that has changed.

Rafuse's book showcases a lot of the author's abilities as a historian and as a writer. Though military book in nature, Rafuse's insight into McClellan's political influence largely explains the behavior attributed on the battlefield. Perhaps no Civil War biographer has detailed his subject's political connections as Rafuse has shown. In the Civil War field, Rafuse is considered as one of the up and coming military historians of this generation. This only makes sense as Rafuse's advisor was the distinguished historian Herman Hattaway, whose book "How the North Was Won" is still considered a standard in this profession. Certainly, Rafuse has a bright career as a scholar, teacher, and writer.

Finally, this biography explains the political influence that troubled the Union generals throughout the War. Recently, scholars have argued that Lincoln and his cabinet caused much of the disappointment in the war's first two years because of their inability to let the generals lead on their own. Certainly, it can be questioned that if McClellan was given the same freedoms as Robert E. Lee in the South, the "young Napoleon" may have ended this war a lot sooner.

A full review of the question.......2005-05-08

Finding a general in American history with as bad a reputation as George B. McClellan is not an easy task. Few Civil War books have anything good to say about him, fewer still defend his actions in the field. His victory at Antietam is often listed as a draw or even a Confederate victory. This "victory" is because McClellan should have destroyed the Army of Northern Virginia and their survival is a "victory" for them. His problems with military intelligence and the chronic over estimation of numbers is a "character defect" that he used to keep from fighting the army he created and loved to much to use. When pressed, even his harshest critics, will admit that McClellan created the Army of the Potomac and that it was the premier Union army during the war. Finally, they will acknowledge that McClellan always obeyed orders from Washington, even when he disagreed with them and felt they hurt his army.
This book covers McClellan's background and actions up to being removed from command for the last time in 1861. While not taking a position, each incident is completely covered and footnoted. This allows the reader to both check the author and to draw well founded conclusions from the text. For this reason, "McClellan's War" should become an important milestone in the evolving debate about his service. The amount of information packed into this book is staggering. While the book is so well written that, it reads like a good novel. The combination produces a very enjoyable and dynamic learning experience.
Everything is here. All the questions about relations with Congress, Lincoln and Scott, are examined and both sides presented. Coverage of the question about reinforcements during the Peninsula Campaign is complete with attention to the critical sequence of events. McClellan's feelings about and support of Pope are fair and well documented as are his difficulties with Stanton. The Antietam Campaign is a major item in the book and very well covered. What McClellan did and did not do, how it influenced R.E. Lee's plans, and the subsequent events is very well done. The condition of McClellan's army, the problems he faced and the effect they have on the battle of Antietam is a revelation.
The author takes the time to explain the theory of Conciliation and the political exchanges between its' supporters and the Abolitionist. The lucid discussion of the development of both these ideas and the background of the people that supported them is an important contribution to ACW this book makes. After reading this, I gained a much better understanding of the early war and how the policies developed as the war progressed.
Over all stands Lincoln, literally towering over McClellan. The book details the pressure Lincoln is under and the changes in his attitude towards, the South, McClellan and the war in the first 18 months of the war. In addition, we come to understand how the two men, wanting the same victory, were unable to bridge the widening gulf between them. McClellan, with his background and beliefs, was unable to understand or respond to Lincoln's problems. Lincoln, forced to respond to pressure and discarding the policy of Conciliation, could not give McClellan the time and resources he needed. The strength of the book is we understand both sides and have sympathy for both men.
In the emerging debate on McClellan, Ethan S. refuse has written his name along side Joseph L. Harsh as authors of "must read" books on the subject.

McClellan's Own Story: The War for the Union; The Soldiers Who Fought It and The Civilians Who Directed It

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McClellan's Own Story: The War for the Union; The Soldiers Who Fought It and The Civilians Who Directed It
George B. McClellan
Manufacturer: Kessinger Publishing, LLC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Book Description

1887. And His Relations to It and to Them. The author's account of the Civil War. McClellan, Union general in the American Civil War, graduated from West Point, served with distinction in the Mexican War and later worked on various engineering projects, notably on the survey for a Northern Pacific railroad route across the Cascade Range. Resigning from the army in 1857, he was a railroad official until the outbreak of the Civil War. George McClellan had proven himself to be an efficient organizer with strong personal magnetism. For this reason, and some successes in West Virginia, President Lincoln approved him Major General in the regular army. He was outranked only by General-in-Chief Winfield Scott. He reorganized a disjointed and poorly disciplined army, which gained him the respect and approval of his men. However, his military operations soon became a frustrating series of lost opportunities. He consistently overestimated his opposing forces, and his carefully devised plans were lacking in execution. After the Battle of Antietam, he was ordered to turn over his command to his good friend Ambrose E. Burnside and to go home to New Jersey to await further orders. They never came. He later served as Governor of New Jersey.

General George B. McClellan, Sheild of the Union

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General George B. McClellan, Sheild of the Union
Warren W. Hassler Jr.
Manufacturer: Louisiana State University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000LOISYK

General George B. McClellan: Shield of the Union

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Simply indispensable.
One of the few books that doesn't vilify General McClellan

General George B. McClellan: Shield of the Union
Warren W. Hassler
Manufacturer: Greenwood Press Reprint
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0837176069

Book Description

A study of the Civil War career of one of the war's most controversial figures, General George B. McClellan, who was dismissed by Lincoln from his post as commander of the Army of the Potomac, in 1862.

Customer Reviews:

Simply indispensable........1998-07-29

Written in a popular style, Hassler still manages to cover all the scholarly ground necessary for such a controversial figure. After 40 years still the best overview of McClellan's CW career. Head and shoulders over more recent works.

One of the few books that doesn't vilify General McClellan.......1998-06-21

A wonderful book that does what few Civil War authors have: point out McClellan's successes along with his failures. Most of the books written about McClellan ridicule him, while Hassler provides a much more detailed and introspecive look at the controversial General. Hassler skillfully avoids the anti-McClellan animus that seems to posess far too many Civil War historians - Check it out. It's a rare find.

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General George B. McClellan: Shield of the Union.
WARREN W., JR. HASSLER
Manufacturer: See notes
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000RQH8FW

George B. McClellan: The Man Who Saved The Union

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George B. McClellan: The Man Who Saved The Union
H. J. Eckenrode , and Bryan Conrad
Manufacturer: Kessinger Publishing, LLC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0548147884

$McClellan\'s own story: the war for the union, the soldiers who fought it, the civilians who directed it and his relations to it and to them$
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McClellan\'s own story: the war for the union, the soldiers who fought it, the civilians who directed it and his relations to it and to them
George Brinton McClellan
Manufacturer: Scholarly Publishing Office, University of Michigan Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Product Description

This volume is produced from digital images created through the University of Michigan University Library\'s preservation reformatting program.

Bloody Ground: Nathaniel Starbuck Chronicles Book IV (Unabridged)

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Starbuck series
Formula series but still a good telling
Bloody Ground
Fiction, good fiction, but all fiction all the same
PER ME SI VA NE LA CITTÀ DOLENTE

Bloody Ground: Nathaniel Starbuck Chronicles Book IV (Unabridged)
Bernard Cornwell
Manufacturer: audible.com
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Download
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ASIN: B00029DHQI

Book Description

The fourth volume in the popular and acclaimed Civil War series from Bernard Cornwellwhose bestselling books featuring Captain Richard Sharpe were dramatized for TVculminates in one of the most dramatic conflicts of the war, the Battle of Antietam.

Customer Reviews:

Starbuck series.......2007-07-13

In late summer 1862, the Confederate Army is invading the United States of America. Major Nate Starbuck has been given command of the Yellowlegs, a battalion composed of failures and cowards. Starbuck does his best to train the battalion and to lead them to the battle against the northern garrison at Harper's Ferry, and then to the bloody battlefield of Antietam where around twelve thousand men died just in some hours. Starbuck and his friends are struggling to survive, not to be killed by the enemies wearing blue uniforms and also by the enemies behind their backs.

This book is the fourth one in the Starbuck Chronicles. Like other Cornwell's books, this one is an excellent read. However, if you already read Sharpes, you would find a lot of similarities between these two series.

Formula series but still a good telling.......2006-12-21

Despite the fact that the entire Starbuck series seems to be a rewriting of the familiar Sharpe series novels, one cannot help but like these books. This, the final addition to the series, is perhaps the one I enjoyed most. Yes, its more of the same but the battle description seems longer in this one than in the others. The theory for how McClellan came to have Lee's plans is interesting and draws in the guerrilla aspects of the war not often touched upon. Cornwell's books are not "great fiction" in the sense of telling a story with deep significance beyond the story, but they are finely spun tales that entertain and that is of value in itself. But do not expect something original in characters - these are Cornwell-templates fleshed out in slightly different situations as with his other novels.

Bloody Ground.......2006-08-24

Bernard Cornwell can really tell a story. He keeps my interest from start to finish.

Fiction, good fiction, but all fiction all the same.......2006-02-15

I will quote from Cornwell's book, The Bloody Ground, " 'There are still yankees in the wood,'Starbuck said, pushing down the lever that rammed the revolver's chamber. ' I shot one,'Lucifer said. 'You damn fool, ' STarbuck said fondly. 'They're fighting for your freedom.' ...'but you shouldn't be fighting. Hell, these ba**rds are trying to liberate you...'" -pages 320-321
Cornwell, Benard. The Bloody Ground. Harper Collins Publishers : 1996.
First off, the yankees were not fighting to free Lucifer, Starbuck's servant, or any other black in the South. In fact, at the battle of Sharpsburg where this scene is taking place, the Emancipation Promclimation was still three months away! And even when the document was signed by Lincoln, it did not free a single slave. The Emancipation Pronmclimation was like saying that slavery can live in the U.S. but in Mexico it will be abolished. The goverment made those, "forever free" where they had no control and let those who they did control be oppressed. It was a military move, a right for the military forces of the North to conscript free and inslaved blacks in the South. I am not a lost cause revisonist. If you can state one fact contridicting mine about what I have said then go for it. But I look to historical documents, letters, and quotes for historical fact. I have quoted from a scene in Cornwell's fictional novel, The Bloody Ground. Now let me quote from history itself...
"It is stated in books and papers that Southern children read and study that all the blood shedding and destruction of property of that conflict was because the South rebelled without cause against the best government the world ever saw; that although Southern soldiers were heroes in the field, skillfully massed and led, they and their leaders were rebels and traitors who fought to overthrow the Union, and to preserve human slavery, and that their defeat was necessary for free government and the welfare of the human family.

"As a Confederate soldier and as a citizen of Virginia, I deny the charge, and denounce it as a calumny. We were not rebels; we did not fight to perpetuate human slavery, but for our rights and privileges under a government established over us by our fathers and in defense of our homes." -Richard Henry Lee, Confederate Colonel

"We are not fighting for slavery. We are fighting for independence." Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederate States of America

"If the South had only wanted to protect slavery, all they had to do was go along with the original 13th Amendment, offered in early 1861 after several states had seceded, which would have protected slavery for all time in the states where it then existed. This was not inducement enough to bring South Carolina or any others back into the fold. The States of the Confederacy, even today, could block the passage of the 13th Amendment, and certainly could have then. This is why the slaveholders wanted to stay in the Union. Their "property" was protected by the Constitution." -Charlie Lott, historian

"The assertion that the South fought for slavery is Yankee propaganda and a monstrous distortion." -Jefferson Davis

"[Defeat] means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy; that our youth will be trained by Northern school teachers; will learn from Northern school books their version of the War, will be impressed by all influences of history and education to regard our gallant dead as traitors, our maimed veterans as fit objects for their derision, it means the crushing of Southern manhood ... to establish sectional superiority and a more centralized form of government, and to deprive us of our rights and liberties." -Patrick Cleburne, Major General

My three stars for this book is inspired by the wonderfully illustrated battle scenes. The characters in this book are very fine and mold dramatically with the scenes and the story. Though I do not enjoy Cornwell's slander of the South, though fictional, I pray for a fifth book in the series. I believe that Major Starbuck, Captain Truslow, and General Swineyard have many more glorious and tragic stories to live in the coming months and years of the 1862-1865. I would love to see the series continue after ten years waiting for a fifth novel. If we are indeed treated to a continuation of the series, I hope that Bernard Cornwell will give a little more historical truth to the South's cause and its soldiers.

PER ME SI VA NE LA CITTÀ DOLENTE.......2005-06-09

'Through me the way into the suffering city.' That city (in this context of course) is Sharpsburg, the location of one of the most horrendous days in American Military history only to be rivaled in horror by the Normandy Invasion. The weight of that day is so succinctly summarized by Mr. Potter, who notes that the battle would one day be in the history books, which he finds odd, "because we came to America to escape history."
If you've read this book you already know how well Cornwell can wrap his words around a scene of battle. A battle as profound as Antietam requires more than just description of historical events, it requires an intimate retelling. Cornwell's words read as a eulogy for those soldiers that met on that day, he brings you to Burnside Bridge & the Sunken Road, he brings you right under the kepi. I found this last outing some of his most powerful writing and easily the best in the series. He hints in the ever present "Historical Notes" section that "Starbuck will march again."
Here's hoping!
PA23 Volunteer Infantry
Birney's Zouaves

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GENERAL GEORGE B. McCLELLAN. Shield of the Union
Warren W Hassler
Manufacturer: Louisiana State University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000HRZ8E4

Book Description

Provides information about works by American composers, including biographical sketches, occasional comments by the composers, and in particular, information that might lead to a further exploration of his or her work and possible performance.

Customer Reviews:

Indispensable Reference Guide.......1999-06-02

"American Piano Trios", by Arno Drucker, belongs in the library of every music school in the country and on the bookshelf (sandwiched between Cobbett's and Groves) of every educator and serious music lover. This is a book of astonishing thoroughness and scholarship. Who could guess that the heritage of AMERICAN chamber music - in this case, Piano Trios - would be so vast and sumptuous.

I knew Samuel Barlow in New York many years ago, but I had no idea that he was a composer, much less a composer of a piano trio and an opera, Mon Ami Pierrot, which "was the first by an American to be produced at the Opera Comique in Paris (1935)." Hundreds of American composers, from Samuel Adler to Ellen Zwilich, are listed with some fascinating biographical sketches and descriptions of their music. There are names, addresses, and in some cases, Web sites, of virtually every piano trio active today.

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Notes, published by Music Library Association, Inc. on June 1, 2000. The length of the article is 580 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: American Piano Trios: A Resource Guide.(Review) (book review)
Author: Robert Follet
Publication: Notes (Refereed)
Date: June 1, 2000
Publisher: Music Library Association, Inc.
Volume: 56 Issue: 4 Page: 969

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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Contemporary American Piano Trio
Francesco Trio Cdmua 4756
Manufacturer: MUSIC & ARTS
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: 6307365099

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