This book holds a special interest for me. My ancestor fought and died under Vaughn's command. Not much is known about Vaughn's 3rd Tennessee Mounted Infantry, the unit he initially formed. I hoped to learn more about why the men from his part of Tennessee fought and what their life was like. The book did not disappoint. I feel I can understand a little better why my ancestor went to war leaving several small children and his Cherokee bride at home. Not a slave owner, rather a poor subsistence farmer, like many of Vaughn's other soldiers. Much like the many nuances of the war across multiple battlefields, Vaughn's own adventures are full of twists and turns.

You don't have to be from East Tennessee to appreciate this book.  Even if you're a well versed reader of this time in American history, you will learn a thing to two from this book. Vaughn is underappreciated as a General and  maybe a little bit of a scroundrel for his post war exploits.

From Amazon:

John Crawford Vaughn was one of the most famous men in Tennessee in the mid-nineteenth century. He was the first man to raise an infantry regiment in the state--and one of the very last Confederate generals to surrender.  History has not been kind to Vaughn, who finally emerges from the shadows in this absorbing assessment of his life and military career.  Making use of recent research and new information, Larry Gordon’s biography follows Vaughn to Manassas, Vicksburg and other crucial battles; it shows him as a close friend of Jefferson Davis, and Davis’s escort during the final month of the war.  And it considers his importance as one of the few Confederate generals to return to Tennessee after Reconstruction, where he became President of the State Senate.  Gordon examines Vaughn’s (hitherto unknown) location on the field of crucial battles; his multiple wounds; the fact that his wife and family, captured by Union soldiers, were the only family members of a Confederate general incarcerated as hostages during the Civil War; and the effect of this knowledge on his performance as a military commander.  Finally, the book is as valuable for its view of this little understood figure as it is for the light it casts on the culture of his day.