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War Like the Thunderbolt: The Battle and Burning of Atlanta. By Russell S. Bonds. (Yardley, Pa.: Westholme, 2009. Pp. xxii, 522. $29.95, ISBN 9781-59416-100-1.)
War Like the Thunderbolt: The Battle and Burning of Atlanta is Russell S. Bonds's second foray into Georgia's Civil War history, following Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the First Medal of Honor (Yardley, Pa., 2007). In his recent offering, Bonds sets out to tell "the true story of the struggle for Atlanta, and the fate that then befell the city and its citizens" (p. xix). While hardly an unexplored subject, the fate of Atlanta is usually considered as part of analyzing the larger Atlanta campaign, as in Albert E. Castel 's Decision in the West: The Atlanta Campaign of 1864 (Lawrence, Kans., 1992). Bonds, however, focuses on the battles for Atlanta itself.
He begins with the Confederate...