To clear up a few misunderstandings about Co. H, A Sideshow to the Big Show it isn't a scholarly essay. There are no footnotes. He was an educated man, but he was not a historian so shouldn't be read as one. He originally wrote many of the passages in the book as letters. He was not personally present during the Franklin-Nashville battles. That is probably why he survived to write his memoir. His book is a series of anecdotes, not factual well researched & documented statements. That does not mean that there is a blatant attempt to deceive. It is not a Joe Johnston v Hood mud throwing document. Watkins is an honest witness.
If you are looking for dates, times & three source backed up quotes, it isn't there. His book has been under a microscope almost from the instant the ink dried. The inconsistencies have all been documented in great detail. This is true of every memoir, no matter who wrote it. If you wish to cross-reference the events of the memoir, there is a wealth of material you can google.
Watkins did assume the veteran's 'okey-dokey inside jokey style' that you find in letters to Confederate Veteran Magazine & other publications of the period. That was ubiquitous & no reflection on him. He was writing with an audience of veterans, in particular the few survivors of his own unit, not the general public in mind. His readers could fill in the blanks, the horrors did not need to be told in graphic detail. After reading Co. H for the first time, it will enrich your understanding of his text if you read the documented history as well.
I encourage you to read Sam's book out loud or listen to the audio version. His use of language is very audible rather than written in nature. This is a good way to understand soldier letters that are often so very obscure on the page. Sam was talking, telling his tale in his mind, not composing a scholarly essay.
It is unfortunate that many members of the public that I have encountered as an NPS volunteer have only read Sam's book & view it with an almost Biblical reverence. Watkins himself would have been the first to disabuse them of that notion. He was a man of great intellect, powers of observation & talent who lived out his postwar life doing menial tasks. He had a lot of time to think about the experience that had killed almost every boy he grew up with & destroyed the culture of his youth. Maybe that accounts for his honesty & made him proof against the contagion of the Lost Cause counterfactual narrative that was so fashionable at the time he published his book. Had he jumped on the "myth making" bandwagon, he might have been able to continue his publishing career. There was no big money to be made in telling the truth in the South at that time. The fact that he continued to ponder & edit his memoir is a clear indication that he never really stopped reliving the fell events he had witnessed.
Ruth Mcallister is both a knowledgable & engaging speaker. If you have the chance to hear her speak about her g-grandpa don't miss it.
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