I have a minor degree in American history, with an emphasis on the Revolutionary War. John Adams is my person of focus. I have read and studied the Civil War, of course, just not as much. I remembered a moment I saw/read years ago. Was it in Ken Burns’ The Civil War? A book? I don’t remember where. But I remembered what.
I made it the title of my next Spy Devils thriller as it directly relates to the determination and revenge theme. Here is the (current) preface of Devil’s Own Day that explains it.
Preface
On April 6th and 7th, 1862, more than 100,000 Union and Confederate soldiers engaged in one of the bloodiest battles ever fought on American soil near a small, log-cabin church in west Tennessee named after the Hebrew word for "peace.”
Shiloh.
Late on the first evening, after twelve straight hours of fighting, Brigadier General William Tecumseh Sherman arrived at the headquarters of his friend and commanding officer, General Ulysses S. Grant. Sherman found Grant—broken sword and all—chewing on a soggy cigar in the rain, which had begun soaking the battlefield.
“Well, Grant,” said Sherman, “we’ve had the devil’s own day, haven’t we?”
“Yes,” Grant replied. “Lick ‘em tomorrow, though.”
By the end of the fight, more than 23,000 soldiers were dead, the most of any key battle to that point of the war.