A wonderful biography.--Christopher R. Mortenson, The Journal of Southern History
John P. Slough
The Forgotten Civil War General
Description
John Potts Slough, the Union commander at the Battle of Glorieta Pass, lived a life of relentless pursuit for success that entangled him in the turbulent events of mid-nineteenth-century America. As a politician, Slough fought abolitionists in the Ohio legislature and during Kansas Territory’s fourth and final constitutional convention. He organized the 1st Colorado Volunteer Infantry after the Civil War broke out, eventually leading his men against Confederate forces at the pivotal engagement at Glorieta Pass. After the war, as chief justice of the New Mexico Territorial Supreme Court, he struggled to reform corrupt courts amid the territory’s corrosive Reconstruction politics.
Slough was known to possess a volcanic temper and an easily wounded pride. These traits not only undermined a promising career but ultimately led to his death at the hands of an aggrieved political enemy who gunned him down in a Santa Fe saloon. Recounting Slough’s timeless story of rise and fall during America’s most tumultuous decades, historian Richard L. Miller brings to life this extraordinary figure.
Reviews
The author has crafted a well-researched and well-written biography of General Slough, a talented man whose 'personal shortcomings thwarted all of his dreams' of greatness. Readers interested in the Civil War or in the history of territorial Colorado, Kansas, and New Mexico will find much to enjoy in its pages.--Roger D. Cunningham, Journal of American's Military Past
The author has crafted a well-researched and well-written biography of General Slough, a talented man whose 'personal shortcomings thwarted all of his dreams' of greatness. Readers interested in the Civil War or in the history of territorial Colorado, Kansas, and New Mexico will find much to enjoy in its pages.--Roger D. Cunningham, Journal of American's Military Past
In addition to documenting the life of a man with notable political, judicial, and military achievements to his record, Richard Miller's biography of John Slough is also framed by elements of a celebrated nineteenth-century American life narrative, wherein a wandering man of drive, talent, and ambition grasps opportunity and attains some measure of elevated stature and accomplishment. . . . This fascinating biography is highly recommended.--Andrew J. Wagenhoffer, Civil War Books and Authors
