
Recollections of a Private Soldier in the Army of the Potomac
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $13.97
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Paul Heitsch
-
By:
-
Frank Wilkeson
About this listen
Who beside the enlisted men can tell how the fierce Confederates looked and fought behind their earthworks and in the open; how the heroic soldiers of the impoverished South were clothed, armed, and fed?
The memoirs of Grant, Lee, Hood, Gordon, Johnston, and other Civil War generals are some of our most common sources that we look at when learning about this tumultuous conflict.
But what about the voices of the common soldier?
Frank Wilkeson, when he wrote his account of the Civil War, aimed to rectify this and reassert the importance of looking at the accounts of the men who carried the muskets, served the guns, and rode their saddles into the heat of battle.
As he states in his preface, "The epauleted history has been largely inspired by vanity or jealousy, saving and excepting forever the immortal record."
Wilkeson and his fellow comrades who lived on the frontlines of the conflict had no need to rescue their reputations or assert their actions and thus their accounts provide a brilliant and unbiased alternative view of this bloody war.
After lying about his age Frank Wilkeson was just 16 when he joined the Union Army in 1864.
Through the course of the next year he saw some of the ferocious battles of Grant's Overland Campaign.
Recollections of a Private Soldier in the Army of the Potomac is a wonderfully refreshing account of the American Civil War that takes listeners to the heart of what it would have been like to have served in the front ranks.
Public Domain (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
-
The Heart of Hell
- The Soldiers' Struggle for Spotsylvania's Bloody Angle
- By: Jeffry D. Wert
- Narrated by: Al Kessel
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The struggle over the fortified Confederate position known as Spotsylvania's Mule Shoe was without parallel during the Civil War. A Union assault that began at 4:30 A.M. on May 12, 1864, sparked brutal combat that lasted nearly twenty-four hours. By the time Grant's forces withdrew, some 55,000 men from Union and Confederate armies had been drawn into the fury, battling in torrential rain along the fieldworks at distances often less than the length of a rifle barrel. One Union private recalled the fighting as a "seething, bubbling, soaring hell of hate and murder."
-
-
The soldier’s’ perspectives
- By Amanda Tyler on 03-01-23
By: Jeffry D. Wert
-
Unvanquished
- How Women of the South Survived the Civil War: In Their Own Words
- By: Pippa Pralen
- Narrated by: Virginia Ferguson
- Length: 2 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Eyewitness accounts from over 50 diaries of southern women facing the hardships of the Civil War. Includes voices of slave women. As Yankee soldiers plundered, and starvation stalked the land, they hid food and heirlooms in wells and swamps. They watched Atlanta and Georgia burn and fed hungry children. Vivid accounts of women who witnessed the battles. Turned into food scavengers at the brink of starvation, southern women devised ways to feed their children.
-
-
Often over looked aspect of the Civil War
- By S. H. Moore on 11-26-19
By: Pippa Pralen
-
Benjamin Franklin Butler
- A Noisy, Fearless Life
- By: Elizabeth D. Leonard
- Narrated by: Justin Price
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Benjamin Franklin Butler was one of the most important and controversial military and political leaders of the Civil War and Reconstruction eras. Remembered most often for his uncompromising administration of the federal occupation of New Orleans during the war, Butler reemerges in this lively narrative as a man whose journey took him from childhood destitution to wealth and profound influence in state and national halls of power. Leonard's nuanced portrait peels away generations of previous assumptions and characterizations to provide a definitive life of a consequential man.
-
-
Much Needed Reexamination of Benjamin Butler
- By Zachary Miller on 02-13-23
-
Born Under a Lucky Star
- A Red Army Soldier's Recollections of the Eastern Front of World War II
- By: Ivan Philippovich Makarov, Anastasia Walker - foreword and translator
- Narrated by: Daniel Henning
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a Russian recruit in World War II, Ivan Makarov witnessed General Chuikov pull out his pistol and shoot their regimental commander as a traitor. That was on his first day at the front. Thrown into an open field to face German tanks and artillery fire, with only rifles and machine guns to defend themselves with, almost 2,000 men of his regiment were wiped out in only six days at the Eastern Front. At this rate, Ivan struggled to comprehend how he would survive the hundreds of battles that lay before him, with death seeming to be the only certainty.
-
-
Great story horrible reading
- By Jarvin Nightwind on 08-26-23
By: Ivan Philippovich Makarov, and others
-
Chancellorsville 1863
- The Souls of the Brave
- By: Ernest B. Furgurson
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 15 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For 130 years historians and military strategists have been obsessed by the battle of Chancellorsville. It began with an audaciously planned stroke by Union general Joe Hooker as he sent his army across the Rappahannock River and around Robert E. Lee's lines. It ended with that same army fleeing back in near total disarray - and Hooker's reputation in ruins. This splendid account of Chancellorsville - the first in more than 35 years - explains Lee's most brilliant victory even as it places the battle within the larger canvas of the Civil War.
-
-
Great telling of the battle
- By Stephen Cochran on 06-22-24
-
All for the Union
- The Civil War Diary and Letters of Elisha Hunt Rhodes
- By: Robert Hunt Rhodes
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 11 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
All for the Union is the astonishing and eloquent diary of Elisha Hunt Rhodes, the Union soldier featured in Ken Burns' highly acclaimed PBS television documentary The Civil War. Enlisting as a private in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, Rhodes fought in every major campaign waged by the Army of the Potomac, from Bull Run to Appomattox. Here, in his own powerfully moving words, Rhodes reveals why he was willing to die to preserve his beloved Union.
-
-
Captivating Narrative
- By Nathan on 07-13-17
-
The Heart of Hell
- The Soldiers' Struggle for Spotsylvania's Bloody Angle
- By: Jeffry D. Wert
- Narrated by: Al Kessel
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The struggle over the fortified Confederate position known as Spotsylvania's Mule Shoe was without parallel during the Civil War. A Union assault that began at 4:30 A.M. on May 12, 1864, sparked brutal combat that lasted nearly twenty-four hours. By the time Grant's forces withdrew, some 55,000 men from Union and Confederate armies had been drawn into the fury, battling in torrential rain along the fieldworks at distances often less than the length of a rifle barrel. One Union private recalled the fighting as a "seething, bubbling, soaring hell of hate and murder."
-
-
The soldier’s’ perspectives
- By Amanda Tyler on 03-01-23
By: Jeffry D. Wert
-
Unvanquished
- How Women of the South Survived the Civil War: In Their Own Words
- By: Pippa Pralen
- Narrated by: Virginia Ferguson
- Length: 2 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Eyewitness accounts from over 50 diaries of southern women facing the hardships of the Civil War. Includes voices of slave women. As Yankee soldiers plundered, and starvation stalked the land, they hid food and heirlooms in wells and swamps. They watched Atlanta and Georgia burn and fed hungry children. Vivid accounts of women who witnessed the battles. Turned into food scavengers at the brink of starvation, southern women devised ways to feed their children.
-
-
Often over looked aspect of the Civil War
- By S. H. Moore on 11-26-19
By: Pippa Pralen
-
Benjamin Franklin Butler
- A Noisy, Fearless Life
- By: Elizabeth D. Leonard
- Narrated by: Justin Price
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Benjamin Franklin Butler was one of the most important and controversial military and political leaders of the Civil War and Reconstruction eras. Remembered most often for his uncompromising administration of the federal occupation of New Orleans during the war, Butler reemerges in this lively narrative as a man whose journey took him from childhood destitution to wealth and profound influence in state and national halls of power. Leonard's nuanced portrait peels away generations of previous assumptions and characterizations to provide a definitive life of a consequential man.
-
-
Much Needed Reexamination of Benjamin Butler
- By Zachary Miller on 02-13-23
-
Born Under a Lucky Star
- A Red Army Soldier's Recollections of the Eastern Front of World War II
- By: Ivan Philippovich Makarov, Anastasia Walker - foreword and translator
- Narrated by: Daniel Henning
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a Russian recruit in World War II, Ivan Makarov witnessed General Chuikov pull out his pistol and shoot their regimental commander as a traitor. That was on his first day at the front. Thrown into an open field to face German tanks and artillery fire, with only rifles and machine guns to defend themselves with, almost 2,000 men of his regiment were wiped out in only six days at the Eastern Front. At this rate, Ivan struggled to comprehend how he would survive the hundreds of battles that lay before him, with death seeming to be the only certainty.
-
-
Great story horrible reading
- By Jarvin Nightwind on 08-26-23
By: Ivan Philippovich Makarov, and others
-
Chancellorsville 1863
- The Souls of the Brave
- By: Ernest B. Furgurson
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 15 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For 130 years historians and military strategists have been obsessed by the battle of Chancellorsville. It began with an audaciously planned stroke by Union general Joe Hooker as he sent his army across the Rappahannock River and around Robert E. Lee's lines. It ended with that same army fleeing back in near total disarray - and Hooker's reputation in ruins. This splendid account of Chancellorsville - the first in more than 35 years - explains Lee's most brilliant victory even as it places the battle within the larger canvas of the Civil War.
-
-
Great telling of the battle
- By Stephen Cochran on 06-22-24
-
All for the Union
- The Civil War Diary and Letters of Elisha Hunt Rhodes
- By: Robert Hunt Rhodes
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 11 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
All for the Union is the astonishing and eloquent diary of Elisha Hunt Rhodes, the Union soldier featured in Ken Burns' highly acclaimed PBS television documentary The Civil War. Enlisting as a private in the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, Rhodes fought in every major campaign waged by the Army of the Potomac, from Bull Run to Appomattox. Here, in his own powerfully moving words, Rhodes reveals why he was willing to die to preserve his beloved Union.
-
-
Captivating Narrative
- By Nathan on 07-13-17
-
Service with the Sixth Wisconsin Volunteers: Four Years with the Iron Brigade
- By: Rufus Dawes
- Narrated by: Zachary Cowan
- Length: 10 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rufus R. Dawes (1838-1899) was just 23 years old when the Civil War broke out. He became a captain in the 6th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, one of the regiments forming the "Iron Brigade" of the Union Army of the Potomac. First published in 1890, this work records his regiment’s routine and operational actions, including Second Bull Run, Gettysburg, and Petersburg. Dawes also recorded details about daily camp life and individual soldiers.
-
-
Direct descendant of Rufus Dawes
- By Bryan Haynes on 07-02-23
By: Rufus Dawes
-
A Worse Place than Hell
- How the Civil War Battle of Fredericksburg Changed a Nation
- By: John Matteson
- Narrated by: David Colacci
- Length: 21 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
December 1862 drove the United States toward a breaking point. The Battle of Fredericksburg shattered Union forces and Northern confidence. As Abraham Lincoln's government threatened to fracture, this critical moment also tested five extraordinary individuals whose lives reflect the soul of a nation. The changes they underwent led to profound repercussions in the country's law, literature, politics, and popular mythology. Taken together, their stories offer a striking restatement of what it means to be American.
-
-
Fantastic Intertwining!
- By Peter H. Christensen on 09-02-21
By: John Matteson
-
Four Years in the Stonewall Brigade
- By: John O. Casler
- Narrated by: Brian Holsopple
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Every memoir of the American Civil War provides us with another view of the catastrophe that changed the country forever. But this is one of the clearest and most informative ever put into audio. As a commander in Stonewall Jackson's brigade, John Casler experienced all the horrors and comedy of the American Civil War. His time was not so different from his countrymen on the other side, with the exception of point of view.
-
-
The Common Soldier's Story
- By Dennis on 10-13-17
By: John O. Casler
-
Witness to Gettysburg
- Inside the Battle That Changed the Course of the Civil War
- By: Richard Wheeler
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Witness to Gettysburg brings the bloodiest, most crucial battle of the Civil War to life through on-the-spot eyewitness accounts. From the courageous fighting men and officers to the civilians watching as the conflict raged through their towns, from the reporters riding with the regiments to the children excited or terrified by the titanic drama unfolding before them, each account stems from personal experience and blends with the whole to create a startlingly vivid tapestry of war. In their own words, and through the eyes of their closest aides, such commanders as Robert E. Lee, Jeb Stuart, and George Meade.
-
-
So Well Read...A lesson to the Overly Dramatic
- By Charles on 08-06-13
By: Richard Wheeler
-
On Desperate Ground
- The Marines at the Reservoir, the Korean War's Greatest Battle
- By: Hampton Sides
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 12 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hampton Sides' superb account of this epic clash in the Korean War relies on years of archival research, unpublished letters, declassified documents, and interviews with scores of marines and Koreans who survived the siege. While expertly detailing the follies of the American leaders, On Desperate Ground is an immediate, grunt's-eye view of history, enthralling in its narrative pace and powerful in its portrayal of what ordinary men are capable of in the most extreme circumstances.
-
-
typical armchair critic armed with hign site
- By Brent on 10-03-18
By: Hampton Sides
-
Co. Aytch
- The Classic Memoir of the Civil War by a Confederate Soldier
- By: Sam R. Watkins
- Narrated by: Pat Bottino
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Early in May 1861, 21-year-old Sam R. Watkins of Columbia, Tennessee, joined the First Tennessee Regiment. He fought in all of its major battles, from Shiloh to Nashville. Twenty years later, with a "house full of young 'rebels' clustering around my knees and bumping about my elbows," he wrote the remarkable account of "Co. Aytch," its common foot soldiers, its commanders, its Yankee enemies, its victories and defeats, and its ultimate surrender on April 26, 1865.
-
-
Must Have
- By Tucker on 11-08-09
By: Sam R. Watkins
-
Panzer Commander
- The Memoirs of Colonel Hans von Luck
- By: Hans von Luck, Stephen E. Ambrose - introduction
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 15 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A stunning look at World War II from the other side.... From the turret of a German tank, Colonel Hans von Luck commanded Rommel's 7th and then 21st Panzer Division. El Alamein, Kasserine Pass, Poland, Belgium, Normandy on D-Day, the disastrous Russian front - von Luck fought there with some of the best soldiers in the world. German soldiers. Awarded the German Cross in Gold and the Knight's Cross, von Luck writes as an officer and a gentleman.
-
-
Reads like Forrest Gump ( a fiction )
- By Randall on 11-08-16
By: Hans von Luck, and others
-
China Marine
- An Infantryman's Life After World War II
- By: E. B. Sledge, Stephen E. Ambrose
- Narrated by: Dan John Miller
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Picking up where his previous memoir leaves off, Sledge, a young marine in the First Division, traces his company's movements and charts his own difficult passage to peace following his horrific experiences in the Pacific. He reflects on his duty in the ancient city of Peiping (now Beijing) and recounts the difficulty of returning to his hometown of Mobile, Alabama, and resuming civilian life haunted by the shadows of close combat.
-
-
Is there any QC check on Audible?
- By PHSINV on 02-12-18
By: E. B. Sledge, and others
-
A Blaze of Glory
- A Novel of the Battle of Shiloh
- By: Jeff Shaara
- Narrated by: Paul Michael
- Length: 18 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's the spring of 1862. The Confederate Army in the West teeters on the brink of collapse following the catastrophic loss of Fort Donelson. Commanding general Albert Sidney Johnston is forced to pull up stakes, abandon the critical city of Nashville, and rally his troops in defense of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad. Hot on Johnston's trail are two of the Union's best generals: the relentless Ulysses Grant, fresh off his career-making victory at Fort Donelson, and Don Carlos Buell.
-
-
I Love Shaara, But Perhaps More in Print
- By Wolfpacker on 12-09-14
By: Jeff Shaara
-
Betrayal at Little Gibraltar
- A German Fortress, a Treacherous American General, and the Battle to End World War I
- By: William Walker
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 11 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year is 1918. German engineers have fortified Montfaucon, a rocky butte in Northern France, with bunkers, tunnels, trenches, and a top-secret observatory capable of directing artillery shells across the battlefield. Following a number of unsuccessful attacks, the French deem Montfaucon impregnable and dub it the Little Gibraltar of the Western Front. Capturing it is a key to success for AEF commander in chief John J. Pershing's 1.2 million troops.
-
-
Compelling narrative, meticulous research
- By JKW on 07-18-16
By: William Walker
-
Devil's Guard
- By: George R. Elford
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 12 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The personal account of a guerrilla fighter in the French Foreign Legion reveals the Nazi Battalion's inhumanities to Indochinese villagers.
-
-
If it is only half true...
- By ROS5FAM13 on 06-17-20
By: George R. Elford
-
D DAY Through German Eyes
- The Hidden Story of June 6th 1944
- By: Holger Eckhertz
- Narrated by: P. J. Ochlan
- Length: 6 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost all accounts of D-Day are told from the Allied perspective, with the emphasis on how German resistance was overcome on June 6, 1944. But what was it like to be a German soldier in the bunkers and gun emplacements of the Normandy coast, facing the onslaught of the mightiest seaborne invasion in history? What motivated the German defenders, what were their thought processes - and how did they fight from one strong point to another, among the dunes and fields, on that first cataclysmic day?
-
-
A work of fiction
- By John Lindsey on 05-22-16
By: Holger Eckhertz
Great Story
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Best history is from actual soldiers
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Fair account of first-hand experience of war.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
that's not how they taught it in high Is school!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A sobering revelation of cannon-fodder soldiering
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Some things never change.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
A True Account of Union Enlisted Experiences 1863-1865
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Very well done!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Excellent
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
An awesome inside view of a Civil War Soldier
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.