The Battles for Spotsylvania Court House and the Road to Yellow Tavern, May 7-12, 1864 continues Gordon C. Rhea's peerless treatment of the Civil War's clash of titans: Grant's Army of the Potomac versus Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Inlaid with detail, innovative analysis, riveting prose, and an abundance of supporting primary evidence, it is a worthy sequel to Rhea's first, acclaimed work, The Battle of the Wilderness, May 5-6, 1864.

Here Rhea examines the maneuvers and battles from May 7, 1864, when Grant left the Wilderness, through May 12, when his attempt to break Lee's line by frontal assault reached a chilling climax at what is now called the Bloody Angle.

Rhea draws exhaustively upon previously untapped materials - most notably contemporary newspaper accounts and diaries and letters only recently made available - to construct the definitive account of Grant and Lee at Spotsylvania. Here for the first time is a detailed description of the cavalry's role in the campaign, from the grim fighting at Todd's Tavern through Philip Sheridan's Richmond raid and Jeb Stuart is mortal wounding at Yellow Tavern.

Here, too, are fresh and challenging interpretations that often contradict conventional wisdom.