The Destruction Of Fighting Joe Hooker

July 2026
1min read

He told Abraham Lincoln he was better than any officer on the field at Bull Run and got the Army’s top job. He built a beaten force into a proud one, and stole a march on Robert E. Lee with it. He was twenty-four hours away from winning the Civil War. Then he fell apart. Gene Smith examines the most fateful failure of nerve in American military history.

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