Author: Anton Adams
published by Emperor's Press, 1998
$38.00

When I heard that Emperor's Press was to release a book on the Mexican-American War, I was both surprised and pleased. Surprised, because it is a little-studied war, though a colorful and important one, that drastically changed the history of the United States. Pleased, because, as many of you know, I have done quite a bit of research on that war in an effort to better understand it and bring some of it to life on the wargaming table.

At HISTORICON I purchased a copy and as soon as I had the chance, sat down and read through it. I will first review the physical aspects of the book, and follow that with a look at the organization, accuracy, and overall use of it to the wargamer.

When you first look at The War in Mexico (TWIM), it is a pretty impressive looking book. It has an excellent dust cover drawing of the U.S. Dragoons at Resaca de la Palma which was provided to the publisher by the U.S. Army, a drawing of a Mexican Cadet from the Company of Military Historians on the inside leaf which is adequate, and an unaccredited picture of U.S. troops storming Chapultepec on the back, which I have seen before in other books, (in black and white) and which while perhaps accurate in its depiction, lacks detail.

The book itself reveals little new about the war to the experienced Mexican War historian (or amateur), but instead is a well-written synopsis of the conflict, that includes information on the campaigns, armies, weaponry, and uniforms in one place that until this was spread across many sources.

Some of the most useful information in TWIM are the Orders of Battle, which are provided in gray-shaded boxes throughout the text. The details in these is better than that of any other single source I have come across, especially for the Mexican army. For the wargamer, these are very valuable, and will make the search for accurate numbers much easier.

The graphics used by the author come from a variety of sources, and even the ones he cites as his own are clearly taken from other well known maps. One that bothers me somewhat is the map for the Battle of Palo Alto. It is clearly a copy of a map that has appeared in many other titles, and it makes the same errors in troop movement that they do. The archeological survey of that same battlefield, and the book published last year on it corrected many misconceptions of this battle, and should have been consulted as a source.

Other maps used in TWIM are details from the series of maps drawn up during the campaign by Robert E. Lee, P.T. Beauregard, and Levi Tower, the engineer officers with General Scott on his march from Vera Cruz to Mexico City. Not stated is that these maps reside in the map collection of the National Archives in College Park, Maryland and are available to any researcher.

The greatest problem with many of the maps are that they are lacking in unit designations and even worse, are simply copies of earlier maps which continue incorrect citations and troop movements. A check against their own Orders of Battle would have prevented many of these repeated errors.

By far the worst aspect of TWIM are the color plates in the middle of the book. These are absolutely horrid, both in their cartoonish nature and in the inaccurate colors used. I have never seen such poor drawings find their way into a published book of military history. I am simply amazed that they were accepted by the publishers.

The color flag illustrations, provided by a different artist, are of a decent quality. While they do not add too much to the total known flags carried by either side during the war, they seem to be accurate enough to be of help to any wargamer looking for examples. The only fault I can find with them is that while they are color copies of hand-painted flags, on several of them there is computer-generated text that looks out of place with the background they lie upon.

One of the most entertaining portions of TWIM is the "Biographies" section at the back of the book. While it is of little use to the wargamer re-fighting the Mexican War, it does show how many of the men were affected by their experiences there and goes on to show their impact during the U.S. Civil War.

Overall, The War in Mexico is a well-organized book with some "physical handicaps" that make it less than it could have been. For the person interested in the Mexican War, it makes a good addition to their bookshelf, but I wouldn't recommend it for anyone with only a small amount of interest. Also, there was a encyclopedia of the Mexican-American War released by Simon and Shuster late last year that retails for $125.00, and while I have yet to see a copy, you might be better off saving your $38 in order to pay for part of that book.