The unvanquished The untold story of Lincoln's special forces, the manhunt for Mosby's Rangers, and the shadow war that forged America's special operations

The earliest modern U.S. special forces first emerged during the Civil War, according to this rip-roaring account from bestseller O'Donnell (The Indispensables). He chronicles the spy missions and covert ops of the Jessie Scouts, Mosby's Rangers, Blazer's Scouts, the Confederate Secret Service, and other irregular units, highlighting their development of techniques that form the bedrock of today's unconventional warfare. The Union Army's Jessie Scouts were a handpicked unit who donned Confederate uniforms to go behind enemy lines for intelligence gathering and kidnapping missions. A squad led by Lt. Richard Blazer peeled off from the Scouts to hunt down the Confederate Army's premier guerilla unit, the Mosby's Rangers; O'Donnell credits Blazer with the astute use of "shoe-leather detective work" to lead his Scouts to their quarry. Nimbly intertwining the stories of these scouts and spies in brief and breezy chapters, O'Donnell emphasizes the innovativeness exhibited by the era's unconventional forces despite a traditional military establishment who frowned on their "ungentlemanly" behavior. He also provides fascinating analysis of the sinister machinations of the Canadian-based Confederate Secret Service as they "hatched plots" to "rob Northern banks," "burn cities to the ground," influence the 1864 presidential election, and even kidnap Abraham Lincoln. It's an entertaining history of the "shadow war" that defined the future of American special operations. (May)

An exploration of some of the irregular fighters from both sides of the Civil War. O'Donnell, author of more than a dozen books on military history, including The Indispensables and Washington's Immortals, focuses on combat units who worked in northern Virginia and West Virginia, especially Mosby's Rangers and their Union counterpart, the Jessie Scouts. "Through their irregular tactics, they changed the course of the war," writes the author. "They were also, arguably, the US Army's first modern special operators and counterinsurgency forces." Much of their work, which O'Donnell covers in often overly excessive detail, involved raids on supply trains and misdirecting or harassing enemy forces to keep them away from the main front. They also acted as spies, often wearing enemy uniforms, risking immediate execution if they were detected doing so. The author also puts the spotlight on actions well away from the battlefield, notably the Confederate Secret Service operation working out of Montreal. There, a group of agents worked to influence the 1864 election, with a strong presence in several western states where disaffection with the war was widespread. They fed antiwar propaganda to northern newspapers and supported "Copperheads," northern sympathizers with the Confederate cause who were prepared to undertake armed insurrections. O'Donnell offers evidence that John Wilkes Booth's assassination of Lincoln was the result of a well-planned operation funded and supported by the Secret Service and known at the highest levels of the Confederate government. The author offers plenty of material that even Civil War buffs will find new. Unfortunately, those readers will have to slog through a certain amount of cliche-ridden, often repetitious writing. Nonetheless, there is sufficient pay dirt to make the digging worthwhile for readers fascinated by military minutiae. A revealing history of the largely unknown role of irregular forces and undercover agents in the Civil War. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.