COMING IN MAY
ISBN: 978-1-964830-09-4
by Preston Lewis
Publication Date: May 13, 2025
The Soldiers Did the Fighting; the Generals, the Infighting
In the waning months of the American Civil War, a delusional Confederate commander makes a desperate attempt to change the course of the South’s dwindling hopes by invading middle Tennessee. The tragic result of Lt. Gen. John Bell Hood’s misplaced hubris devastates his Army of Tennessee and alters the lives of the citizens of Franklin, Tennessee.
In a historical novel reminiscent of The Killer Angels, Too Much the Lion follows a handful of Confederate generals, infantrymen and local residents through the five days leading up to the horrific Battle of Franklin on November 30, 1864. The lives of soldiers ranging from Major General Patrick Cleburne to Brigadier General Hiram Granbury and from Sergeant Major Sumner Cunningham to Corporal Sam Watkins will be forever changed by Hood’s decisions and mistakes.
Franklin civilians like apprehensive and loving mother Mary Alice McPhail and teen Hardin Figuers, desperate to serve the Confederacy but too young to enlist, are ensnared in the events that will bring death and devastation to their very doorsteps. Devout Confederate Chaplain Charles T. Quintard must reconcile his religious beliefs with his support of slavery. Slaves like the elder Wiley Howard and the inquisitive young Henry B. Free are trapped on the fault line between what has been and what could be.
Too Much the Lion offers an unvarnished account of the dying days of the Confederacy in a powerful and moving narrative of honor and betrayal, bravery and cowardice, death and survival. Told with poignancy and honesty by an accomplished novelist, Too Much the Lion achieves for the Battle of Franklin what The Killer Angels did for the Battle of Gettysburg, providing a classic fictional account of one of the Civil War’s pivotal encounters.
Survivors on the Battle of Franklin
“A grand holocaust of death.”—Cpl. Sam Watkins, Co. H, First Tennessee Infantry, Army of Tennessee.
“It can’t be called anything else but cold-blooded MURDER.” Capt. Samuel T. Foster, Twenty-Fourth Texas Cavalry-Dismounted, Army of Tennessee.
“They charge me with having made Franklin a slaughter-pen, but, as I understand it, war means fight and fight means kill.”—Lt. Gen. John Bell Hood, Commander, Army of Tennessee
Historians on the Battle of Franklin
“That was the kind of battle Franklin was, first for one side, then the other, combining the grisliest features of Pickett’s Charge and Spotsylvania’s Bloody Angle.”—Shelby Foote in The Civil War, A Narrative: Red River to Appomattox
“Having proved even to Hood’s satisfaction that they could assault breastworks, the Army of Tennessee had shattered itself beyond the possibility of ever doing so again.”—James M. McPherson in Battle Cry of Freedom
“The Battle of Franklin was five hours of intense combat, leaving the Army of Tennessee grievously wounded and forever changed.”—Eric A. Jacobson in For Cause & for Country: A Study of the Affair at Spring Hill & the Battle of Franklin
“Hood had in effect mortally wounded his army at Franklin.”—David J. Eicher in The Longest Night: A Military History of the Civil War