The Civil War still has surprises! This book reveals the events of Direct Dismissal, used for Union officers who were so awful that they did not deserve a court-martial. Many were described, officially, as "utterly worthless." Even chaplains got the boot, sixteen of them, not to mention eighty surgeons.The book begins with an essay on military justice, then presents over a thousand cases, followed by a comparison with Confederate military justice. In 140 years, no other book has explored dismissal in the Civil War. Drunkards, traitors, deserters, opium addicts, brawlers, seducers, and men with "loathsome diseases," they're all here, in a story never told before.