"A People's History of the Civil War is "bottom up" history, illustrated with little-known anecdotes and first-person testimony. David Williams brings to life the brutal, mundane experiences of the war - such as the mutilated bodies which, in the words of one soldier, lay "thick as autumn leaves" over the fields after every major battle - and the harsh realities of battlefield medicine and wartime rations. At the same time, he gives us a moving and...

"More than 140 years ago, Mark Twain observed that the Civil War had 'uprooted institutions that were centuries old, changed the politics of a people, transformed the social life of half the country, and wrought so profoundly upon the entire national character that the influence cannot be measured short of two or three generations.' In fact, five generations have passed, and Americans are still trying to measure the influence of the immense fratricidal...

In this first academic biography of Jefferson Davis's wife, Varina, Cashin (Ohio State Univ.) presents an engaging look at the Confederacy's first lady, who surprisingly did not believe in the Southern cause. Much of the book, however, focuses on Davis's life after the Civil War, when she struggled to support her penniless husband and later managed her own survival as a widow for over 25 years. Varina Davis drew vast criticism during the postbellum...

"A thrilling historical account of Allan Pinkerton's pivotal role as spymaster of the Civil War and forefather of the Secret Service"--P. [4] of jacket.

The story of the Ohioan who became the leader of the Union Army and later the president.

The story of the Confederate States of America, the proslavery, antidemocratic nation created by white Southern slaveholders to protect their property, has been told many times in heroic and martial narratives. Now, however, Stephanie McCurry tells a very different tale of the Confederate experience. When the grandiosity of Southerners' national ambitions met the harsh realities of wartime crises, unintended consequences ensued. Although Southern...

"When the peoples of the Indian Territory found themselves in the midst of the American Civil War, squeezed between Union Kansas and Confederate Texas and Arkansas, they had no way to escape a conflict not of their choosing--and no alternative but to suffer its consequences. When the Wolf Came explores how the war in the Indian Territory involved almost every resident, killed many civilians as well as soldiers, left the country stripped and devastated,...

An authoritative history of the Army of the Potomac's contributions to the Civil War draws on previously unpublished sources to document such events as their defeat at Bull Run, their victory at Gettysburg, and the leadership changes that directly influenced their effectiveness. By the author of Gettysburg: Day Three. The Sword of Lincoln is the first authoritative single-volume history of the Army of the Potomac in many years. From Bull Run to Gettysburg...

"How did Americans imagine the Civil War before it happened? The most anticipated event of the nineteenth century appeared in novels, prophecies, dreams, diaries, speeches, and newspapers decades beforehand. People forecasted a frontier filibuster, an economic clash between free and slave labor, a race war, a revolution, a war for liberation, and Armageddon. Reading their premonitions reveals how several factors, including race, religion, age, gender,...

Daniel Webster, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Jefferson Davis, John Brown. We know their names and recall the place of each in our nation's history. But do we recognize their faces and those of the dozens of their contemporaries who forged a new and forward-looking America during the Civil War era? Faces of Discord is a look into the real faces of the leading historical figures of this turbulent and transformative time. Compiled from...