Best U.S. Civil War books - FReeper opinions sought

Imagination ^ | 7 Oct 2001 | just me

[fnord]

Hi there. I am going to buy a few Civil War books to get me through the winter. Given the wealth of knowledge here on FR, I am sure some FReepers can give me their recommendations.

I already have Killer Angels and Stillness at Appomatox. Looking for general overall history books and also ones of more specific scope (campaigns, individuals, etc).

Any suggestion would be most appreciated :-)

[sendtoscott]

Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men : A History of the American Civil War
by Jeffrey Rogers Hummel (Paperback - May 1996)

From Publishers Weekly
In this insightful treatment of the Civil War (addressing the causes, the war itself and Reconstruction), Hummel's text argues against the thesis that armed confrontation was inevitable. "As an excuse for civil war," he says, "maintaining the States territorial integrity is bankrupt and reprehensible. Slavery's elimination is the only morally worthy justification." But slavery, he suggests, was on its way out in any case. Not only was it a political liability, but the institution's many-faceted costs (social cost, enforcement, uprisings, mistreatment) outweighed any profits. If, after decades of unsuccessful compromise, the North had recognized the South's revolutionary right to self-determination and had let the Gulf states secede, slavery would have succumbed in the border states. Hummel goes on to argue, as have many others before, that after a devastating war and the disappointment of Reconstruction, a federal government that once interfered only a little in the affairs of individual states "had been transformed into an overbearing bureaucracy that intruded into daily life with taxes, drafts, surveillance, subsidies and regulations." Hummel, a professor of history and economics at Golden Gate University in San Francisco, quotes David H. Donald, saying, "Before the Civil War, many politicians and writers referred to the United States in the plural"--i.e., the United States are, a grammatical agreement no longer used after 1865. With its insightful analysis (not to mention the extensive bibliographical essays that elaborate each chapter), Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men will supply both the academic and Civil War buff with an added perspective on the causes and consequences of the Civil War.

Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Hummel (history and economics, Golden Gate Univ.) presents some uncomfortable truths for both sides of the Civil War. For the South, Hummel builds a case that the war was indeed about slavery. For the North, he shows that a war to preserve the union was morally bankrupt and that freeing the slaves was the only justifiable reason for fighting. Yet Hummel demonstrates that even a war for such a noble cause was probably unnecessary, since slavery was politically doomed in an independent South. Hummel also illustrates some of the cost of the war, such as Lincoln's suppression of political opposition, the closing of dissenting newspapers, and the creation of big government under Republicans Lincoln, Johnson, and Grant. Here, Hummel steps on some toes. A worthwhile purchase for public and academic libraries.

Robert A. Curtis, Taylor Memorial P.L., Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio

Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

[Non-Sequitur]

Stonewall, by Byron Farwell. An excellent biography of General Jackson
Decision in the West: The Atlanta Campaign of 1864, by Albert Castel. Close to being the definitive history of Sherman vs. Johnston in Georgia
Three books by Stephen Sears. Landscape Turned Red, about the battle of Antietam; To The Gates of Richmond, about the Penninsula Campaign of 1862; and Chancellorsville, about the battle of the same name.
I recommend all of them highly.

[sendtoscott]

Lincoln's Little War

Lincoln's Little War, Webb Garrison's latest in a collection of Civil War books, examines the role Abraham Lincoln played in America's bloodiest war. Did Lincoln really provoke the war thinking it would be nothing more than a brief conflict? In this story of less familiar precipitating events that shaped the conflict, Garrison relates the incidents leading to the Civil War and the involvement that Lincoln had in them including:

*Lincoln's manipulation of Charleston *His refusal to work with Southern leaders *Vague campaign platforms which did not indicate his unwillingness to compromise *Lincoln'sunflagging determination to keep the Union together at any cost

With these and other factors, Garrison shows an Abraham Lincoln who believed that he had a divine right to keep the country united. He also reveals a religious President Lincoln who, in following the direction of God, absolved himself of any personal responsibility by claiming that God had led him to all decisions he made about the war. This book illuminates Lincoln's complex plan designed to restore the Union by means of a short and nearly bloodless war, however, what Lincoln expected to be a little war became the nation's darkest hour.

[thescourged1]

Northern generals are for the most part, well-documented and referenced. The Confederacy had 450-500 general officers, and the best rererence I have found concerning them individually was 'Confederate Generals in Gray.' I cannot recall the author, but if you can find it, it is a great tool to have nearby when reading about the Civil War.

[Bars4Bill]

'The Photographic History of the Civil War'. It contains thousands of pictures. The set was published in 1911 and I have no idea if it was ever republished.

It has been. It's available from The Blue & Gray Press, 110 Enterprise Avenue, Secaucus, NJ 07094.

[Right_Wing_Mole_In_Seattle]

Here's one I haven't seen mentioned yet:

THE LIFE and CAMPAIGNS of LT. GEN. T. J. "STONEWALL" JACKSON
by R. L. Dabney

Very inspiring. Dabney was a close friend of Jackson's, so you might want to read a modern biography as well.

[Non-Sequitur]

Mild point of correction. The Grant biography is actually 3 volumes. The first volume was done by Lloyd Lewis and was called Captain Sam Grant. Lewis died shortly before the book was published and his widow prevailed upon Catton to make use of Lewis' notes and complete the trilogy. Catton did the last two, Grant Moves South and Grant Takes Command.

[Cincinatus]

I second (or third or fourth) the many recommendations to you here to read Shelby Foote's magnificent trilogy, The Civil War: A Narative. Read it all; read the whole thing, straight through. Start on page one and don't stop until you finish page 3600. It's not only a scrupulously fair and meticulous history, it's a work of art. It's not only the best book on the Civil War, I believe that it's one of the finest books ever written.

After you finish Foote, you will be able to intelligently select the books on the aspects of the war that most interest you. Just for some guidance, I would heartily recommend...

Lincoln and his Generals by T. Harry Williams. The very best book on the problem of finding a union commander. Brilliant, witty, and entertaining.

Embrace an Angry Wind by Wiley Sword. About John Bell Hood's ill-fated 1864 campaign and the death of the western army of the Confederacy. Profoundly moving.

High Tide at Gettysburg by Glenn Tucker. The best campaign history of Gettysburg -- and I've read them all. Tucker was the first to "rehabilitate" Longstreet.

Decision in the West by Albert Castel. The Atlanta campaign; "Gone With the Wind" as it really happened.

Freedom by William Safire. Along with "The Killer Angels" and "Lincoln" (see below), one of the three best Civil war novels. Safire's theme is how much liberty should we expect to surrender to preserve our democratic experiment? The themes are unnervingly pertinent to today.

Lincoln by Gore Vidal. OK, so he's an extreme, leftist creep. But Gore Vidal can write. And his Lincoln is so well realized and rings so true, I can almost imagine Abe sitting in the room with me. Vidal's best book and one of the only two he's written that are really worth reading (the other is Julian, about the apostate Roman Emperor, but that's for another list!)

These should get you started. Good luck and enjoy!

[kaylar]

Oddly enough , I've read the Lewis book, but long before acquiring the Catton books. Did not know there was supposed to be a link between them.

[Nora]

Bibliography of Confederate Flag books: Flags Of The Confederacy.

[July 4th]

This one's not on the level of some of the others mentioned, but "A Brave Black Regiment" is pretty good.

There's also Weigley's history of the US military, which is great, but happens to include 400 years of military history along with the Civil War.

[billbears]

You have to understand LLAN's point of view. Unless it was censored by the north(and on this point it doesn't matter if it was factual or not), then he doesn't care to read it.

The problem most northern supporters have with Adams' book is that he either quotes from the Founding Fathers(of which Tyrant Abe was not), actual newspapers of the day in the north that weren't shut down yet by good ol' Abe, or actual records of the time.

Believe it or not, there was a history before the north came along to revise it. And they call Southerners revisionists for wanting to make it right!!

I might also suggest Black Southerners in Gray edited by Richard Rollins and written by several blacks doing genealogical studies on their families, Black Slaveowners: Free Black Slavemasters in South Carolina by Larry Koger, Robert Durden's The Gray and the Black, and my personal favorite The Confederate Negro by Ervin Jordan, the first black professor at UNC. Jordan's book is a little hard to come by and has to be ordered on an indvidual basis because it is out of print.

For the first though, I would highly recommend Adams' book. Very quick read(although a little dry) and presents the facts, not the dreams of northerners interested in continuing to rewrite United StateS history

[LadyJD]

Hi,

I don't have time to read thru the thread to see if anyone has posted this link to you.

Greg Durand re-publishes a lot of the WONA (War of Northern Aggression) books that the empire's historians would like to consign to the memory hole. He has also written one of the definitive histories on Lincoln and his times.

Greg's page on that defining event in the destruction of the American Republic is here:

TRUTH IN HISTORY

[John_Kavanagh]

I agree with a number of previous posters that the best single work on the subject is The Civil War: A Narrative, by Shelby Foote. As someone observed above, it's great history and a work of art.

For the events leading up to the war, David M. Potter's The Impending Crisis provides a judicious overview.

For the common soldier's experience, Bell I. Wiley's Life of Johnny Reb and Life of Billy Yank are still a good place to start. Gerald Linderman's Embattled Courage is an absorbing study of Civil War combat.

Some of my favorite campaign books are The Gettysburg Campaign, by Edwin Coddington; Embrace an Angry Wind (on Hood's disastrous Tennessee Campaign), by Wiley Sword; Chancellorsville by Stephen Sears; Gordon C. Rhea's three volumes (so far) on Grant's Overland Campaign; and Larry J. Daniel's Shiloh, among many others.

There are good biographies of Robert E. Lee (by Douglas Southall Freeman and Emory M. Thomas), Stonewall Jackson (by Burke Davis, Frank Vandiver, and James I. Robertson), Jefferson Davis (by William C. Davis), and Ulysses S. Grant (by Lloyd Lewis [first volume] and Bruce Catton [volumes two and three]). Don't miss Lee's Lieutenant's, also by Freeman.

I'll add one novel to those already suggested: Long Remember, by Mackinlay Kantor, which looks at the battle of Gettysurg from the civilian point of view.

Finally, a book to avoid: William McFeely's Grant, which is riddled with errors and left-wing pap.

[general_re]

Well, everyone seems to have the war itself pretty well covered, so I'll throw in my 2¢ worth by recommending a book to backfill the plot for you ;)

William Freehling's The Road to Disunion : Secessionists at Bay, 1776-1854 is a really great look at the politics and culture of the South leading up to the war. It's definitely worth the read, and Freehling's next work (volume two in what's shaping up to be a great series), Road to Disunion : Bleeding Kansas to Fort Sumter is due out Real Soon Now.

Also, if you just want a fun (but still historically accurate) piece of speculative historical fiction, try Harry Turtledove's The Guns of the South ;)

[kaylar]

If it's civil war fiction you like, here's some anthologies.

Chickamauga and other Civil war Stories ed. Shelby Foote )the Foote fans here should like it)

Civil War Fantastic ed Martin Greenberg

The Fantastic Civil War ed. Frank McSherry

Confederacy of the Dead ed. Gilliam, Greenberg, and Kramer

Like the 3 preceding, these two books will appeal to the fan of horror/SF as much as the civil war aficiando :

Bring the Jubilee Ward Moore

The Guns of the South by Harry Turtledove

Both are set in an alternate universe where the south won the civil war. The Turtledove book has at least one sequel.

[billbears]

The Turtledove storyline is now up past the first World War, starting with How Few Remain(which is the actual start because Guns of the South involves time travel and was really written as a single shot deal), American Front, Walk in Hell, Breakthroughs, and the latest is American Empire: Blood and Iron

[kaylar]

One more post on civil war fiction :

The best civil war short story I've read to date was published in Year's Best Fantasy and Hotrror : Seventh Annual Collection ed Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling, pub 1993. It's called "The Sunday-Go-To-Meeting Jaw", and it's by Nancy Collins. The story deals with the return of a maimed Confederate veteran (thought long dead) to his wife and children. It's heartbreaking, beautiful, and a good depiction of life in Arkansas after the war. The ending is one of the most gutwrenchimg things I've ever read. I've run across this story in several anthologies , and I recommend it highly to anyone.

[Non-Sequitur]

Another good memoir is All For The Union: The Civil War Diary and Letters of Elisha Hunt Rhodes. A good small scale view of a typical unit of the times would be Mother, May You Never See The Sights I Have Seen: The 57th Massachusetts Veteran Volunteers in the Last Year of the Civil War, by Warren Wilkinson.

[kaylar]

Apparently he's doing two series : One has to do with a timetraveling South African arms salesman who sells 21st century technology to General Lee, enabling him to win the war. That's the series that starts with Guns of the South. The other series, which ALSO deals with the south winning the civil war, is separate from the "Guns of the South " storyline, as it has the southern victory due to rational causes consistent with the true history of the civil war, rather than time travelling. That one starts with "How Few Remain". I've only read "Guns", but judging from the amazon.com reviews, the less'science fiction-y' alternate history books are better, if only because the concept of a SA man going back in time to protect apartheid is now dated.

BTW, Harry Harrison did an alternate history book in which Great Britain enters the civil war on the side of the south-supposedly. Actually, they wish to conquer the land lost to Andrew Jackson. The CSA and the USA join forces against the common foe. Here's the reviews for those books :Stars and Stripes Forever, and Stars and Stripes in Peril