News Briefs

News Briefs — July 2020

Originally published July 2020 · p. 27

Brian Steel Wills Receives Houston Civil War Round Table’s “Frank E. Vandiver Award of Merit”

HOUSTON, Texas— Continuing a 38-year tradition, the Houston Civil War Round Table (HCWRT) announces that it has awarded the Frank E. Vandiver Award of Merit to Dr. Brian Steel Wills. The Vandiver Award recognizes outstanding contributions to Civil War scholarship or preservation efforts by an individual or an institution. Presented annually, the award honors the memory of Dr. Frank Everson Vandiver (1925–2005), a renowned Civil War historian and one of the earliest members of HCWRT. Lynda Crist, a longtime member of HCWRT and editor of the Jefferson Davis Papers at Rice University, was the first Vandiver Award recipient in 1982. Other past winners include Gary Gallagher, Ed Bearss, Richard Sommers, William C. “Jack” Davis, Ed Cotham, Frank O’Reilly, Don Troiani, James “Bud” Robertson, Eric Jacobson, Gordon Rhea, James McPherson, John Nau III and Wilson Greene. HCWRT selected Dr. Wills for this year’s award in view of his contributions to the historiography of the Civil War era and his service as a Civil War tour guide, speaker, and preservationist over a career spanning more than three decades. A native of Virginia, Brian Steel Wills is a graduate of the University of Richmond (B.A.) and the University of Georgia (M.A. and Ph.D.). He is currently Professor of History and the Director of the Center for the Study of the Civil War Era at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Ga. A prolific writer on Civil War topics, Dr. Wills is especially noted for his biographies of Union General George H. Thomas and Confederate Generals Nathan Bedford Forrest and William Dorsey Pender. His most recent book, Inglorious Passages: Noncombat Deaths in the American Civil War, has also drawn acclaim. In addition, Dr. Wills has authored articles and book reviews in multiple publications, including the Journal of Military History and Georgia Historical Quarterly. In announcing the award to Dr. Wills, President Mike Harrington commented: “It is a real privilege to honor an outstanding member of the Civil War community, especially one who is known as a dynamic classroom instructor who has succeeded in passing along his love for history to countless of his students.” A large, wooden Minié ball symbolizing the award will be presented to Dr. Wills when he addresses the Houston Civil War Round Table at its meeting scheduled for November 19, 2020.

Miller Wins 25th Austin Civil War Round Table’s Prize for his Book on the Vicksburg Campaign for Cold Harbor, Jeffry D. Wert for The Sword of Lincoln, A. Wilson Greene for Civil War Petersburg, Craig L. Symonds for Lincoln and His Admirals, Donald S. Frazier for Fire in the Cane Fields, Edwin Bearss and J. Parker Hills for Receding Tide, Elizabeth Varon for Appomattox, and S.C. Gwynne for Rebel Yell. For more information, contact the President of the Austin Civil War Round Table, Inc., David White, email: hdwhite1978@att. net.

AUSTIN, Texas—Donald L. Miller, the John Henry McCracken Emeritus Professor of History at Lafayette College, has won the twenty-fifth annual Daniel M. & Marilyn W. Laney Book Prize awarded by the Austin Civil War Round Table, Inc. The winning work is Vicksburg: Grant’s Campaign That Broke the Confederacy, published by Simon and Schuster. The book is Miller’s first book venture into Civil War history. Three of his previous ten award-winning books, most of them best sellers, focus on World War II, among them Masters of the Air, which is being made into a ten-part dramatic series by Tom Hanks and Stephen Spielberg for Apple productions. Vicksburg examines Ulysses Grant’s yearlong campaign to take the city and the entire Mississippi Valley, arguably the decisive campaign of the Civil War. Grant’s success in the Vicksburg Campaign split the Confederacy in two, along the line of the Mississippi River, and led to his appointment as general-in-chief of all Union armies. Miller’s book is a war history, not a strictly military history, a deeply researched examination of the social, economic, and political implications of military conflict and a book about civilians as well as soldiers. In the Mississippi Valley campaign, Grant freed over 100,000 slaves and put nearly 26,000 of them in Union blue, as soldiers of the republic. “In this carefully research book, written with sizzling and persuasive prose, Miller has found the way to write both military and emancipation history in one profound package,” writes Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David W. Blight. The Wall Street Journal called Vicksburg, “An epic story. Books like Vicksburg are exactly what Thomas Hardy had in mind when he wrote that ‘war makes rattling good history.’” Historian and Pulitzer Prize winner James McPherson declared it, “The fullest and best history of the Vicksburg campaign.” Past winner of the Laney Prize, Professor Elizabeth Varon wrote: “At the heart of his story is U.S. Grant, who emerges here as a master of maneuver and improvisation, and a hero made human and real. This is military history at its best.” Prize winning historian John Berry called it “a magnificent book, certainly one the very best ever written about the Civil War. It makes the reader truly understand not only the battle of Vicksburg, not only the Civil War, but war itself.” The book previously won the Civil War Round Table of New York’s prestigious Fletcher Pratt Award. The Laney Prize, which includes a stipend, will be presented to Miller at the October 15, 2020 meeting of the Austin Civil War Round Table, Inc. The prize is awarded yearly for distinguished scholarship and writing on the military or political history of the Civil War. Established by the membership of the Austin Civil War Round Table, the Prize honors the Laneys for their splendid efforts on behalf of the Austin Civil War Round Table, Inc. and especially, for their many efforts to protect the endangered battlefields of the Civil War. Among the previous winners of the Laney Prize are William C. Davis for The Cause Lost, Gary Gallagher for The Confederate War, Richard McMurry for Atlanta: 1864, Gordon C. Rhea