My Most Favorite Book Read in 2020

Originally published November 2020 · p. 41

My Most Favorite Book Read in 2020 The Enduring Civil War: Reflections on the Great American Crisis, by Gary W. Gallagher. Louisiana State University Press, (2020). 277 pages; illustrated. $34.95. Renowned Civil War historian, author, and lecturer, Gallagher is an emeritus professor with the University of Virginia. This collection of essays for Civil War Times Illustrated over the last decade covers a wide variety of CW issues and speaks to all enthusiasts. Seriously, it should be read by every buff! Readers will find the essays intellectually challenging as they examine areas of interpretation and memory. They introduce competing versions of history that will stimulate readers. As well, Gallagher re-introduces us to past CW historians who may now be overlooked but remain profoundly relevant to modern readers. If you are interested in a 1-1/2 hour on-line Sept. 10th, 2020, interview Abraham Lincoln Book Shop conducted with Gary over Zoom on our The House Divided broadcast: https://www.facebook. com/AbrahamLincolnBookShop/ videos/2666742703588795/ Daniel Weinberg on obtaining lost orders, and led from the front. The book is well researched, full of original source material and detailed as to movements, troop positions, and internal rivalries. A great read and well needed to reappraise McClellan’s actions. Wayne Wolf

Sons of Tom Cobb, by William Smedlund, Marble, N.C., 2019. This book humanizes the war beautifully. It’s coverage of the major battles highlights one unit, where they were on the field, how they affected the outcome, or were affected by it. My own ancestor served in this unit along with cousins and a brother in law. Being able to follow a specific unit brings home the fact that battles were about individuals and groups of individuals reacting to something beyond their control. That’s not often accomplished. John Thomas

How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchs, Democracy and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America, by Heather Cox Richardson, published by Oxford University Press, 2020. A great book, that really opened my eyes about today’s politics. David Goetz Too Useful To Sacrifice, by Steven R. Stotelmyer, Savas Beatie, 2019, $32.95. This book wonderfully apprised the generalship of George B. McClellan from South Mountain to Antietam and debunks the myths that McClellan had a case of the slows. He responded vigorously to intelligence at hand, moved promptly

Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War, by Elizabeth R. Varon (Oxford, 2019). It is a rare accomplishment to produce an entirely new, and entirely convincing, re-interpretation of the Civil War. That is precisely what Elizabeth Varon did in recasting the conflict as a “holy war” for the “political salvation” of victims of a depraved social order, whites as well as blacks. She sees in the Union cause a faith-based nationalism aimed not only at saving the Union, but making it more perfect. This is a well-researched, well-argued, and visionary work. I particularly admired Varon’s acknowledgment that Lincoln’s “malice toward none” policy distinguished between “the rebel chieftains and the duped masters.” Harold Holzer.

The Real Horse Soldiers: Benjamin Grierson’s Epic 1863 Civil War Raid Through Mississippi, by Timothy B. Smith. Table of contents, maps, illustrations, preface, prologue, bibliography, index, hardcover, 345 pp., 2018, Savas Beatie, savasbeatie.com, $32.95. Notwithstanding John Ford’s colorful 1959 film based on this episode, The Real Horse Soldiers is an informative, well written account of the successful Union cavalry raid that retains the reader’s attention and interest. It is also a credible, well-researched endeavor, solidly based on archival and other primary sources. The author demonstrates that Grierson’s daring foray deep into rebel territory served as an effective strategic diversion before local Confederate forces realized and thus attempted to counter Grant’s descent on Vicksburg. Excellent maps and photographs complement this must-read contribution to the vast literature of the Civil War that tells the real story. C. Lee Noyes

The Worst Passions of Human Nature, Paul D. Escott, University of Virginia Press, 2020. While a number of superb volumes appeared in 2020, Escott’s volume is by far my favorite published this year because it serves as a useful reminder that history is multi-layered and complex. Central to this study is the notion that, while a growing number of individuals in the North understood the inextricable connections between slavery and the Civil War and also comprehended emancipation’s benefits to the Union war effort, it did not necessarily mean that white northerners supported racial equality. Escott’s intense analysis of an array of primary materials reveals deep divisions on the question of equality and how racism in the North was “far more indestructible than the institution of slavery.” Jonathan A. Noyalas Director, Shenandoah University’s McCormick Civil War Institute The Fight for the Old North State: The Civil War in North Carolina, January-May 1864, by Hampton Newsome. 2019. University Press of Kansas, www.kansaspress.ku.edu. The various chapters contained in six sections take us on a detailed, fact-filled journey through the time period in North Carolina. The three-time history book author Newsome covers the Union expeditions and plans to retain an advantage, joint land and water offensive operations of the Confederacy, as well as the strategies and movements of the commanders in his literary effort to illuminate the “struggle for North Carolina” during the early part of 1864. His thorough research and many interspersed observations and pronouncements of civilians, the press, and the military leaders including Butler, Lee, and their subordinates plus the ongoing distrust between the political leaders of North Carolina and Virginia, expertly relays to the reader the strategic, social, and political grounding of the War’s last year. Joan Wenner, J.D. Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War, by Elizabeth R. Varon. UNC Press, 2019. This tome is not a traditional story of North versus South but rather a new interpretation about why the Civil War happened, why the Union was victorious, and the Confederacy defeated. This work covers people’s voices that permit readers to gain a sense of what happened throughout the conflict, the tangible experience of the fighting, as well as what went on in the U.S. House of

Representatives and the Senate. Elizabeth Varon allows students to peek into the tactics and strategies during the War’s campaigns, as well as the aftermath, including the failures of Reconstruction. David Marshall Hymns of the Republic: The Story of the Final Year of the American Civil War, S.C. Gwynne, Scribner, 2019 Gwynne is well known to Civil War readers for Rebel Yell, his excellent 2014 biography of Stonewall Jackson. His new book is sharply written and reminds us how politically vulnerable President Lincoln was to both renomination and reelection in the summer of 1864. Gwynne begins his account with Grant’s unpretentious arrival in Washington to take command of all Union armies. After the disaster at the Wilderness and the bungling of political generals, it is a firm Grant, in August 1864, who wrestles control of military operations from the War Department and carefully coordinates a decisive victory across a tragic Southern landscape. W. Clifford Roberts, co-author of Atlanta’s Fighting 42nd. Texas Brigadier to the Fall of Atlanta: John Bell Hood, by Stephen Davis. Mercer University Press, 2019. Well written, thoroughly researched, and ably footnoted, this first volume of Steve Davis’s planned two-volume biography of Hood is the best Civil War book I’ve read this year. As the first full-length biography of this controversial Confederate general in nearly 40 years, Davis’s study benefits from the recent publication of a cache of the general’s previously unknown private papers. The strength of this book is Davis’s generally favorable account of Hood’s service with the Army of Tennessee. Davis faults Hood for intriguing to replace Joe Johnston as commander, but he attributes Hood’s failure to hold Atlanta to Sherman’s superior numbers. C. Michael Harrington Three Years with the 92d Illinois The Civil War Diary of John M. King. Edited by Claire E. Swedberg. Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, PA, 1999. Yes, I know it was not published in 2020, but I reread it this year for insights into Civil War soldiery and their material culture. The 92nd was a regiment in Wilder’s “Lighting” Brigade. It is loaded with small details such as the “assembly line” reshoing of horses and mules, the Spencer rifle being issued and used, camp life, and cowardice. The index contains a wealth of material culture and intimate details of camp life, marches, and fighting not usually present. Ideal for generating first person interpretive impressions. Larry Babits Civil War News Editor