In April 1861, Dick and Tally Simpson, sons of South Carolina Congressman Richard F. Simpson, enlisted in Company A of the Third South Carolina Volunteers of the Confederate army. Their letters home--published here for the first time--read like a historical novel, complete with plot, romance, character, suspense, and tragedy. In their last year of college when the war broke out, Dick and Tally were hastily handed their diplomas so they could volunteer for military duty. Dick was twenty; Ta...

A New York Times–bestselling author's account of the devastating military campaign that broke the Confederacy's back in the last months of the Civil War.In November 1864, just days after the reelection of President Abraham Lincoln, Gen. William T. Sherman vowed to "make Georgia howl." The hero of Shiloh and his 65,000 Federal troops destroyed the great city of Atlanta, captured Savannah, and cut a wide swath of destruction through Georgia and the Carolinas ...

A biography of the two gifted Civil War commanders from a New York Times–bestselling author: "A great story . . . History at its best" ( Publishers Weekly).Their names are forever linked in the history of the Civil War, but Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant could not have been more dissimilar. Lee came from a world of Southern gentility and aristocratic privilege while Grant had coarser, more common roots in the Midwest. As a young officer trained...

A main selection in History Book-of-the-Month Club and alternate selection in Military Book-of-the-Month Club. In the spring of 1862, many Americans still believed that the Civil War, "would be over by Christmas." The previous summer in Virginia, Bull Run, with nearly 5,000 casualties, had been shocking, but suddenly came word from a far away place in the wildernesses of Southwest Tennessee of an appalling battle costing 23,000 casualties, most of them during a single day. It was more than...

No single group of men at West Point--or possibly any academy--has been so indelibly written into history as the class of 1846. The names are legendary: Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, George B. McClellan, Ambrose Powell Hill, Darius Nash Couch, George Edward Pickett, Cadmus Marcellus Wilcox, and George Stoneman. The class fought in three wars, produced twenty generals, and left the nation a lasting legacy of bravery, brilliance, and bloodshed.This fascinating, remarkably intimate chro...

Told from the point of view of an ordinary foot soldier, this personal memoir has been hailed as one of the liveliest, wittiest, and most significant commentaries ever written on the Civil War.Among the plethora of books about the Civil War, Company Aytch stands out for its uniquely personal view of the events as related by a most engaging writer—a man with Twain-like talents who served as a foot soldier for four long years in the Confederate army....

The Civil War is most often described as one in which brother fought against brother. But the most devastating war fought on American soil was also one in which women demonstrated heroic deeds, selfless acts, and courage beyond measure. Women mobilized soup kitchens and relief societies. Women cared for wounded soldiers. Women were effective spies. And it is estimated that 300 women fought on the battlefields, usually disguised as men. The most fascinating Civil War women include:...

This YA Civil War history chronicles the Union and Confederate paths to Gettysburg, the epic battle, and its aftermath with vivid firsthand accounts.In the summer of 1863, General Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia advanced into Pennsylvania in a daring offensive to win the Civil War in a single campaign. They met the Union Army at the quiet crossroads town of Gettysburg and engaged in a dramatic and costly battle that lasted three days. The results of...

In retrospect, General William Tecumseh Sherman considered his march through the Carolinas the greatest of his military feats, greater even than the Georgia campaign. When he set out northward from Savannah with 60,000 veteran soldiers in January 1865, he was more convinced than ever that the bold application of his ideas of total war could speedily end the conflict. John Barrett’s story of what happened in the three months that followed is based on printed memoirs and documentary records ...

In the tradition of the bestselling Silent Night: The Story of the World War I Christmas Truce, the true story of a Civil War Christmas miracleIn the waning days of 1862, Union and Confederate troops set up camp within earshot of one another in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Christmas had just passed, and for many of these battle-wearied young soldiers the holiday season was a melancholy reminder of the families and loved ones they’d left behind. Bands from both...

This third volume of the ground-breaking eyewitness narrative that has been called a “masterpiece” traces events from January 1863 to March 1864—a crucial period in the American Civil WarSpanning the crucial months from January 1863 to March 1864, this third volume of The Library of America’s highly acclaimed four volume series presents an incomparable portrait of a nation at war with itself while illuminating the military and political events that brought the Unio...

Featuring hundreds of first-hand writings from the American Civil War, this final installment of the highly acclaimed four-volume series traces events from March 1864 to June 1865After 150 years the Civil War still holds a central place in American history and self-understanding. It is our greatest national drama, at once heroic, tragic, and epic—our Iliad, but also our Bible, a story of sin and judgment, suffering and despair, death and resurrection in a ...