American Civil War
"...but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive,
and the other would
accept war rather than let it perish,
and the war came."
Abraham Lincoln, 2nd Inaugural Address
4 March 1865
NOVELS
Crane, S. (1997). The red badge of courage. Tor Books.
The book starts out with a new regiment
for the Union army waiting around for some fighting. Jim Conklin, a
friend of the main character, Henry Fleming, hears some rumors about their
next movements. He tells the other soldiers of the rumors telling them
that they’re going to go around the enemy and attack them from behind.
Sure enough, a few days later, they start marching and they attack.
This is the first battle for the regiment so a few soldiers, including Henry
Fleming, desert the regiment. After Henry deserts, he finds Jim and
walks with him for a while before Jim dies. Henry wanders about a bit
and gets in a fight with another lost soldier of the Union army who hits
him across the head with the butt of his rifle causing Henry to bleed.
By night, Henry, with the help of another soldier, finds his way back to
his own regiment. Luckily, no one suspects Henry of deserting.
Henry lies about the head wound being from the battle. During the night,
Henry is cared for by a friend named Wilson. By morning, Henry is well
rested and fights with his regiment several battles that day. Henry
always stayed in the front and encouraged the other soldiers to fight harder
showing much courage. He was complimented by the Colonel, but despite
his victory, he still feels guilty about deserting his regiment the day before.
Hunt, I. (1987). Across five aprils. Berkley
Pub Group.
Life
during the civil war is hard, especially for a 9-year-old boy and his family.
His brothers, Bill, John, and Tom, and cousin, Eb Carron, had to leave home
and join the army; now, since all his older brothers have gone to war, Jethro
Creighton has to make up the work for them. A few years later, the Matt and
Ellen heard some terrible news - Tom was dead. In March 1863 finds Eb, now
considered a deserter, hiding in the woods near their home, and Jethro does
all he can do to help, even writing to the president. After four years of
hardship and pain, the war is finally over. However, to everyone's disappointment,
the president, Mr. Abraham Lincoln and been murdered in the fifth and last
April of the war.
Keith, H. (1989). Rifles
for watie. HarperTrophy.
Jeff, a Union soldier from Kansas, decides to join the Union army
after his family is bushwacked by two rebel soldiers. He joins with two other
of his friends. He meets new friends in the war and loses some. While marching
one day Jeff meets a young Chrokee rebel Indian girl. He falls in love with
her at first sight. Later he is asked to be a spy on the Rebel side. But
he becomes close to the people on the Rebel side. He has to make a hard decision,
whether to stay true to the Union or join the rebels and stay with the one
he loves.
Shaara, M.
(1993). The killer angels. Ballantine Books.
The Killer Angels is a fascinating portrayal of the key
events of the battle at Gettysburg. This small town in Pennsylvania was the
site of the convergence of the huge forces of the Confederate and Union armies,
led by Robert E. Lee and George Meade respectively. The clash of forces here
was to certainly alter the course of the Civil War, giving the Union side
the upper hand. The novel tells the story more from the perspective of the
South, with focus on General James Longstreet and General Lee; but also Colonel
Joshua Chamberlain from the North. Shaara steps into the mindset of these
main characters, along with a few others, and weaves a tragic, and sometimes
ironic storyline.
Bierce, A. (1993). In the midst of life: Tales of
solders and civilians. Citadel Pr.
A
dark collection of Bierce's short stories; those in the "Soldiers" section
are all in US Civil War settings, and are extraordinarily cruel and sharp,
like grand guignol tales. An uncomprehending deaf-mute child stumbles into
the middle of a battle; soldiers follow orders and kill their relatives and
families; fate plays cruel tricks on individuals in the middle of mass death.
Most of the stories in the "Civilians" section are part of Bierce's corpus
of supernatural tales, and are mostly familiar ones, like "A Watcher by the
Dead" and "The Eyes of the Panther"
PICTURE BOOKS
Winter, J. (1992).
Follow the drinking gourd. Knopf.
Winter's story begins with a peg-leg sailor who
aids slaves on their escape on the Underground Railroad. While working for
plantation owners, Peg Leg Joe teaches the slaves a song about the drinking
gourd (the Big Dipper). A couple, their son, and two others make their escape
by following the song's directions.
Hopkinson, D. (1995). Sweet clara and the
freedom quilt. Random House.
As a seamstress in the Big House, Clara dreams of a reunion
with her Momma, who lives on another plantation--and even of running away
to freedom. Then she overhears two slaves talking about the Underground Railroad.
In a flash of inspiration, Clara sees how she can use the cloth in her scrap
bag to make a map of the land--a freedom quilt--that no master will ever
suspect.
Ringgold, F. (1995). Aunt Harriet's Underground Railroad
in the Sky. Crown Pub.
This is the story of Cassie who follows the route
taken by her ancestors on the way to freedom. But mostly, this is the story
of the Underground Railroad and of the slavery they were running from and
the freedom they were running to and of Harriet Tubman, the great "conductor"
on the underground railroad and all the "stations" on the road to freedom.
Polacco, P. (1994). Pink and Say.
Philomel Books.
This heart-wrenching historical picture
book, based on a true story, presents us with two men from the Union army
who meet after a battle of the Civil War. Say, the white younger man, has
been wounded. Pink, a black man, carries him home to where his mother is
surviving in ruins of a deserted plantation. Pink is determined to rejoin
his unit in spite of mother's protest. Say, who was deserting when wounded,
only agrees because of the danger they present to Pinks mother. Marauders
come and kill her while they hide in the cellar. On the way to the front
lines they are captured by confederates and taken to Andersonville prison,
Pink is hung. Say survives to become author's great-great grandfather.
BIOGRAPHIES
Freedman,
R. (1989). Lincoln: A photobiography. Econo-Clad
Books
Freedman begins by contrasting
the Lincoln of legend to the Lincoln of fact. His childhood, self-education,
early business ventures, and entry into politics comprise the first half
of the book, with the rest of the text covering his presidency and assassination.
Miller, W. L. (2002).
Lincoln's Virtues: An Ethical Biography. Knopf
According to Miller, Lincoln's life was motivated
by the desire to distance himself from his humble origins; though he may
have begun as a young man of the people, he quickly sought a place among
the intellectual and cultural elite that Thomas Jefferson had dubbed the
"natural aristocracy." He never introduced his sons to his father and stepmother.
He harbored an intense dislike for all forms of menial labor, and was displeased
when campaign posters positioned him as a rail-splitter. In this same spirit,
he despised the simple, petty bigotries common among the working classes
of his day and eschewed the Know-Nothingism popular in the United States
of the 1850s as being beneath him.
Oates, S. B. (1994).
With Malice Toward None: A Life of Abraham Lincoln. Harper Perennial.
A masterful biography of Lincoln that follows his
bitter struggle with poverty, his self-made success in business and law,
his early disappointing political career, and his leadership as President
during one of America's most tumultuous periods.
INFORMATIONAL BOOKS
Wagner, M. E., Gallagher,
G. W. (2002). The library of congress Civil War desk reference.
Simon & Schuster
This work's highly credentialed editors and contributors
were able to draw on the vast and rich Civil War resources of the Library
of Congress, which include unpublished letters from soldiers and nurses,
Union and Confederate maps, speeches by Frederick Douglass, photographs by
Matthew Brady, and well over 50,000 published books and pamphlets. The resulting
work is not arranged alphabetically; instead, the 13 chapters cover broad
topics or themes, including military intelligence, medicine, prisoners of
war, wartime politics, the home front, war on the water, battles and battlefields,
and weaponry.
Heidler,
D. S., Heidler, J. T. (2002). Encyclopedia of the American Civil
War: A Political, Social, and Military History. W.W. Norton & Company.
The editors and more than 250 distinguished contributors
present some 1600 alphabetically arranged, concise articles on every aspect
of the period, supplemented by informative battle maps and many of the most
famous period black-and-white photographs in crisp, clear reproductions.
Ranging from a few paragraphs to several pages, the entries create a comprehensive
and compelling picture of the war. They include not only detailed discussions
of the major and minor battles and military life in general, but also the
war's effects on society, from government, politics, and technology to journalism,
commerce, and home life.
Created by Michelle Bernick
Created on 12-02-02