DOCSLIB.ORG

Crawford NF T 2021.Pdf (663.6Kb)

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Crawford NF T 2021.Pdf (663.6Kb) “A Matter of Increasing Perplexity”: Public Perception, Treatment, and Military Influence of Refugees in the Shenandoah Valley During the American Civil War Noah Frazier Crawford Thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts In History Paul Quigley (Chair) Melanie Kiechle Brett Shadle May 7, 2021 Blacksburg, Virginia Keywords: Refugee, Fugitive, Deserter, Unionist, Virginia, Civil War Era “A Matter of Increasing Perplexity”: Public Perception, Treatment, and Military Influence of Refugees in the Shenandoah Valley During the American Civil War Noah Frazier Crawford Abstract: This thesis examines the ways in which definitions and perceptions of refugees in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia evolved over the course of the American Civil War. It investigates perspectives from individuals in both the United States and Confederate States to illustrate how misconceptions about refugees—who they were, what they wanted, and how they could benefit each side—dominated how displaced people were discussed. I argue that despite significant attention to refugees in newspapers, military reports, and among the public, both sides failed to adequately assist refugees who were displaced as a result of the war. Utilizing a broadly chronological approach allows greater insight into how the situation in the Shenandoah Valley escalated over time with the addition of various refugee demographic groups, including white Unionists, Black self-emancipated people, deserters, and pro-Confederate civilians. This thesis discusses how each of these groups challenged Americans’ culturally-constructed definition of the word “refugee.” It also demonstrates how military commanders made use of refugees as sources of military intelligence who directly influenced the events of several military campaigns. This thesis argues that misconceptions about refugees hindered an effective and meaningful response to the Valley’s refugee crisis among government officials, military officers, and the general populaces of the North and the South. “A Matter of Increasing Perplexity”: Public Perception, Treatment, and Military Influence of Refugees in the Shenandoah Valley During the American Civil War Noah Frazier Crawford General Audience Abstract The devastation wrought by the American Civil War in the Shenandoah Valley of western Virginia sparked a refugee crisis that grew in size over the course of the war. From the earliest days of the conflict in 1861, Americans correctly predicted that the war would displace many people. However, mistaken ideas about who qualified as a refugee and what to do with or for refugees prevented an effective response that could have alleviated the suffering of many of these people. This thesis examines how Americans struggled to understand refugees as matters of gender, race, and loyalty appeared to complicate the subject. It offers insight into not only how Americans perceived refugees, but also explores refugee experiences in order to illuminate voices that were overlooked both in the 1860s and in the decades since the war. iv Acknowledgements Many individuals deserve my thanks for their parts in the formulation of this thesis. The members of my thesis committee provided invaluable assistance. Dr. Melanie Kiechle offered a perspective that not only resulted in greater clarity throughout the project, but encouraged the inclusion of incisive analysis that was absent in initial drafts. Dr. Brett Shadle assisted greatly in helping to crystallize my earliest undeveloped ideas about the topic and consistently provided insight into how to maintain an emphasis on the refugees themselves. Dr. Paul Quigley, my committee chair, deserves praise not only for his contributions to place the events described herein within the broader context of the Civil War, but for his observations, suggestions, and patience with my many half-formulated ideas from the very beginning of the project through the present. I am also grateful to the many members of the Virginia Tech History faculty and my peers in the graduate program for their mentorship and encouragement. Ben Olex, Dylan Settle, and Alfonso Zavala in particular provided not only academic insight, but also offered more relaxed topics of conversation related to American history that provided a welcome respite from work. Other friends, including John C. Settle, Joey Frazier, and Nate Eaton also deserve appreciation for the same reason. My grandmother, Christine Crawford, deserves especial mention; her recollections of life as a refugee planted the seeds of this project in my mind many years ago, and I am grateful beyond expression for her many kindnesses and inspiring this thesis. Additionally, Dr. Kitty Crosby’s encouragement and support throughout my academic endeavors was tremendously appreciated. My family—my mother, Lindsey; father, Gregg; and brother, Daniel—have been supportive of my academic endeavors (and infatuation with American history) from the very v beginning and I cannot thank them enough for not only tolerating, but encouraging me at every step. I appreciate their patience when I bothered them with a story, sent them something to read, or talked their ears off on car rides. Finally, I wish to thank Andi Crosby for her tireless support, encouragement, and love throughout the past five years. She has shown me what it means to live life and to work with a passion, and I could not have asked for a better person with whom to traverse the trials of graduate school. vi Contents Abstract……………………………………………………………………………...……...……ii General Audience Abstract…………………………………………………………………….iii Acknowledgements…………………………………………..……………………….………....iv Introduction “What Shall Be Done With Them?”: Perceptions of American Civil War Refugees, Then and Now…………………………………………………………………………………..1 American Perceptions of Refugees at War’s Beginning………………………………..…4 Refugees in the War: Assumptions, Misconceptions, and Influence on the Conflict……..6 The History of the Shenandoah Valley Before the American Civil War…………………9 Historiography…………….……………………………………………………………..13 Chapter I “Neither Pity nor Protection”: White Unionists and Black Refugees in the Shenandoah Valley, 1861-1862……………………………………………………………………….24 Initial Refugee Flights and Encounters with Military Forces, May - December, 1861…………………………………………………………..26 Refugees and Military Intelligence, January - June, 1862……………………………………………………………..33 Refugee Experiences as an Indicator of an Evolving War, July – December, 1862…………………………………………….…………….41 Chapter II “An Immense Tide of Emigration”: The Developing Crisis in the Valley, January 1863 – April 1864………………………………………………………………….……………49 “A Great Exodus:” The Emancipation Proclamation in the Shenandoah Valley, January – June 1863……………………………………………………………...51 “Thankful It Is No Worse”: Refugee Activity Shifts Southward, April 1863 – January 1864……………………………………………..………..55 “Pathways Along the Mountain Sides”: The Rise of Deserters as a Refugee Demographic August 1863 – April 1864………………………………………………………..63 Chapter III “We Are Starving, I and My Children”: Refugees, Hard War, and the Conflict’s Uncertain End, April 1864 – October 1865…………………………………………………….....74 vii Sigel’s Campaign: April – May, 1864………………………………………………………………..75 Prayer Meetings and Ice Cream Socials: Northern Public Mobilizations for Refugees, Summer 1864…………………………………………………………………….80 Hunter’s Campaign: June 1864………………………………………………………………………...83 Sheridan Takes Charge: August – December, 1864………………………………………………………..88 “Feed Upon the Enemy”: January – October 1865………………………………………………………….96 Conclusion: The Shortcomings of Civil War Refugee Policy………………………………104 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………………...108 Introduction “What Shall Be Done With Them?”: Perceptions of American Civil War Refugees, Then and Now On the first day of June 1861, the New York Times ran an opinion piece in its morning issue that generated considerable controversy among that periodical’s vast audience. As war drums echoed across the United States, “The Problem of the Negro Fugitives” presented Times readers with a subject that, while familiar, was hardly foremost in their minds as the United States prepared to put down the rebellion of the Southern states. In a remarkably prophetic piece, an anonymous contributor to the Times predicted that the plight of many thousands of noncombatants would come to be prioritized as a byproduct of the war and would demand the same level of attention as supplying the troops or procuring victory on the battlefield. “The really embarrassing question growing out of the war, and which in its novelty, and in the difficulties surrounding it, transcends all others, is just beginning to show itself,” the article began. Before honing in on its purpose, the article discussed how certain rules of war had long since been regulated with such stipulations as prohibiting violence against civilians and demanding humane treatment of prisoners. But what shall we do with the slaves that may fall into our hands by the fortunes of the war, who to the South are chattels—to the North human beings?... We may yet find useful employment for ten or twenty thousand, but what shall we do with fifty or a hundred thousand? They must be presently fed and clothed, and though clearly contraband in reference to the rebels, we cannot treat them as other articles contraband of war, put them up to auction, and sell them to the highest bidder… Whatever may be the final event, we may have
Load more

Recommended publications
  • First Battle of Kernstown
    First Battle of Kernstown The First Battle of Kernstown was fought on March 23, 1862, in Frederick County and Winchester, Virginia, the opening battle of Confederate Maj. Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson's campaign through the Shenandoah Valley during the American Civil War. Attempting to tie down the Union forces in the Valley, under the overall command of Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks, Jackson received incorrect intelligence that a small detachment under Col. Nathan Kimball was vul- nerable, but it was in fact a full infantry division more than twice the size of Jackson’s force. His initial cavalry attack was forced back and he immediately reinforced it with a small infantry brigade. With his other two brigades, Jack- son sought to envelop the Union right by way of Sandy Ridge. But Col. Erastus B. Tyler's brigade countered this movement, and, when Kimball’s brigade moved to his Valley Campaign: Kernstown to McDowell. assistance, the Confederates were driven from the field. Confederate There was no effective Union pursuit. Union Although the battle was a Confederate tactical defeat, it represented a strategic victory for the South by prevent- ing the Union from transferring forces from the Shenan- doah Valley to reinforce the Peninsula Campaign against maining division, under Brig. Gen. James Shields, was the Confederate capital, Richmond. Following the earlier stationed at Strasburg to guard the lower (northeastern) Battle of Hoke’s Run, the First Battle of Kernstown may Valley, and intelligence indicated that it was withdrawing be considered the second among Jackson’s rare defeats. toward Winchester. Banks made preparations to leave the Valley personally on March 23.[4] Jackson’s orders from Johnston were to prevent Banks’s 1 Background force from leaving the Valley, which it appeared they were now doing.
    [Show full text]
  • Timeline 1864
    CIVIL WAR TIMELINE 1864 January Radical Republicans are hostile to Lincoln’s policies, fearing that they do not provide sufficient protection for ex-slaves, that the 10% amnesty plan is not strict enough, and that Southern states should demonstrate more significant efforts to eradicate the slave system before being allowed back into the Union. Consequently, Congress refuses to recognize the governments of Southern states, or to seat their elected representatives. Instead, legislators begin to work on their own Reconstruction plan, which will emerge in July as the Wade-Davis Bill. [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/reconstruction/states/sf_timeline.html] [http://www.blackhistory.harpweek.com/4Reconstruction/ReconTimeline.htm] Congress now understands the Confederacy to be the face of a deeply rooted cultural system antagonistic to the principles of a “free labor” society. Many fear that returning home rule to such a system amounts to accepting secession state by state and opening the door for such malicious local legislation as the Black Codes that eventually emerge. [Hunt] Jan. 1 TN Skirmish at Dandridge. Jan. 2 TN Skirmish at LaGrange. Nashville is in the grip of a smallpox epidemic, which will carry off a large number of soldiers, contraband workers, and city residents. It will be late March before it runs its course. Jan 5 TN Skirmish at Lawrence’s Mill. Jan. 10 TN Forrest’s troops in west Tennessee are said to have collected 2,000 recruits, 400 loaded Wagons, 800 beef cattle, and 1,000 horses and mules. Most observers consider these numbers to be exaggerated. “ The Mississippi Squadron publishes a list of the steamboats destroyed on the Mississippi and its tributaries during the war: 104 ships were burned, 71 sunk.
    [Show full text]
  • Interpretive Plan for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District Project No
    Interpretive Plan for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District Project No. GA-2255-03-016 Prepared for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation Prepared by John Milner Associates, Inc. and Riggs/Ward Design, PC November 2008 Interpretive Plan for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District Project No. GA-2255-03-016 Prepared for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation New Market, Virginia Prepared by John Milner Associates, Inc. Architects, Landscape Architects, Archeologists, Planners West Chester, Pennsylvania with Riggs Ward Design Exhibit Designers Richmond, Virginia November 2008 The views and conclusions contained in this document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the opinions or policies of the U.S. Government. Mention of trade names or commercial products does not constitute their endorsement by the U.S. Government. Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District Interpretive Plan Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS vii EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ix PART I: CONTEXT FOR INTERPRETATION Chapter 1 Vision, Purpose and Background 1-1 1.1 Shenandoah Valley Battlefields National Historic District 1-1 1.2 Management and Implementation Plans 1-3 1.3 Interpretive Plan Guidelines, 2001 1-3 1.4 Goals for Providing a Meaningful Interpretive Experience 1-4 1.5 Interpretive Vision and Approach 1-5 Chapter 2 Existing Interpretation in the Valley 2-1 2.1 An Overview of Existing Interpretation 2-1 2.2 Regional Attractions 2-1 2.3 Interpretive Attractions 2-2 2.4
    [Show full text]
  • Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign
    Civil War Book Review Spring 2009 Article 17 Shenandoah 1862: Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign Judkin Browning Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr Recommended Citation Browning, Judkin (2009) "Shenandoah 1862: Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign," Civil War Book Review: Vol. 11 : Iss. 2 . Available at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr/vol11/iss2/17 Browning: Shenandoah 1862: Stonewall Jackson's Valley Campaign Review Browning, Judkin Spring 2009 Cozzens, Peter Shenandoah 1862: Stonewall Jackson’s Valley Campaign. University of North Carolina Press, $35.00 hardcover ISBN 9780807832006 The Shenandoah Campaign and Stonewall Jackson In his fascinating monograph, Peter Cozzens, an independent scholar and author of The Darkest Days of the War: The Battles of Iuka and Corinth (1997), sets out to paint a balanced portrait of the 1862 Shenandoah Valley campaign and offer a corrective to previous one-sided or myth-enshrouded historical interpretations. Cozzens points out that most histories of the campaign tell the story exclusively from the perspective of Stonewall Jackson’s army, neglecting to seriously analyze the decision making process on the Union side, thereby simply portraying the Union generals as the inept foils to Jackson’s genius. Cozzens skillfully balances the accounts, looking behind the scenes at the Union moves and motives as well as Jackson’s. As a result, some historical characters have their reputations rehabilitated, while others who receive deserved censure, often for the first time. After a succinct and useful environmental and geographical overview of the Shenandoah region, Cozzens begins his narrative with the Confederate army during Jackson’s early miserable forays into the western Virginia Mountains in the winter of 1861, where he made unwise strategic decisions and ordered foolish assaults on canal dams near the Potomac River that accomplished nothing.
    [Show full text]
  • Touring the Battle of Cool Spring
    Touring the Battle of Cool Spring Welcome to Shenandoah University’s Shenandoah River Campus at Cool Spring Battlefield. On July 18, 1864, the 195 acres that now comprise the Campus at Cool Spring Battlefield played an important role in the Battle of Cool Spring—the largest and bloodiest Civil War battle fought in Clarke County. Shenandoah University invites you to use this guide to explore important elements of the Battle of Cool Spring. Please feel free to either take this guide home with you or return it to the kiosk after the tour, but whatever you decide please help spread the word about this valuable historic resource. The tour begins at the kiosk located near the end of the parking lot located closest to the Shenandoah River. The walking tour is approximately 2 miles round-trip and takes you over some uneven terrain so please watch your step. Please see the trail map on the last page of this guide to assist you in navigating the property. Tour markers are also located along the trail to assist in navigation. Follow the Stops Below to Tour the Battlefield Self-Guided Tour Stop Map Stop 1: Prelude to Battle (Kiosk) Gen. Jubal A. Early (From Battles & Leaders) “We haven’t taken Washington, but we’ve scared Abe Lincoln like hell.” Confederate general Jubal A. Early After marching to within sight of the Capitol dome in Washington, D.C. on July 11, 1864, the capital of the United States seemed within Confederate general Jubal Early’s grasp. However, with the imposing Fort Stevens in his front and news that additional Union reinforcements were on the way to protect the capital, Early decided to withdraw on the night of July 12 and return to Virginia.
    [Show full text]
  • Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: the Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham
    Civil War Book Review Summer 2007 Article 6 Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham Arthur W. Bergeron Jr. Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr Recommended Citation Bergeron, Arthur W. Jr. (2007) "Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham," Civil War Book Review: Vol. 9 : Iss. 3 . Available at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/cwbr/vol9/iss3/6 Bergeron: Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham Review Bergeron, Arthur W., Jr. Summer 2007 Gorman, Kathleen, ed. Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham. Southern Illinois University Press, $27.95 hardcover ISBN 9780809327225 Fact and Fiction? Two Accounts of the Civil War Experience Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie WickershamEdited by Kathleen Gorman A Civil War Soldier of Christ and Country: The Selected Correspondence of John Rodgers Meigs, 1859-1864 Edited by Mary A. Giunta Originally published in 1915 as The Gray and the Blue, John T. Wickersham's stories about his experiences in the Confederate army during the Civil War have been edited in this new edition by Professor Kathleen Gorman. Johnnie Wickersham claimed to have joined the Confederate army in Missouri at age 14 and to have served with it until May 1865. He also stated that he received a captain's commission from General Sterling Price. Gorman acknowledges that there is no record of Wickersham as a soldier. It appears that he simply attached himself to a volunteer company in which one of his brothers served, probably a company in the 4th Missouri Infantry Regiment (later the 1st and 4th Missouri Consolidated Infantry).
    [Show full text]
  • Stonewall Jackson's 1862 Valley Campaign, April 10-14, 2012
    BGES Presents: Stonewall Jackson’s 1862 Valley Campaign, April 10-14, 2012 1862 dawned dark for the Confederates in Richmond—Federal inroads along the Atlantic Coast threatened lines of communications and industrial sites attempting to build a Confederate navy. In the west, George H. Thomas defeated Confederates at Mill Spring, Kentucky; Confederate hopes in Missouri had been dashed at Elkhorn Tavern. Most glaringly, a quiet but determined Union brigadier general named U.S. Grant sliced the state of Tennessee wide open with victories at Forts Henry and Donelson leading to the fall of Nashville. A Union flotilla filled to the gunwales with blue coated soldiers lurked in the Gulf of Mexico and would soon move against the south’s largest city, New Orleans, occupying it by May 1. In Virginia, the main southern army had unexpectedly abandoned its position in Northern Virginia and fallen back beyond the Rappahannock River while spies reported the movement of the federal army towards boats destined for the Virginia peninsula. In the Shenandoah Valley, a quiet Virginia Military Institute professor who had gained fame at Manassas in July 1861 commanded a Confederate force that was seemingly too small to accomplish anything noteworthy. That professor, Thomas J. Jackson, was an enigma whose strict sense of military propriety had caused him to offer his resignation when politicians interfered with his decision to push soldiers into the field during the harsh winter near Romney. Jackson stationed his force in the northern reaches of the Shenandoah Valley and would soon find himself embroiled in conflict with Brigadier General Richard Garnett on the heals of Stonewall’s only defeat at the battle of Kernstown.
    [Show full text]
  • General Phillip H. Sheridan
    SHERIDAN, Philip Henry, soldier, b. in Albany, N. Y., 6 March, 1831; d. in Nonquitt, Mass., 5 Aug., 1888. After attending the public school he was entered as a cadet in the United St'ttes military academy, 1 July, 1848. On account of a quarrel with a cadet file-closer in 1850, whose conduct toward him he deemed insulting, he wu.s suspended from the academy for a year, but re­ turned, and was graduated, 1 July, 1853, standing thitty-fourth in a class of fifty-two, of whieh James B. McPherson was at the head. Gen. John M. Schofield and the Coniederate Gen. John B. Hood were also his classmates. On the day of his gradu­ ation he wa" appointed a brevet 2d lieutenant in the 3d infantry. After service iu Kentucky, Texas, and Oregon. he was made 2d lieutenant in the 4th inf,mtry, 22 Nov., 1854, 1st lieutenant, 1 March, 18G1. 'lnd captain in the 13th infantry, 14 May, 1861. In December of that year he was chief quartermaster and commissary of the a.rmy in southwestern Missouri. In the Mississippi cam­ paign from April to September, 1862, he was quar­ termaster at. Gen. Halleck's headqnarters during the ad"anre upon Corinth. It then became mani­ fest that his tl'l1e place was in the field. On 20 May, 1862, he was appointed colonel of the 2d Michigan cavalry, and on 1 July was sent to make a mid on Booneville, Miss. He did excellent ser­ vice in the pursuit of the enemy from Corinth to Baldwin.
    [Show full text]
  • HFR00306 Harpers Ferry Repels an Attack, Base of Operations For
    HARPERS FERRY REPELS AN ATTACK AND BECOMES THE MAJOR BASE OF OPERATIONS FOR SHERIDAN’S ARMY, JULY 4, 1864 TO JULY 27, 1865 (A Report on the Federal Fortifications at Harpers Ferry, W. Va., January 1, 1864, to July, 1865, to accompany “Map IV-Harper’s Ferry, W. Va., July 4, 1864-April 9, 1865,” date January 15, 1950.) 18 Illustrations Harpers Ferry National Monument Prepared By: Charles W. Snell Historian (Park Supervisory Dated January 21, 1960 105 pages Research Project No. HF-96D Table of Contents Introduction ......................................................... 1 A. Primary Maps Used in the Preparation of Map IV .................. 1 CHAPTER I: STATE OF THE HARPERS FERRY FORTIFICATION, OCTOBER 7, 1863 – JULY 2, 1864. ........................................................ 5 1. Maryland Heights ................................................ 5 2. Loudoun Heights ................................................. 6 3. Camp Hill ....................................................... 6 4. Bolivar Heights ................................................. 7 5. Function of Harpers Ferry, October, 1863-July, 1864 ............. 9 6. Federal Plans for Defending Harpers Ferry ...................... 11 CHAPTER II: GENERAL EARLY ATTACKS HARPERS FERRY, JULY 3-8, 1864 ..... 13 1. Sunday, July 3, 1864 ........................................... 13 2. Monday, July 4, 1864 ........................................... 16 3. Tuesday, July 5, 1864 .......................................... 20 4. Wednesday, July 6, 1864 .......................................
    [Show full text]
  • Our Captain Is a Gentleman”: Officer Elections Among Virginia Confederates, 1861-1862
    Virginia Commonwealth University VCU Scholars Compass Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 2017 "Our Captain is a Gentleman”: Officer Elections among Virginia Confederates, 1861-1862 Ryan C. O'Hallahan Virginia Commonwealth University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd Part of the Military History Commons, Social History Commons, and the United States History Commons © Ryan C. O'Hallahan Downloaded from https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/4869 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact [email protected]. "Our Captain is a Gentleman”: Officer Elections among Virginia Confederates, 1861-1862 A thesis submitted in partial requirements for the degree of Master of History at Virginia Commonwealth University. by Ryan C. O’Hallahan, Bachelor of Arts, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2015 Director: Dr. Kathryn Shively Meier Assistant Professor, Department of History Virginia Commonwealth University Richmond, Virginia 9 May 2017 2 Acknowledgements Without the guidance, support, knowledge, and patience of Dr. Kathryn Shively-Meier this thesis would never have come to fruition. Working with her has made me a better historian, writer, and scholar of the Civil War. To her I owe an extreme debt of gratitude. John Deal at the Library of Virginia has been a sounding board for this thesis and my career for over two years. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to work with him. The faculty at VCU Department of History have been instrumental in my development.
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter 6 (The Civil War, 1861-1862)
    SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY Chapter 6: The Civil War, 1861-1862 Chapter 7: The Civil War, 1863-1865 The scholarship devoted to the Civil War, particularly in the past two decades, has been extraordinary, both in quantity and quality At the top of the "must read" list would be two exceptional general works by James McPherson, Ordeal By Fire: The Civil War and Reconstruction, (4th ed., McGraw-Hill, 2010), which places the war in a broad nineteenth- century context, devoting approximately equal attention to the prewar era, the war, and the postwar decades, and the now classic Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era (Oxford University Press, 1988), a masterpiece of scholarship on the war years that set the standard for the field. For an excellent traditional military history of the war, see Russell F. Weigley, A Great Civil War: A Military and Political History (Indiana University Press, 2000). Other outstanding surveys are Allen C. Guelzo, Fateful Lightning: A New History of the Civil War and Reconstruction (Oxford University Press, 2012); Charles P. Roland, An American Iliad: The Story of the Civil War (2nd ed., University of Kentucky Press, 2004); and Michael Fellman, Lesley Gordon, and Daniel Sutherland, This Terrible War: The Civil War and Its Aftermath (2nd ed., Prentice Hall, 2009). Louis Masur, The Civil War (Oxford University Press, 2011) is a brief yet valuable survey. Older but good multivolume works include Allan Nevins, The War for the Union (4 vols., Scribner, 1959-1971); Bruce Catton, The Centennial History of the Civil War (3 vols., Doubleday, 1961-1965); Shelby Foote, The Civil War (3 vols., Random House, 1958- 1974); and Kenneth P Williams, Lincoln Finds a General: A Military Study of the Civil War (5 vols., Macmillan, 1949-1959).
    [Show full text]
  • The 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign
    The 1864 Shenandoah Valley Campaign September to October 1864 A Module for Stonewall in the Valley [Revised May 12, 1998] NOTE: Sheridan in the Valley is not a complete game. You MUST own Stonewall in the Valley in order to use this module. Designer's Note: This is my first "module" for the GCACW series. It looks fine to me (but I'm biased) - however, I realize it will require a lot of work if it is ever to be published (which is my ultimate goal.) Most of you probably have much more experience with the game system that I do. I would appreciate any feedback you can give me to help improve this module. Please feel free to (constructively) criticize any and all parts of this module - be merciless! Thank you. John Menichelli HEADQUARTERS, In the Field, Monocacy Bridge, Md.. August 5, 1864—8 p.m. Major-General HUNTER, Commanding Department of West Virginia: GENERAL: In pushing up the Shenandoah Valley, where it is expected you will have to go first or last, it is desirable that nothing should be left to invite the enemy to return. Take all provisions, forage, and stock wanted for the use of your command; such as cannot be consumed destroy. It is not desirable that the buildings should be destroyed; they should rather be protected, but the people should be informed that so long as an army can subsist among them recurrences of these raids must be expected, and we are determined to stop them at all hazards. Bear in mind the object is to drive the enemy south, and to do this you want to keep him always in sight.
    [Show full text]