Civil War Monitor

An Interview with Diane Sommerville

Our conversation with Diane Sommerville, an associate professor of history at Binghamton University and author of a recent article entitled "'A Burden Too Heavy to Bear': War Trauma, Suicide, and Confederate Soldiers" in the December 2013 issue of the journal Civil War History. In this article (part of a special issue dedicated to the Trauma of War) Sommerville discusses the role of suicide in the Confederacy, the many forms that it took, and the reactions to these events. She finishes the interview discussing how this article fits into her larger manuscript project.