
Book Reviews
The digital home of book reviews and author interviews—and your source of the most up-to-date information on all things Civil War literature


Published: 11/19/14
SCAFIDI: To the Bramble and the Briar (2014)
To the Bramble and the Briar by Steve Scafidi. University of Arkansas Press, 2014. Paper, ISBN: 978-1557286512. $16.95. It’s 1901. We stare into a freshly opened coffin “to verify it was...
Published: 11/12/14
HUBBELL (ed.): On Lincoln (2014)
On Lincoln edited by John T. Hubbell. Kent State University Press, 2014. Paper, ISBN: 978-1606352007. $29.95. On Lincoln pulls together some of the finest scholarly writing about our nation’s sixteenth president from...
Published: 11/12/14
ZOLA: We Called Him Rabbi Abraham (2014)
We Called Him Rabbi Abraham: Lincoln and American Jewry, A Documentary History by Gary Phillip Zola. Southern Illinois University Press, 2014. Cloth, IBSN: 978-0809332922. $49.50 A number of years ago, I...
Published: 11/5/14
WHITE: Emancipation, the Union Army, and the Reelection of Abraham Lincoln (2014)
Emancipation, the Union Army, and the Reelection of Abraham Lincoln by Jonathan W. White. Louisiana State University Press, 2014. Cloth, IBSN: 978-0807154571. $39.95. Jonathan W. White has a healthy propensity for...
Published: 10/29/14
SCHMIEL: Citizen-General (2014)
Citizen-General: Jacob Dolson Cox and the Civil War Era by Eugene D. Schmiel. Ohio University Press, 2014. Paper, ISBN: 978-0821420836. $26.95. Mid-nineteenth century America can be considered the heyday of the...
Published: 10/29/14
WILLIAMS (ed.): Stonewall’s Prussian Mapmaker (2014)
Stonewall’s Prussian Mapmaker: The Journals of Captain Oscar Hinrichs edited by Richard Brady Williams. University of North Carolina Press, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-1469614342. $45.00. Mention mapmaking and Stonewall Jackson, and students...
Published: 10/22/14
HOLZER: Lincoln and the Power of the Press (2014)
Lincoln and the Power of the Press: The War for Public Opinion by Harold Holzer. Simon & Schuster, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-1439192719. $37.50. Harold Holzer, author of the clear, fast-paced, and...
Published: 10/22/14
DEVINE: Learning from the Wounded (2014)
Learning from the Wounded: The Civil War and the Rise of American Medical Science by Shauna Devine. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-1469611556. $39.95. The sesquicentennial...
Published: 10/15/14
ESCOTT: Uncommonly Savage (2014)
Uncommonly Savage: Civil War and Remembrance in Spain and the United States by Paul D. Escott. University Press of Florida, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-0813049410. $74.95. The tendency to compare elements of...
Published: 10/8/14
ABBOTT: Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy (2014)
Liar, Temptress, Soldier, Spy: Four Women Undercover in the Civil War by Karen Abbott. HarperCollins Publishers, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-0062092892. $27.99. In this compelling popular history, New York Times bestselling author Karen Abbott...
Published: 10/8/14
DAVIS & GREENWALT: Hurricane from the Heavens (2014)
Hurricane from the Heavens: The Battle of Cold Harbor, May 26-June 5, 1864 by Daniel T. Davis and Phillip S. Greenwalt. Savas Beatie, 2014. Paper, ISBN: 978-1611211870. $12.95. “I have always...
Published: 10/1/14
NESTER: The Age of Lincoln and the Art of American Power (2014)
The Age of Lincoln and the Art of American Power, 1848-1876 by William R. Nester. Potomac Books, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 1612346588. $34.95. President Lincoln did not shrink from exerting his power....
Published: 10/1/14
ZEITZ: Lincoln’s Boys (2014)
Lincoln’s Boys: John Hay, John Nicolay, and the War for Lincoln’s Image by Joshua Zeitz. Viking Press, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-0670025664. $29.95. Astounding as it may seem to modern Americans, Abraham...
Published: 9/24/14
BINNINGTON: Confederate Visions (2013)
Confederate Visions: Nationalism, Symbolism, and the Imagined South in the Civil War by Ian Binnington. University of Virginia Press, 2013. Cloth, ISBN: 978-0813935003. $39.50. At one time, the very phrase “Confederate...
Published: 9/24/14
LEIGH (ed.): Co. Aytch (2014)
Co. Aytch, or a Side Show of the Big Show by Sam Watkins and edited by Philip Leigh. Westholme Publishing, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-1594161797. $14.95. Sam Watkins’ Co. Aytch has long been regarded...
Published: 9/17/14
RUBIN: Through the Heart of Dixie (2014)
Through the Heart of Dixie: Sherman’s March and American Memory by Anne Sarah Rubin. University of North Carolina Press, 2014. Cloth, ISBN: 978-1469617770. $35.00. The men of William Tecumseh Sherman’s army...
Published: 9/17/14
JONES & SWORD (eds.): Gateway to the Confederacy (2014)
Gateway to the Confederacy: New Perspectives on the Chickamauga and Chattanooga Campaigns, 1862-1863 edited by Evan C. Jones and Wiley Sword. Louisiana State University Press, 2014. Cloth, IBSN: 9780807155097. $39.95. Literature...
Published: 9/10/14
HAMLER: Civil War Woodworking (2014)
Civil War Woodworking Volume II: More Authentic Projects for Woodworkers and Reenactors by A.J. Hamler. Linden Publishing, 2014. Paper, ISBN: 9781610351966. $24.95. In this well written, prolifically illustrated book, master carpenter...