3 comments about The Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Vol. 2.

1. This book is a good subject for the Civil War buff that delves into the personal accounts of a general from birth to retirement. This a must companion for "Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant, Volume One."



2. General Grant wrote this book while dying of throat cancer. He had been swindled by a dishonest Wall Street Broker and his trophies and possessions were stripped from him to satisfy the demands of his debtors. Bankrupt, suffering from a terminal illness and never passing a moment without acute pain, he produced this magnificent monument to his greatness. Those who denigrate Grant as a drunkard, butcher or bumbling President need to read this book in order to correct these errant assumptions. It is impossible to read this book and not realize that Grant was an inordinately intelligent man and one hell of a writer.

   Grant's Memoirs are a deserved classic in American literature and considered the greatest military Memoirs ever penned, exceeding Caesar's Commentaries. Grant wrote as he lived: with clear, concise statements, unembellished with trivialities or frivolities. The only "criticism" the reader might have is that Grant bent over backwards not to wound the feelings of people in the book. He takes swipes at Joe Hooker and Jeff Davis, but what he left unsaid would have been far more interesting. A compelling and logical reason why Grant was so spare in his comments was because he was involved in a race with death. He didn't know how long he could live and therefore, "cut to the chase."

   Grant's assessments of Lincoln, Sherman, Sheridan and other military leaders are brilliant and engrossing. His style, like the man himself, was inimitable and couldn't be copied. In everyday life, Grant was a very funny man, who liked to listen to jokes and tell them himself. His sense of the absurd was acute. It's no accident that he loved Mark Twain and the two hitched together very well. Twain and Grant shared a similar sense of humor, and Grant's witicisms in the Memoirs are frequent, unexpected and welcome. There are portions where you will literally laugh out loud.

   Though Grant's Memoirs were written 119 years ago, they remain fresh, vibrant and an intensely good read. I have read them many times in my life and I never weary of the style and language that Grant employed. He was a military genius to be sure, but he was also a writer of supreme gifts, and these gifts shine through on every page of this testament to his greatness. All Americans should read this book and realize what we owe to Grant: he preserved the union with his decisive brilliance. In his honor, we should be eternally grateful.




3. General Grant wrote this book while dying of throat cancer. He had been swindled by a dishonest Wall Street Broker and his trophies and possessions were stripped from him to satisfy the demands of his debtors. Bankrupt, suffering from a terminal illness and never passing a moment without acute pain, he produced this magnificent monument to his greatness. Those who denigrate Grant as a drunkard, butcher, bumbling President need to read this book in order to correct these errant assumptions. It is impossible to read this book and not realize that Grant was an inordinately intelligent man and one hell of a writer.

   Grant's Memoirs are a deserved classic in American literature and considered the greatest military Memoirs ever penned, exceeding Caesar's Commentaries. Grant wrote as he lived: with clear, concise statements, unembellished with trivialities or frivolities. The only "criticism" the reader might have is that Grant bent over backwards not to wound the feelings of people in the book. He takes swipes at Joe Hooker and Jeff Davis, but what he left unsaid would have been far more interesting. A compelling and logical reason why Grant was so spare in his comments was because he was involved in a race with death. He didn't know how long he could live and therefore, "cut to the chase."

   Grant's assessments of Lincoln, Sherman, Sheridan and other military leaders are brilliant and engrossing. His style, like the man himself, was inimitable and couldn't be copied. In everyday life, Grant was a very funny man, who liked to listen to jokes and tell them himself. His sense of the absurd was acute. It's no accident that he loved Mark Twain and the two hitched together very well. Twain and Grant shared a similar sense of humor, and Grant's witicisms in the Memoirs are frequent, unexpected and welcome. There are portions where you will literally laugh out loud.

   Though Grant's Memoirs were written 113 years ago, they remain fresh, vibrant and an intensely good read. I have read them in! their entirity 30 times in my life and I never weary of the style and language that Grant employed. He was a military genius to be sure, but he was also a writer of supreme gifts, and these gifts shine through on every page of this testament to his greatness. All Americans should read this book and realize what we owe to Grant: he preserved the union with his decisive brilliance. In his honor, we should be eternally grateful.

3 comments about Growing Up in the 1850s: The Journal of Agnes Lee.

1. Miss Agnes Lee, as the daughter of the famous general, was in a unique position to record the inner workings of one of America's oldest families. She records a touchingly ordinary life of a typical 19th-century young woman; home life, going to school, her hopes and dreams. Truly interesting to historians should be her position as "teacher" for her grandfather's slaves, who were being prepared for their freedom. General Lee wanted them to be taught to read and write so they could make a living, and Miss Agnes and her beloved sister Annie (who died tragically of typhoid during the war) taught the classes. Agnes, like her sisters, never married although she had a hearbreaking love over with Orton Williams, whom the war turned into a hard-drinking man. She tearfully refused his proposal and never healed from her grief when he was hanged by Union troops. This is an invaluable resource for a young girl's life of the period. Highly recommend



2. The Journal of Agnes Lee was written over a 5-year period while Agnes was between 12 and 17, and before the Civil War that would make her father such a legend. Don't expect breathtaking adventure here, but rather sit back and enjoy a view of this young girl coming of age in the 1850's. My strongest reaction to the book was, "How I would have loved to know Agnes!" She really does come alive here with exuberant spontaneity. Her writings provide many glimpses into the overall family life and way of thinking about her life. Agnes' love for her family is intense, and it can make the reader jealous of such closeness, rarely seen in today's society. I do recommend this book to those who want to know about General Lee's family life, and those who are interested in knowing more about this delightful girl, taken from the world by illness at age 32.



3. Eleanor Agnes Lee was the daughter of General Robert E. Lee, the famous Conferderate Commander in the War Between the States. This is the journal from her girlhood. I thoroughly enjoyed it. There are many books about Robert E. Lee, but there are very few about the rest of his family. This is one of the only sources on his third, beautiful daughter, Agnes, and lets us see better the life of the Lee family. It tells of her faith, her struggles, and her wonderful relationship with her family. I loved this book!

5 comments about The Warrior Generals: Combat Leadership in the Civil War.

1. This is an intriguing book, although not without some controversy. The method is to examine three pairs of generals, one each from the Union and Confederate armies--East and West--at different levels of command. The two top generals at the end of the Civil War, Ulysses Grant and Robert E. Lee are one pair. Two generals of armies in the West--George Thomas with the Union and John Bell Hood with the Confederates--are profiled and compared. Finally, two generals in the East--Francis Barlow and John B. Gordon--are compared, each at Division or Corps command level.
   
   The end result is illuminating. Certainly, Robert E. Lee is not treated kindly. Grant comes in for some hits, as well. Nonetheless the criticisms are handled pretty well and the author does credit each for their strengths.
   
   At the lowest level of command, Barlow and Gordon, we get an interesting tratment of two commanders who may not be as well chronicled as others. Nonetheless, each served with distinction and both were certainly interesting character studies.
   
   Finally, and maybe most controversial, is the juxtaposition of Thomas (Southern born, despised by his family and mistrusted by some in the North) and Hood. The latter is a perfect example of the "Peter Principle," where one gets promoted above one's level of competence. A terrific division commander, Hood was overmatched as an army (and probably even as a corps) commander. Buell's treatment of Thomas is almost over laudatory. To be sure, the record is clear that Thomas was a stalwart, at whatever level of command he held; he excelled from the start of the Civil War, with his crushing of Zellicoffer's army at Mill Springs to his smashing victory over Hood at Nashville. Nonetheless, the treatment of Thomas is perhaps a bit "over the top," despite his genuine accomplishments and the shabby treatment that he received from Grant and Sherman toward the end of the war.
   
   In the end, a very interesting book, marred mainly by the overenthusiastic treatment of Thomas (even though, I would argue, Thomas deserves much more credit as a general than he is often given).



2. I enjoyed Mr. Buell's book. As a number of people have noted, the author provides perspectives on Generals Lee and Grant that may be unfair in some respects but are often thought-provoking. The portions on General Thomas explain his greatness in a way I had not read before.
   
   On the other hand, the book's description of a single incident causes me great concern about how much the reader can rely upon the author's descriptions of other events throughout the book.
   
   That one event concerns the so-called Lost Order. On September 9, 1862, General Lee, then at Frederick, MD, issued seven copies of the order (Special Orders No. 191) to his commanders, including D.H. Hill and Stonewall Jackson, directing them to split up and attack Harper's Ferry, VA from three directions, thus dividing his army into four parts. Jackson, not realizing that Lee issued a copy of the order directly to Hill, also issued a copy of the order to Hill, Jackson's subordinate. Hill received the copy of the order from Jackson, but the copy from Lee was somehow lost. Beginning September 12, the Union army moved into Frederick. Incredibly, on September 13, a Union soldier camped on the outskirts of Frederick by chance found the order lying in a field, wrapped around some cigars. The order was ultimately forwarded to General McClellan, leading ultimately to the Battle of Antietam (Sharpsburg) on September 17.
   
   I do not profess to be a Civil War expert, but both books I had read about this incident clearly stated that it was never determined whether Hill received the copy of the order from Lee and therefore should be blamed for its loss. On the one hand, according to those books, Hill always adamantly maintained that he never received the order, and his adjutant supplied an affidavit to that effect. On the other, Lee's adjutant, R.H. Chilton, maintained that, although he did not have a specific recollection or documentary evidence, he was confident that he must have received confirmation that the order was delivered to Hill. Beyond that, no other evidence turned up. No courier confessed carelessness, and the identity of the owner of the cigars was never determined. See, Sears, Landscape Turned Red: The Battle of Antietam, pp. 111-115 and Appendix I; McPherson, Crossroads of Freedom: Antietam, The Battle that Changed the Course of the Civil War, pp. 107-108.
   
   It is certainly fair for an author to suggest that one scenario or the other is the more likely one (in view of the explicit, albeit selfserving, testimony of Hill and his adjutant, I would be inclined to conclude that Hill did not receive the copy of the order, and that in the rush of events [Lee's army was splitting up and moving out] Lee's adjutant did not notice that he did not receive confirmation of receipt). Mr. Buell does not do this, however. Instead, giving no hint of any uncertainty or controversy, he relates one hypothetical scenario as firmly established fact: "Hill . . . received two copies of the special order. . . . Hill snorted at the inept staff work of the high command and tossed away the redundant order. A staff officer retrieved the document and used it to wrap his cigars. When Hill and Lee's army got underway the next morning, September 10, the package was left behind." Buell, pp. 111-112.
   
   Again, I am no expert, but if Messrs. Sears and McPherson are correct in describing the available evidence, Mr. Buell's description is, with all due respect, misleading. He presents the story as gospel, adding vivid details (Hill "snorted" and "tossed away" the order; a "staff officer" retrieved and reused it) that lead the reader to believe that he is relying upon an account by a witness (presumably the messenger or Hill or a member of Hill's staff), when there apparently was none.
   
   This disparity, in turn, causes me to wonder how many other times in the book Mr. Buell may have used similar, apparently misleading techniques to present hypothetical scenarios as fact without alerting the reader that uncertainty exists.
   
   As I have emphasized, I am only a layperson interested in the Civil War. James McPherson apparently did not complain about Mr. Buell's treatment of the Lost Order incident (the book cover includes a blurb by Mr. McPherson praising the book; I have not been able to find his original review), so perhaps I am being unfair. If anyone has other thoughts, I would be delighted to hear them.



3. Great book which analyzes six of the top generals in the civil war. Warrior Generals gives you a glimpse into their heads before, during and after battles. Excellent companion to Foote and McPherson, must read for American Civil War buffs.



4. Buell analyzes three COnfederate and three Union soldiers with six very different leadership styles.
   
   Buell gives a title to each of the six different men and they are:
   
   The Yoeman: Ulysses S. Grant
   The Aristocrat: Rboert E. Lee
   The Knight-Errant: John Bell Hood
   The Roman: George H. Thomas
   The Cavalier: John B . Gordon
   The Puritan: Francis C. Barlow
   
   Buell researched this book heavily, including delving into the National Archives to the point that he actually found boxes of papers from the Civil War that had not even been opened since they were packaged and delivered after the war, a fact that I find amazing given the vast number of books written on the war every year.
   
   Buell is quite clear in his book that Robert E. Lee was vastly overrated and quite possibly incompetent (he never says it outright but he infers it). I agree that Lee has been overrated by some, but his incompetence is refuted, in my mind, by his track record against a much larger, better equipped army over the course of the war. To his credit, Buell does not lay the blame for the vast number of casualties in the Seven Days Battles in the Peninsular Campaign on Lee - which I consider fair consider that he was forced to take charge during the battles due to the wounding of Confederate General Joseph Johnston. Lee can't really take the blame for a situation he did not create.
   
   Buell also is extremely critical of Grant, sometimes in a contradictory manner. At the beginning of the book he is critical of Grant's strategy as unimaginative at the end of the war (press Lee constantly, despite the constant casualties since Lee could not replace his casualites and Grant could easily replace his own - it quickly became a numbers game and denied Lee his famed mobility) and then, towards the end of the book he praises it.
   
   Buell's favorite is obviously Thomas, a brilliant organizer who built the army that literally simultaneously destroyed the Confederate Army of Tennessee (under Thomas) and was the core of Sherman's famous March to the Sea through Georgia. However, he was ultimately relieved of command by Grant for being to deliberate - a conclusion that I share with Grant. Buell, however, believes that it was an unjust firing. (Grant believed that action was often more important than preparation - sometimes true, sometimes not, but Thomas never seemed to be prepared enough...)
   
   Although I disagreed with many of his conclusions, I did enjoy Buell's book. It was informative and well written.



5. First, a caveat: If you say, "War of Northern Aggression", hold dear the Lost Cause, and celebrate Massa Robert Lee's birthday as a high holy day, you should avoid this book altogether rather than read it and go on to write an emotional review raving against it and giving only one star. This book dares depart from the usual hagiographic treatment of Lee, suggesting that some of his actions were less than genius, and that some were brutal mistakes. Trust me, if you consider this sacrilege, please avoid this book.
   As for everyone else, this is an outstanding book - the freshest take on the Civil War that I have read in years. Buell ignores the received wisdom on such giants as Grant, Lee, Sherman, Hood, and Jackson, and goes back to original sources to reconstruct the actual men behind the legends. His take on these generals is sometimes controversial, usually enlightening, and always interesting.
   Buell focuses on three pairs of generals - Grant and Lee, Thomas and Hood, and Barlow and Gordon. This devise works well to allow him to examine each major phase of the war in both the eastern and western theaters. By including the lesser known Barlow and Gordon, Buell is also able to contrast the West Point trained professionals to volunteer generals who made up such a large segment of those who served in the Civil War.
   Grant and Lee, in particular, come in for reassessment in Buell's work, and both suffer somewhat from it. This, however, is not character assassination, but a valid reexamination of undeniably great men, assessing them by their actions rather than the legends that have grown around them. You might not totally agree with all of Buell's conclusions, but they may make you reassess what you think you already know.
   One of the high points of the book is the treatment of General George Thomas. One of the greatest generals of the war, Thomas has been often overlooked for many reasons (including the fact that he was a Southerner mistrusted by the North, he did not get along well with Grant, and he died shortly after the war leaving no memoirs.)What you read here will leave you hungry for more information on the great forgotten man of the Civil War.
   Buell writes well, his prose moves swiftly, and though he covers the general's actions in many battles, he never gets bogged down in the details that are more appropriately left to books that cover a particular campaign.
   Read this book and you will discover something almost as rare as a Burnside victory - fresh ideas about the Civil War.
   
   
   Theo Logos

No comments about Abraham Lincoln: Great American Historians on Our Sixteenth President.

5 comments about Blue-Eyed Child of Fortune: The Civil War Letters of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw.

1. After viewing the movie Glory for many years I came across this book and purchased it immediately. Robert Gould Shaw grew up in an influencial home which had amazing political and social connections with the abolitionist movement. His words preserved from the past through today and gives us insight on what he was thinking about after fighting at Antietam as well as his feelings about his role and service for this nation.
   
   A must for any civil war reenactor or student of the American Civil War.



2. If, like me, you have seen the film "Glory", where Matthew Broderick plays Col. Robert Gould Shaw, white commander of the black 54th Massachusetts Regiment during the Civil War, you will see only a brief a glimpse of who Shaw was in his short life. Broderick does a masterful job of capturing some of Shaw's personality, but if you want to get inside this young man's head and find out who he really was, I highly recommend reading the book, "Blue Eyed Child of Fortune", ed. by Russell Duncan.
   
   This collection of Shaw's letters shows a far more complex and conflicted young man than Broderick was given a chance to play. While his parents burned with the abolitionist spirit of Boston's intellectual elite, Shaw struggled with his own prejudices and his own self doubts throughout his short life. Never an exemplary student, he dropped out of Harvard to work in his uncle's New York firm, but rapidly found the work boring and unsuited to him. Struggling to find his place in the world, the Civil War came along and gave him a sense of purpose and direction.
   
   Enlisting first in the 7th New York Guards, he served until his enlistment was up, and then joined the 2nd Massachusetts, gaining position as an officer. He "saw the elephant" at Winchester, Antietam and Cedar Mountain, was slightly wounded in two of those engagements, and found out first hand about the horrors of war. During winter camp in 1862-63, his father visited with word that Shaw had been tapped by Massachusetts Governor John Albion Andrew to command a new black regiment. At first, Shaw refused this offer on the basis that he felt a strong bond with the men he had fought and bled with, but then changed his mind and accepted the position of Colonel of the 54th Massachusetts.
   
   Returning home to Boston to take command of his new regiment, he was deeply conflicted over whether these men would pan out to be good soldiers, but as time wore on and they proved their worth, Shaw's respect for his men grew, as did their respect for their commanding officer. After three months training, they left for duty in South Carolina after a grand parade down Boston streets. Shaw chafed for some action for his men, and the first that they saw was the tragic raid and burning of Darien, Georgia under the command of Kansas jayhawker Col. James Montgomery. Shaw was outraged at this action and very nearly refused his orders from his commanding officer, but reluctantly had to obey and ask his men to do what he felt was utterly immoral and against the codes of war. He would write letters of protest to his father and to others.
   
   Eventually, in his quest for real action for his men, they were assigned a diversionary action on James Island to allow Union troops to land on nearby Morris Island for a planned assault on Fort Wagner a few days later. Sustaining light casualties in a skirmish, Shaw was impressed that his men were indeed up to snuff as soldiers, and so, a few days later, after a long exhausting march in a storm to Morris Island during which they got no rest, they were assigned to the lead attack column on Fort Wagner on the evening of July 18, 1863.
   
   Sadly, Union intelligence on Ft. Wagner was badly flawed. It was originally thought that the fort held a complement of only 300 men and that after days of relentless shelling by the Union navies, that the fort would be softened up enough to withstand a frontal Union assault. However, most of Wagner's nearly 1500 men were in a massive bombproof riding out the shelling, and so, when the Union assault began with the 54th leading the attack column, they took the heaviest casualties, including the young Col. Shaw, who foresaw his own demise while speaking to Lt. Col. Edward "Ned" Hallowell, his second-in-command, while on a steamer on the way to their assignment: "If I could only live a few weeks longer with my wife, and be at home a little while, I might die happy, but it cannot be. I do not believe I will live through our next fight."
   
   Rather unfortunately, Shaw was right. He was killed upon reaching the parapets of Wagner, a bullet through his heart killing him instantly. His body was stripped and thrown into a common grave with his men, and his father asked, when the Union finally took the fort a few months later when it was abandoned by the Confederates, that his body be left there with his men. Shaw's burial spot now lies somewhere under the Atlantic Ocean, the island having eroded significantly in the past 140 years since Shaw's demise and burial there.
   
   This book will give you a great insight into a very conflicted, complicated and yet reluctantly heroic young man who was just coming into his own at the time of his tragic death. I am sure that he would have shunned the limelight had he survived the war to live to old age and would have been content to live life with his beloved Annie, to whom he was married a mere two months before his death. Annie would never remarry and lived the rest of her life as his widow, dying in 1907. The war would doubtless have made Shaw and given him the potential to focus his life and go on to great things had he lived to do so. Having lived so much of his young life with such rebellion against his mother's domineering apron strings and not quite sure what he wanted out of life, the war gave Shaw a brief opportunity to find out what it was he was made of. In so doing, he achieved the one thing he never dreamed of, immortality.
   
   Read this book if you are eager to know the "real" Shaw. Letting him speak for himself is the best way to know this fascinating man who died so tragically young at the peak of his life. Follow it up with "Where Death and Glory Meet", Russell Duncan's excellent biography of Shaw. By the time you finish these two books, you will feel as if you know Shaw quite well. If you want to know a few of his men, read "A Brave Black Regiment" by Capt. Luis Emilio, a regimental history of the 54th, "On the Altar of Freedom" by Cpl. James Henry Gooding, a black soldier in the 54th, and "A Voice of Thunder", the letters of Sgt. George E. Stephens, another black soldier in the 54th. I just hope that more letters and diaries from this regiment surface and are published someday. Doubtless there are more hiding in attics and other unknown places.
   
   This book comes highly recommended for good Civil War reading of a primary source, along with the other books mentioned that are by Shaw's soldiers. Together, they beat any historian's account of this historic regiment. Read them all if you are interested in Civil War or black history.



3. it's must have book I love this book



4. Russell Duncan's compendium of letters both exalts and puzzles.The job of editing the letters and setting them in the context of war, family ties, friendships, etc. is thorough and, for the most part, makes them accessible. Let's not forget, though, that the editor omitted some letters that don't support his main thesis: that Col. Shaw was a rich young pleasure-lover who fought to get back to his privileged existence, never changing this outlook throughout the war; he "never fully understood nor dedicated himself" to the cause of Black freedom (pp.1-2). So here we are presented with a young man raised by abolitionists who went to all the hazards of preparing and leading something new, a black regiment, before dying in the middle of it, without understanding what he was about, or dedicating himself to it. It's fashionable to "debunk" the heros of yore, but even those letters we have tell us otherwise, and Duncan reverses his appraisal, back and forth, several times. We should also beware of measuring citizens of other times against a modern baseline on classism, racism, etc. Apart from these problems, found in the introduction and some footnotes, the book lets Shaw speak for himself (he does it eloquently and enjoyably) and the reader can draw his/her own conclusion on ideas, events, and character development.



5. Robert Gould Shaw's letters home are a very realistic look of the Civil War battles by a unique individual with many perspectives. The brutality of battle along with the emotional turmoil from such a young officer bring the war to life. The authors have given us a true picture of a brave officer and the war. As you read the letters of Shaw you want to pull the blankets closer on the cold winter nights he spent in the field. You can share the suffering along with Shaw at the loss of friends. The courage and love of family and devotion of country are evident throughout his premature adult life. God bless the 54th and may Robert Gould Shaw and all that served with him and under him never be forgotten.

3 comments about Herndon's Informants: Letters, Interviews, and Statements about Abraham Lincoln.

1. With Herndon's Informants Douglas L. Wilson and Rodney O. Davis have made a tremendous contribution to Lincoln scholarship. Much of what we know of Lincoln's pre-presidential years, especially, was compiled through interviews and correspondence by Lincoln's last law partner William H. Herndon. Although many of these items were published decades ago in Emanuel Hertz's anthology The Hidden Lincoln, that collection's limitations have long frustrated Lincoln students. The only alternative was the expensive and awkward-to-use microfilm verison of Herndon's papers available from the Library of Congress.
   
   Now, however, Wilson and Davis have made this treasure trove of firsthand information available in an affordable and convenient format. Moreover, they have carefully tried to reproduce texts exactly, retaining oddities of spelling and punctuation, a feature entertaining to ordinary readers and valuable to scholars. The book's presentation of documents in chronological order is welcome. Scholars will probably be the main consumers using this product.
   
   This volume is a major contribution to Lincoln studies.



2. Forget authors, historians with agendas. Read what the people who actually knew Abraham Lincoln said about him.
   
   Before Lincoln's body was cold, William Herndon, Lincoln's law partner for 17 years and friend for longer, began interviewing Lincoln's friends, family members, enemies, acquaintances, neighbors, etc. His goal was to collect as much information as possible about his friend, so he could write a completely truthful biography. "Warts and all" Herndon said. Unfortunately, Herndon soon realized he could not use some of the information he collected because it was very personal and Lincoln's image would be tarnished. Fortunately, some of this information he could not use you will find in this book. While 98% of this book contains very interesting information about all aspects of Lincoln's life. It is the remaining 2%, the unsavory stuff, that is so fascinating! For instance, I was surprised to read about the number of Lincoln's friends who told stories about Lincoln's involvement with prostitutes (before his marriage). Some friends even speculate about Lincoln maybe having one or two illegitimate children. This book contains information I never learned in school about Lincoln!



3. In the preface to his "Life of Lincoln", William Herndon expounded that when writing the history of Lincoln's early life "the whole truth concerning him should be known" and there should be "nothing colored or suppressed." Having set the standard Herndon failed to follow it, for there were something's even Herndon must have felt should not be put into print. Scholars wishing to explore Lincoln's early life beyond the insights offered by Herndon's biography had to turn to examining the letters and notes collected for over a twenty year period by himself and his collaborator Jesse Weik. This often proved to be a daunting task. As the editor's in their introduction noted even though available on Micro roll film specific documents are "very hard to locate" and even if located are "very hard to read." To further complicate matters the index to the Herndon collection prepared by the Library of Congress is "neither accurate nor complete." What Editors Douglas L. Wilson and Rodney O. Davis have done in their "Herndon's Informants" is to transcribe all of the known Herndon, Weik letters and notes into a readable and properly indexed Documentary Edition. What they have also done is create a masterpiece of scholarship that will be used by students of Lincoln for decades to come. "Herndon's Informants" offers the student the complete Herndon collection, unabridged and un-editorialized. To anyone who has a strong interest in learning more about Lincoln's early life this is just about all that is available and it simply must become a part of your personal library.

5 comments about Mary's World: Love, War, and Family Ties in Nineteenth-century Charleston.

1. Mary's World helped me to understand life in the Antebellum South and the culture that thrived on slavery. But it also showed the North's response to winning the Civil War, which was anything but forgiving. It was a thrill to see the Miles Brewton House and the St. Michael's Cemetary on my recent visit to Charleston, and to feel the connection with the Mottes, Alstons, and Pringles.



2. The book is well written and entertaining. The story was nicely presented around the letters of Mary Pringle. All the similar names of the characters make it a little confusing. A nice reference chart showing the relationship of the characters should be included at the beginning of the book. Did the author hide some things to make the family look better? I wonder. It's hard for a Northerner to muster up a lot of sympathy for this family of slave owners. Perhaps Julius, who likely became a Unionist, was the real hero of the family. It's ironic that the South nearly destroyed our country in the 1860's, but is saving it today.



3. In Mary's World Richard N. Cote has succeeded admirably where so many others have tried and yet missed the mark. With his succinct style and exceptional organizational skills he has laid bare the thoughts,emotions and lives of Mary Pringle, her family and their slaves, and done so in a way that has given us a book
   that is informative as well as enjoyable. By putting their lives
   into context with the times Mr Cote has given the reader not only the opportunity to learn what they thought and felt but the ability to understand why they thought and felt the way they
   did. This book will appeal to historians and the average reader
   alike.
   It took me only 2 days to read Mary's World and I found myself
   so absorbed that when interrupted I was momentarily confused to find I wasn't in 19th century Charleston.



4. FOR THOSE INTERESTED IN ANTEBELLUM CULTURE AND THE CIVIL WAR, THIS IS A MUST READ. EVEN FOR THOSE WHO AREN'T A STUDENT OF THE ERA, "MARY'S WORLD" IS STILL A FASCINATING GLIMPSE OF THE LIFE OF AN ELITE SOUTHERN PLANTER FAMILY. TAKEN FROM FAMILY PAPERS, THE STORY OF THE PRINGLES IS A FIRST HAND ACCOUNT OF THEIR INNERMOST THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS.
   
   THE READER GETS TO WATCH WILLIAM BULL AND MARY ALSTON PRINGLE'S CHILDREN GROW UP. BY THE END OF THE BOOK YOU FEEL AS IF YOU HAVE KNOWN THEM ALL. I DREADED FINISHING THE BOOK BECAUSE I FELT AS IF I WAS LEAVING OLD FRIENDS.
   
   DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND MAKE TIME FOR THIS BOOK. REGARDLESS OF WHETHER YOU ARE AN "ANTEBELLUM-OPHILE" LIKE ME OR NOT, THIS IS AN EXCELLENT BOOK.



5. I found this book in Charleston on vacation after touring this home. I loved this book! Now I want to visit again because I am so much more invested. I read this book for pure pleasure, and di it deliver! One doesn't need to visit the south to enjoy, the book takes you there. It gives such insight to the era and history the reader gets pulled right in.

3 comments about General Stand Watie's Confederate Indians.

1. ....one of the worst of which is that the Confederacy was a white, Anglo-Saxon monolith. The truth is that the Confederacy pioneered the idea of giving blacks and women positions of authority [the Matron Law], placed Jews in positions of power, and put General's stars on a Mexican. And, we had the first American Indian General; this wonderful book is his story.
   
   Stand Watie was born in Georgia in 1806, and went west on the Trail of Tears. In Oklahoma, he became a rich, powerful, slave-owning rancher. [Yes, Indians owned slaves; so did Jews, Mexicans, and, surprise, Blacks]. He also gained both friends and enemies; as one of the two rival Principal Chiefs of the Cherokee Nations, he headed the Mixed Blood faction, which some thought got along a little too well with the government. [The other Chief, John Ross, was also a rich slave-owning rancher, living in a mansion, married to a white woman; he had less Indian blood than Watie]. Sort of like the Pure Bloods and the Mud-Bloods in the Harry Potter stories, only this wasn't funny........
   
   When the Civil War came, both sides wanted the Indians of the Five Civilized Tribes in present day Oklahoma; enter another of the few Civil War characters who provide a measure of comic relief, Brigadier General Albert Pike, sent by the Confederacy to recruit the Indians; he did a pretty good job, too, capitalizing on the very real beef that the Indians had with the US. Pike's Civil War career is a minor footnote to a long, productive life. Today, he is best known as the philosopher of Scottish Rite Masonry. Pike resigned in late 1862 [Maybe---another topic], and was replaced by the more conventional, but less colorful, Douglas Cooper. Cooper said that Pike was either disloyal to the Confederacy, or was insane; Masons know which was the case.....
   
   Oklahoma saw action all thru the war; the battles aren't as well known as the eastern ones, but the troops gave just as much, and the dead were just as dead. Stand Watie was a hero of Wilson's Creek, and proved to be an effective leader the whole way. Indeed, this was a theatre of operations where the Confederacy remained viable right to the end. Stand Watie was rewarded with General's stars in 1864, and was the very last Confederate General to stack arms.
   
   This book is a true classic, a well written account of a part of the Civil War that most people don't even know existed.. Many thanks to Mr. Cunningham, and many thanks to the University of Oklahoma Press for making it available.



2. Well written chronicle of one of the South's finest soldiers.
   Too little has been introduced about the struggle between North and South in the Nations. This book is the best I have read on the subject.
   Watie and his gallant band are well represented in their struggle to defend their families and save their homes from ruin during the Yankee invasion.



3. Excellent overview of Native American Confederates. A little looked at fact of the Civil War. Does justice to all men, women of all color, nationalities whom fought for what they beleived in.

3 comments about Abraham Lincoln: Man Behind the Myths, The.

1. In this small but valuable volume, Oates explores the reality beyond the two sources of Lincoln myth: the primary myth of a saintly and folkloric Lincoln of Carl Sandburg and a secondary myth of the 'white honky' Lincoln of the 1970's revisionists. Oates emphasizes that Lincoln drew deeply upon the "spirit of his age", which was a profoundly revolutionary time across the world. Oates relates how Lincoln absorbed one of the core lessons of America from the example of Henry Clay: : "in this country one can scarcely be so poor, but that, if he will, he can acquire sufficient education to get through the world respectably".
   
   That slavery was the cause of the Civil War is beyond all doubt. As Oates explains, however, the North did not go to war to free the slaves. In the standard phrasing, the North went to war to 'preserve the union'. Oates explores Lincoln's fears that the spread of slavery in the wake of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the Dred Scott decision would lead to the destruction of democratic society. The debate then still raged on the world stage whether a republican form of government could last. Lincoln rejected the "ingenious sophism" that states could freely leave the Union. "With rebellion thus sugar coated [southern leaders] have been drugging the public mind of their section for more than thirty years." Secession posed nothing less than a final challenge to popular government. If a minority could destroy the government any time it felt aggrieved, then no government could endure. Thus the war had to be fought to preserve not just the American Republic, but the possibility of republican government.
   
   Lincoln did in fact oppose slavery from early on. His views on racial matters apart from slavery became more fully progressive over time. Lincoln, however, hoped that slavery would slowly melt away in a losing competition with free labor and that liberated slaves would resettle in Africa. It is part of Lincoln's greatness that he later gave up these views. Oates explores this evolution in his thinking. Oates debunks the notion that the Emancipation Proclamation was unimportant in liberating the slaves. Oates also refutes the notion that Lincoln would have favored an easy hand during Reconstruction. On the contrary, the evidence strongly suggests he would have led the so-called Radical Republicans.
   
   Highly recommended for any reader with an interest in Lincoln, the Civil War era, or really pretty much any American.



2. As an amateur genealogist I discovered that I was a sixth cousin, five times removed to President Abraham Lincoln through the Lincoln and Holmes families. On page 21 ( Abraham Lincoln, The man Behind The Myths ) Mr. Oates wrote that there was a mistaken belief that Thomas Lincoln was not Abraham's real father rather it was a Senator John C. Calhoun or a Henry Clay. If this was true it would mean that I was not related to President Abraham Lincoln. How would such a rumour start ? Is there any documented evidence that Nancy Lincoln had an affair with one of these men while being married to Thomas Lincoln. At the time I am trying to locate Stephen B. Oates so I can get this matter cleared up. Sincerely, Mr. Blair E. Bartlett, 87 Shillington Road, Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada, E2J 4K7 1-506-696-6175



3. We invented Abraham Lincoln. Not the man, of course, but the myth, that solemn and statuesque giant memorialized eternally overlooking the Capitol mall. The power of that myth and the quiet dignity of its personage dwarfs us all. But the myth is not the man. Myths never are. Stephen Oates in his _Abraham Lincoln, The Man Behind the Myths_, does not seek to diminish the man but rather to clarify him, separating the mythos from the mortal. And it is not an undaunting task, it seems, for overly soon after Lincoln's tragic end the mills began to churn. The public's shredding of the White House interior for mementos while Mary Lincoln lay debilitated in the next room seems symbolic of the wolfpack mentality in Washington even today. And every new memoir published by another family acquaintance of the Lincoln's almost always got it wrong, and tore anew at the heart of the family. We may not have memorialized and glorified our modern-day tragic heroes to such an extent, for we have simultaneously tried to scandalize them. But the tabloid trade it seems has always been a yellow paper. Even Lincoln was vilified in his time and after. He was, Oates, reminds us, one of the most unpopular living presidents of our history. But though the legacy ballooned to heroic proportions after his passing, the man seems to have been lost in it all, remaining only in the hearts of the family leaving quietly and unattended down the steps of the White House never to return.

1 comments about Lincoln: The Presidential Archives.

1. Lincoln: The Presidential Archives, Chuck Wills, Dorling Kindersley Publications, 160 pp, b/w photographs, watercolor maps, bibliography, ephemera, September 2007.
   
   If you wish to hold reproductions of Lincoln's elementary mathematics notebook, the Lincoln-Todd marriage license, Lincoln's letter to Sheilds outlining the terms of their forthcoming duel, Lincoln's patent application, the first piece of mail delivered by the Pony Express from St. Joseph, Missouri to Julesburg, Rocky Mountains, Mary Todd Lincoln's letter from NYC to her husband in which she asks for more cash, the telegram from Tammany Hall to Lincoln informing him of the Draft Riots and many more documents, then this splendid book is for you.
   
   Not just a collection of paper documents, but also a fine biography with period photographs, maps, and illustrations on every other page, Lincoln: The Presidential Archives, is a wonderful book. In particular, rare photographs of Denton Offut's store where Lincoln clerked, the Lincoln and Berry store, and the Edwards' house in which the Abraham and Mary were wed are published.
   
   The book's heavy and glossy paper and a strong binding allows the book to stay open at every page. Lincoln: The Presidential Archives is both an attractive coffee table book and a 'hands-on' biography. The narrative contents are well organized and the eight sturdy, opaque, full-page envelopes that hold the reproductions have a paper flap that allows for easy removal and return of the reproduction documents.
   
   Lincoln: The Presidential Archives is worth every penny and will be a welcomed gift for any Lincoln enthusiast, Civil War buff, American history reader or social science teacher.