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For countless readers, the books of Bell Irvin Wiley (1906–1980) remain a high-water mark in historical writing on the American Civil War. The Life of Billy Yank, The Life of Johnny Reb, The Road to Appomattox, Southern Negroes, 1861–1865, all are classics in the field, and Wiley’s influence on contemporary Civil War scholarship has been immeasurable. The Bell Irvin Wiley Reader offers for the first time many lesser known and unpublished writings of this eminent historian and provides an intimate portrait of the man Life magazine once hailed as “the nation’s foremost authority of soldier life during the Civil War.” Culled from a trove of 176 boxes of Wiley’s personal papers at ...
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Most of the letters were published serially in the Georgia Historical Quarterly, Mar. 1958-Sept. 1959.
Originally published forty years ago, Bell Irvin Wiley’s The Road to Appomattox marked one of the first efforts by a Civil War scholar to identify the internal causes of the South’s defeat. Today this elegant little book remains one of the most penetrating, thought-provoking works on the subject. In the book’s three chapters, Wiley treats three broad reasons for the failure of the Confederacy: weak political leadership, low morale among the populace, and four “internal influences” in the South. Those four shortcomings stemmed from traits apparently endemic to southerners in general, Wiley explains, and they included disharmony among and between political and military leaders; the g...
In this companion to The Life of Johnny Reb, Bell Irvin Wiley explores the daily lives of the men in blue who fought to save the Union. With the help of many soldiers' letters and diaries, Wiley explains who these men were and why they fought, how they reacted to combat and the strain of prolonged conflict, and what they thought about the land and the people of Dixie. This fascinating social history reveals that while the Yanks and the Rebs fought for very different causes, the men on both sides were very much the same. "This wonderfully interesting book is the finest memorial the Union soldier is ever likely to have.... [Wiley] has written about the Northern troops with an admirable objectivity, with sympathy and understanding and profound respect for their fighting abilities. He has also written about them with fabulous learning and considerable pace and humor.
Pictorial survey of the political leadership and social conditions in the South during the Civil War. Includes 300 photographs and Appendices listing members of the Confederate Congress and its Generals.
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"Between 1820 and 1861 more than 12,000 American blacks made the long voyage to Liberia. Many were members of families that had been brought to America in the 1600s. In the jungles of West Africa these new settlers battled virulent tropical diseases, marauding wild beasts, and fierce native tribesmen; with only basic hand tools (draft animals could hardly survive the climate) they faced the challenge of carving out fields from one of the world's densest forests. To former masters and to their own people the new Liberians wrote letters about physical deprivations, often asking for help; they also reported proudly on the political progress of their adopted country, which became a republic in 1...
In this companion to The Life of Johnny Reb, Bell Irvin Wiley explores the daily lives of the men in blue who fought to save the Union. With the help of many soldiers' letters and diaries, Wiley explains who these men were and why they fought, how they reacted to combat and the strain of prolonged conflict, and what they thought about the land and the people of Dixie. This fascinating social history reveals that while the Yanks and the Rebs fought for very different causes, the men on both sides were very much the same. "This wonderfully interesting book is the finest memorial the Union soldier is ever likely to have.... [Wiley] has written about the Northern troops with an admirable objectivity, with sympathy and understanding and profound respect for their fighting abilities. He has also written about them with fabulous learning and considerable pace and humor.