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A review by moreteamorecats
What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War by Chandra Manning
4.0
As a record of profound social change, this book is terrific. Manning's commendable research has brought to light the changing thoughts of Civil War soldiers, Black and White, Union and Confederate, about the causes of the war. Her sources are engrossing, lively, often hilarious. I assume she's picked out the best quotes from a lot of rather humdrum letters, camp newspapers, and so on, but I still had a sense of the great wealth of nineteenth-century American rhetoric underlying what she's raised up.
This is definitely a supplemental text. Have some other Civil War knowledge from the standard sources under your belt before you pick this one up. From them, you'll learn how generals talked. From this one, you'll hear from the privates. It's an eye-opener and a real pleasure. Manning's exposition didn't bowl me over, but it didn't need to: Her sources, quite rightly, do most of the talking.
My favorite point: Lincoln's formulations in his major public writings and speeches were very much in line with what his army was saying. Manning says the army mourned him as the only leader who truly understood them. There's something geistlich going on there that deserves further attention.
This is definitely a supplemental text. Have some other Civil War knowledge from the standard sources under your belt before you pick this one up. From them, you'll learn how generals talked. From this one, you'll hear from the privates. It's an eye-opener and a real pleasure. Manning's exposition didn't bowl me over, but it didn't need to: Her sources, quite rightly, do most of the talking.
My favorite point: Lincoln's formulations in his major public writings and speeches were very much in line with what his army was saying. Manning says the army mourned him as the only leader who truly understood them. There's something geistlich going on there that deserves further attention.