Books about Appomattox from Amazon.com

There are a few books that belong on the shelf of every Civil War buff: James M. McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom, one of the better Abraham Lincoln biographies, something on Robert E. Lee, perhaps Shelby Foote's massive trilogy The Civil War. Add Jay Winik's wonderful April 1865 to the list. This is one of those rare, shining books that takes a new look at an old subject and changes the way we think about it. Winik shows that there was nothing inevitable about the end of the Civil War, from the fall of Richmond to the surrender at Appomattox to the murder of Lincoln. It all happened so quickly, in what "proved to be perhaps the most moving and decisive month not simply of the Civil War, but indeed, quite likely, in the life of the United States."

Things might have been rather different, too. "What emerges from the panorama of April 1865 is that the whole of our national history could have been altered but for a few decisions, a quirk of fate, a sudden shift in luck." When Lee abandoned Richmond, for instance, his soldiers rendezvoused at a nearby town called Amelia Court House. There, the general expected to find boxcars full of food for his hungry troops. But "a mere administrative mix-up" left his army empty-handed and may have limited Lee's options in the days to come. Or what if Lee had decided not to surrender at all, but to turn his resourceful army into an outfit of guerrilla fighters who would harass federal officials? National reconciliation might have become impossible as the whole South turned into a region plagued with violence and terrorism. For the Union, "there would be no real rest, no real respite, no true amity, nor, for that matter, any real sense of victory--only an amorphous state of neither war nor peace, raging like a low-level fever." One of Lee's officers actually proposed this scenario to his commander in those final hours; America is fortunate Lee didn't choose this path.

Winik is an exceptionally good storyteller. April 1865 is full of memorable images and you-are-there writing. Readers will come away with a new appreciation for that momentous month and a sharpened understanding of why and how the Civil War was fought. Let it be said plainly: April 1865 is a magnificent work, surely the best book on the Civil War to be published in some time. --John J. Miller.
Price: $5.70 [Notify me when price goes down.]

"I have never read a better, more vivid, more understandable account of the savage battling between Grant's and Lee's armies.... Foote stays with the human strife and suffering, and unlike most Southern commentators, he does not take sides. In objectivity, in range, in mastery of detail in beauty of language and feeling for the people involved, this work surpasses anything else on the subject.... It stands alongside the work of the best of them."--New Republic.
Price: $13.75 [Notify me when price goes down.]

An intimate and gripping look at terrorist violence during the Reconstruction era

Between 1867, when the defeated South was forced to establish new state governments that fully represented both black and white citizens, and 1877, when the last of these governments was overthrown, more than three thousand African Americans and their white allies were killed by terrorist violence. That violence was spread by roving vigilantes connected only by ideology, and by the hateful invective printed in widely read newspapers and pamphlets. Amid all the chaos, however, some men and women struggled to establish a “New South” in which former slaves would have new rights and a new prosperity would be shared by all. In his vivid, fast-paced narrative of the era now known as Reconstruction, Stephen Budiansky illuminates the lives of five remarkable men—two Union officers, a Confederate general, a Northern entrepreneur, and a former slave—whose idealism in the face of overwhelming hatred would not be matched for nearly a century. The Bloody Shirt is a story of violence, racism, division, and heroism that sheds new light on a crucial time in America’s history..
Price: $6.32 [Notify me when price goes down.]

When amnesia patient Burke Rocklin falls in love with a Union nurse, neither is aware that he is a Confederate Can she verify his story to prevent him from being court-martialed?.
Price: $7.15 [Notify me when price goes down.]

A companion to Grant's Lieutenants: From Cairo to Vicksburg, this new volume assesses Union generalship during the final two years of the Civil War. Steven Woodworth, one of the war's premier historians, is joined by a team of distinguished scholars--Mark Grimsley, John Marszalek, and Earl Hess, among others--who critique Ulysses S. Grant's commanders in terms of both their working relationship with their general-in-chief and their actual performances.

The book covers well-known Union field generals like William T. Sherman, George Thomas, George Meade, and Philip Sheridan, as well as the less-prominent Franz Sigel, Horatio Wright, Edward Ord, and Benjamin Butler. In addition, it includes an iconoclastic look at Grant's former superior and wartime chief of staff Henry W. Halleck, focusing on his wise counsel concerning Washington politics, the qualities of various subordinates, and the strategic environment. Each of these probing essays emphasizes the character and accomplishments of a particular general and shows how his relationship with Grant either helped or hindered the Union cause.

The contributors highlight the ways Grant's lieutenants contributed to or challenged their commander's own success and development as a general. In addition to revisiting Grant's key collaboration with Sherman, the essays illuminate the hostile relationship between Grant and Thomas, commander of the Army of the Cumberland; Grant's almost daily contact with "Old Snapping Turtle" Meade, whose expertise relieved Grant of the close tactical direction of the Army of the Potomac; and the development of a highly successful command partnership between Grant and Sheridan, his new commander of the Army of the Shenandoah. Readers will also learn how Grant handled the relative incompetence of his less sterling leaders--perhaps failing to give Butler adequate direction and overlooking Ord's suspect political views in light of their long relationship.

Like its companion volume, Grant's Lieutenants: From Chattanooga to Appomattox is an essential touchstone for Civil War scholars and aficionados. It offers new and profound insights into the command relationships that fundamentally shaped both the conduct of the war and its final outcome.

This book is part of the Modern War Studies series..
Price: $25.16 [Notify me when price goes down.]

For nearly thirty years, Mort Künstler has focused his considerable artistic talent on interpreting the Civil War through his paintings In doing so, he has turned to leading historians and scholars for information that he has then translated on canvas to create an indelible image of this defining ordeal in America's history. More than 160 of those images--supplemented by preliminary sketches, early studies, and photographs of works in progress--are the basis for the four volumes in this series.

Volume 4 follows the course of the war from the battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3, 1863) through the end of the war at Appomattox (April 9, 1865). The march through Virginia and into Tennessee and Georgia, culminating at the battle of Chickamauga, the Atlanta campaign, the battles of Franklin and Nashville, Sherman's March to the Sea, the North's rampage through South Carolina, and battles through North Carolina all ended in a parlor in a house at an obscure railroad crossroads.

In addition to portraying scenes from the conflict, Künstler also explores the human side of the struggle. Thus he has produced thoughtful studies of leaders at decisive moments, instances of daily camp life for the soldiers, and the emotional state of civilians and soldiers North and South as the war ground to its end.

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