A People's History Of The Civil War: Struggles for the Meaning of Freedom

(Paperback)

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The acclaimed sweeping history of a nation at war with itself, told here for the first time by the people who lived it

Bottom-up history at its very best, A People's History of the Civil War "does for the Civil War period what Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States did for the study of American history in general" (Library Journal). Widely praised upon its initial release, it was described as "meticulously researched and persuasively argued" by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Historian David Williams has written the first account of the American Civil War though the eyes of ordinary peoplefoot soldiers, slaves, women, prisoners of war, draft resisters, Native Americans, and others. Richly illustrated with little-known anecdotes and firsthand testimony, this pathbreaking narrative moves beyond presidents and generals to tell a new and powerful story about America's most destructive conflict.

A People's History of the Civil War is "readable social history" which "sheds fascinating light" (Publishers Weekly) on this crucial period. In so doing it recovers the long-overlooked perspectives and forgotten voices of one of the defining chapters of American history.

Reviews

A more competent and honest portrait is [now] available for future generations.Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Highly recommended.Library Journal

Through his exhaustive research . . . Williams exposes this 'rich man's war and poor man's fight' for what Whitman called a 'seething hell.'Morning Star (London)

Author Bio

David Williams is a professor of history at Valdosta State University, where he teaches courses on the history of Georgia, the Old South, and the Civil War era. He is the author of A People's History of the Civil War: Struggles for the Meaning of Freedom and Bitterly Divided: The South's Inner Civil War, both published by The New Press. He lives in Valdosta, Georgia.