Looks at the attack on Fort Sumter, discussing the divison between the north and the south, the soldiers who defended Fort Sumter, and the impact on the history of America.

In her diary, Mary Boykin Chesnut, the wife of a Confederate general and aid to president Jefferson Davis, James Chestnut, Jr., presents an eyewitness account of the Civil War.

Chronicles the events leading up to the firing of the first shot of the Civil War on April 12, 1861.

Contextualizing the events before and after the battle, The Battle of Fort Sumter provides the ideal supplement to any course on the American Civil War, American history, or American military history.

In 1829, construction began on a fort atop a rock formation in the mouth of Charleston Harbor. Decades later, Fort Sumter was near completion on December 26, 1860, when Major Robert Anderson occupied it in response to the growing hostilities between the North and South. As a symbol of sedition for the North and holy ground for the South, possession of Fort Sumter was deemed essential to both sides when the Civil War began. By 1864, the fort, heavily bombarded by Union artillery, was a shapeless mass of ruins, mostly bermed rubble and sand with a garrison of Confederate soldiers holding its ground. Join author M. Patrick Hendrix as he follows the tumultuous lives of the men who fought to control what later became one of the most revered monuments to the war.

A gripping and original account of how the Civil War began and a second American revolution unfolded, setting Abraham Lincoln on the path to greatness and millions of slaves on the road to freedom. An epic of courage and heroism beyond the battlefields, 1861 introduces us to a heretofore little-known cast of Civil War heroes—among them an acrobatic militia colonel, an explorer’s wife, an idealistic band of German immigrants, a regiment of New York City firemen, a community of Virginia slaves, and a young college professor who would one day become president. Their stories take us from the corridors of the White House to the slums of Manhattan, from the waters of the Chesapeake to the deserts of Nevada, from Boston Common to Alcatraz Island, vividly evoking the Union at its moment of ultimate crisis and decision. Hailed as “exhilarating….Inspiring…Irresistible…” by The New York Times Book Review, Adam Goodheart’s bestseller 1861 is an important addition to the Civil War canon. Includes black-and-white photos and illustrations.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Luce and His Empire examines in detail the events that exploded into the Civil War, under the eyes of festive picknickers who lined Charleston's shore to cheer the rebel gunners shelling the hated fort and its Federal defenders. First Blood is historical writing at its finest.