Story of blockade runners, the captains, the crews, the cargoes, the opponents, and the unbelievable escapes.

In Down the Wild Cape Fear, novelist and nonfiction writer Philip Gerard invites readers onto the fabled waters of the Cape Fear River and guides them on the 200-mile voyage from the confluence of the Deep and Haw Rivers at Mermaid Point all the way to the Cape of Fear on Bald Head Island. Accompanying the author by canoe and powerboat are a cadre of people passionate about the river, among them a river guide, a photographer, a biologist, a river keeper, and a boat captain. Historical voices also lend their wisdom to our understanding of this river, which has been a main artery of commerce, culture, settlement, and war for the entire region since it was first discovered by Verrazzano in 1524. Gerard explores the myriad environmental and political issues being played out along the waters of the Cape Fear. These include commerce and environmental stewardship, wilderness and development, suburban sprawl and the decline and renaissance of inner cities, and private rights versus the public good.

Confederate Slave Impressment in the Upper South

Of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who died in the Civil War, two-thirds, by some estimates, were felled by disease; untold others were lost to accidents, murder, suicide, sunstroke, and drowning. Meanwhile thousands of civilians in both the north and south perished—in factories, while caught up in battles near their homes, and in other circumstances associated with wartime production and supply. These “inglorious passages,” no less than the deaths of soldiers in combat, devastated the armies in the field and families and communities at home. Inglorious Passages for the first time gives these noncombat deaths due consideration. In letters, diaries, obituaries, and other accounts, eminent Civil War historian Brian Steel Wills finds the powerful and poignant stories of fatal accidents and encounters and collateral civilian deaths that occurred in the factories and fields of the Union and the Confederacy from 1861 to 1865. Wills retrieves these stories from obscurity and the cold calculations of statistics to reveal the grave toll these losses exacted on soldiers and civilians, families and society. In its intimate details and its broad scope, his book demonstrates that for those who served and those who supported them, noncombat fatalities were as significant as battle deaths in impressing the full force of the American Civil War on the people called upon to live through it. With the publication of Inglorious Passages, those who paid the supreme sacrifice, regardless of situation or circumstance, will at last be included in the final tabulation of the nation’s bloodiest conflict.

Dramatic developments unfolded during the first months of 1865 that brought America's bloody Civil War to a swift climax. As the Confederacy crumbled under the Union army's relentless "hammering," Federal armies marched on the Rebels' remaining bastions in Alabama, the Carolinas, and Virginia. General William T. Sherman's battle-hardened army conducted a punitive campaign against the seat of the Rebellion, South Carolina, while General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant sought to break the months-long siege at Petersburg, defended by Robert E. Lee's starving Army of Northern Virginia. In Richmond, Confederate President Jefferson Davis struggled to hold together his unraveling nation while simultaneously sanctioning diplomatic overtures to bid for peace. Meanwhile, President Abraham Lincoln took steps to end slavery in the United States forever. Their Last Full Measure relates these thrilling events, which followed one on the heels of another, from the battles ending the Petersburg siege and forcing Lee's surrender at Appomattox to the destruction of South Carolina's capital, the assassination of Lincoln, and the intensive manhunt for his killer. The fast-paced narrative braids the disparate events into a compelling account that includes powerful armies; leaders civil and military, flawed and splendid; and ordinary people, black and white, struggling to survive in the war's wreckage.

Carr tells the story of the noble lighthouse from its earliest history to details of the 1999 relocation of the treasured landmark. For now, North Carolinians have succeeded in protecting their lighthouse as it has protected thousands of sailors for over a century. 32 halftones. Maps.

"A Spellbinding Tale Of The Last Days Of The Confederacy." --David J. Eicher, author of The Longest Night In the only book to tell the definitive story of Confederate President Jefferson Davis's chase, capture, imprisonment, and release, journalist and Civil War writer Clint Johnson paints a riveting portrait of one of American history's most complex and enduring figures. "Riveting And Revealing." --Marc Leepson, author of Desperate Engagement In the vulnerable weeks following the end of the war and Abraham Lincoln's assassination, some in President Andrew Johnson's administration burned to exact revenge against Jefferson Davis. Amid charges of conspiracy to murder Lincoln and treason against the Union, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton ordered cavalry after Davis. After a chase through North and South Carolina and Georgia, Davis was captured. The former United States senator and Mexican War hero was imprisoned for two years in Fortress Monroe, Virginia, where he was subjected to torture and humiliation--yet he was never brought to trial. "Engaging. . .Vivid, Fresh, And Entertaining." --Chris Hartley, author of Stuart's Tarheels With a keen eye for period detail, as well as a Southerner's insight, Johnson sheds new light on Davis's time on the run, his treatment while imprisoned, his surprising release from custody, and his later travels, in this fascinating account of a defining episode of the Civil War. "Compelling. . .an indispensable volume for any Civil War library." --Daniel W. Barefoot, author of Let Us Die Like Brave Men "One Of The Most Fascinating And Overlooked Dramas In Civil War History." --Rod Gragg, author of Covered With Glory

Historians have given a great deal of attention to the lives and experiences of Civil War soldiers, but surprisingly little is known about navy sailors who participated in the conflict. Michael J. Bennett remedies the longstanding neglect of Civil War sea

Continuing from Volume I, Volume II intersperses numerous soldiers’ letters with those from home. The issue of slavery from both the owners and individuals is brought forth. Did colored men really serve as Confederate soldiers? Did free black men? Union soldiers described southern women as defi ant, beautiful, crude, and pitiful. Read of women aboard blockade-runners, the fall of Wilmington, Sherman’s march, Stoneman’s western raiders, and the end of the war. Did any civilians die due to these raids? Did they idly sit by as their lives and homes were destroyed? The war did come to their doorstep during the second half of the confl ict. Both Volume I and II tell something from each of the state’s 87 counties. Perhaps you may fi nd information about your ancestor among these pages. Information from period newspapers, as well as mostly unpublished letters, tell their stories.

The lifeblood of the Confederacy, the blockade runners of the Civil War usually began life as regular fast steam-powered merchant ships. They were adapted for the high-speed dashes through the Union blockade which closed off all the major Southern ports, and for much of the war they brought much-needed food, clothing and weaponry to the Confederacy. This book traces their operational history, including the development of purpose-built blockade running ships, and examines their engines, crews and tactics. It describes their wartime exploits, demonstrating their operational and mechanical performance, whilst examining what life was like on these vessels through accounts of conditions on board when they sailed into action.