Biographical dictionary detailing the pre- and post-war activities of over 500 Yale College students during the Civil War era.

A comprehensive look at how slavery and resistance to it have shaped Yale University Award-winning historian David W. Blight, with the Yale and Slavery Research Project, answers the call to investigate Yale University’s historical involvement with slavery, the slave trade, and abolition. This narrative history demonstrates the importance of slavery in the making of this renowned American institution of higher learning. Drawing on wide-ranging archival materials, Yale and Slavery extends from the century before the college’s founding in 1701 to the dedication of its Civil War memorial in 1915, while engaging with the legacies and remembrance of this complex story. The book brings into focus the enslaved and free Black people who have been part of Yale’s history from the beginning—but too often ignored in official accounts. These individuals and their descendants worked at Yale; petitioned and fought for freedom and dignity; built churches, schools, and antislavery organizations; and were among the first Black students to transform the university from the inside. Always alive to the surprises and ironies of the past, Yale and Slavery presents a richer and more complete history of Yale, the third-oldest college in the country, showing how pillars of American higher education, even in New England, emerged over time intertwined with the national and international history of racial slavery.

Though located in the heart of Unionist New England, Harvard produced 357 alumni who fought for the South during the Civil War--men not just from the South but from the North as well. This encyclopedic work gathers their stories together for the first time, providing unprecedented biographical coverage of the Crimson Confederates. Included are alumni of Harvard College, Law School, Medical School, and Lawrence Scientific School. The emphasis of the entries is on the alumnus's military career, whether as an infantry private or as a signal scout, as a surgeon or as a teacher in the Confederate Naval Academy, as an aide-de-camp or as an artillery captain. The range of participation took these men into all the major battles from the Eastern Theater under Robert E. Lee to the Trans-Mississippi under Richard Taylor and Sterling Price. Their careers spanned firing a gun at Fort Sumter and the earliest battles in Virginia to the closing shots at Bentonville and Mobile. Harvard's general officers included two major generals-- W. H. F. "Rooney" Lee (one of Robert E. Lee's sons) and John Sappington Marmaduke--as well as thirteen brigadiers, among them James Rogers Cooke, Stephen Elliott, States Rights Gist, John Echols, Ben Hardin Helm, Albert Gallatin Jenkins, Bradley Tyler Johnson, and William Booth Taliaferro. Several engineers and scientists from Lawrence Scientific School constructed major fortifications at Vicksburg and in Charleston Harbor, while others worked in the Nitre and Mining Bureau. An appendix of civilian Harvard alumni who served the Confederacy as congressmen, diplomats, jurists, editors, and in other ways is also included. This comprehensive, remarkably detailed reference work will be valuable for researchers and browsers alike. Helen P. Trimpi has taught at Stanford, College of Notre Dame (Belmont, California), University of Alberta, and Michigan State University. She is the author of Melville's Confidence Men and American Politics in the 1850s, numerous essays on Melville and modern poetry, and five volumes of poetry. Trimpi is a member of the Company of Military Historians.

New York Times bestselling authors Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen conclude their inventive trilogy with Never Call Retreat, a remarkable answer to the great "what if" of the American Civil War: Could the South have indeed won? After his great victories at Gettysburg and Union Mills, General Robert E. Lee's attempt to bring the war to a final conclusion by attacking Washington, D.C., fails. However, in securing Washington, the remnants of the valiant Union Army of the Potomac, under the command of the impetuous General Dan Sickles, is trapped and destroyed. For Lincoln there is only one hope left: that General Ulysses S. Grant can save the Union cause. It is now August 22, 1863. Lincoln and Grant are facing a collapse of political will to continue the fight to preserve the Union. Lee, desperately short of manpower, must conserve his remaining strength while maneuvering for the killing blow that will take Grant's army out of the fight and, at last, bring a final and complete victory for the South. Pursuing the remnants of the defeated Army of the Potomac up to the banks of the Susquehanna, Lee is caught off balance when news arrives that General Ulysses S. Grant, in command of more than seventy thousand men, has crossed that same river, a hundred miles to the northwest at Harrisburg. As General Grant brings his Army of the Susquehanna into Maryland, Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia maneuvers for position. Grant first sends General George Armstrong Custer on a mad dash to block Lee's path toward Frederick and with it control of the crucial B&O railroad, which moves troops and supplies. The two armies finally collide in Central Maryland, and a bloody week-long battle ensues along the banks of Monocacy Creek. This must be the "final" battle for both sides. In Never Call Retreat, Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen bring all of their critically acclaimed talents to bear in what is destined to become an immediate classic.

According to the 1860 census, nearly 350,000 native northerners resided in a southern state by the time of the Civil War. Although northern in birth and upbringing, many of these men and women identified with their adopted section once they moved south. In this innovative study, David Ross Zimring examines what motivated these Americans to change sections, support (or not) the Confederate cause, and, in many cases, rise to considerable influence in their new homeland. By analyzing the lives of northern emigrants in the South, Zimring deepens our understanding of the nature of sectional identity as well as the strength of Confederate nationalism. Focusing on a representative sample of emigrants, Zimring identifies two subgroups: “adoptive southerners,” individuals born and raised in a state above the Mason-Dixon line but who but did not necessarily join the Confederacy after they moved south, and “Northern Confederates,” emigrants who sided with the Confederacy during the Civil War. After analyzing statistical data on states of origin, age, education, decade of migration, and, most importantly, the reasons why these individuals embarked for the South in the first place, Zimring goes on to explore the prewar lives of adoptive southerners, the adaptations they made with regard to slavery, and the factors that influenced their allegiances during the secession crisis. He also analyzes their contributions to the Confederate military and home front, the emergence of their Confederate identities and nationalism, their experiences as prisoners of war in the North, and the reactions they elicited from native southerners. In tracing these journeys from native northerner to Confederate veteran, this book reveals not only the complex transformations of adoptive southerners but also the flexibility of sectional and national identity before the war and the loss of that flexibility in its aftermath. To Live and Die in Dixie is a thought-provoking work that provides a novel perspective on the revolutionary changes the Civil War unleashed on American society.

Explore the human side of the Civil War through archival images and biographical sketches of Confederate and Union sailors. During the American Civil War, more than one hundred thousand men fought on ships at sea or on one of America’s great inland rivers. There were no large-scale fleet engagements, yet the navies, particularly the Union Navy, did much to define the character of the war and affect its length. The first hostile shots roared from rebel artillery at Charleston Harbor. Along the Mississippi River and other inland waterways across the South, Union gunboats were often the first to arrive in deadly enemy territory. In the Gulf of Mexico and along the Atlantic seaboard, blockaders in blue floated within earshot of gray garrisons that guarded vital ports. And on the open seas, rebel raiders wreaked havoc on civilian shipping. In Faces of the Civil War Navies, Civil War photograph collector Ronald S. Coddington focuses his skills on the Union and Confederate navies. Using identifiable cartes de visite of common sailors on both sides of the war, many of them never before published, Coddington uncovers the personal histories of each individual. These unique narratives are drawn from military and pension records, letters, diaries, period newspapers, and other primary sources. In addition to presenting the personal stories of seventy-seven intrepid volunteers, Coddington also focuses on the momentous naval events that ushered in an era of ironclad ships and other technical innovations. Taken collectively, these “snapshots” show that the history of war is not merely a chronicle of campaigns won and lost, it is the collective personal odysseys of thousands of individual men.

The mysterious, highly influential hidden world of Yale’s secret societies is revealed in a definitive and scholarly history. Secret societies have fundamentally shaped America’s cultural and political landscapes. In ways that are expected but never explicit, the bonds made through the most elite of secret societies have won members Pulitzer Prizes, governorships, and even presidencies. At the apex of these institutions stands Yale University and its rumored twenty-six secret societies. Tracing a history that has intrigued and enthralled for centuries, alluring the attention of such luminaries as Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Skulls and Keys traces the history of Yale’s societies as they set the foundation for America’s future secret clubs and helped define the modern age of politics. But there is a progressive side to Yale’s secret societies that we rarely hear about, one that, in the cultural tumult of the nineteen-sixties, resulted in the election of people of color, women, and gay men, even in proportions beyond their percentages in the class. It’s a side that is often overlooked in favor of sensational legends of blood oaths and toe-curling conspiracies. Dave Richards, an alum of Yale, sheds some light on the lesser known stories of Yale’s secret societies. He takes us through the history from Phi Beta Kappa in the American Revolution (originally a social and drinking society) through Skull and Bones and its rivals in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. While there have been articles and books on some of those societies, there has never been a scholarly history of the system as a whole.

A “timely” look at the roles played by ex-Confederates after the war, in politics, academia, the military, industry, and more (Midwest Book Review). The long and bloody American Civil War claimed the lives of more than 700,000 men. When it ended, former opponents worked to rebuild their reunified nation and move into the future together. Many people will find that surprising—especially in an era witnessing the destruction or removal of Confederate monuments and the desecration of Confederate cemeteries. In this unique and timely book, award-winning author Stephen M. Hood identifies more than three hundred former Confederate soldiers, sailors, and government officials who reintegrated into American society and attained positions of authority and influence in the federal government, the United States military, academia, science, commerce, and industry. Their contributions had a long-lasting and positive influence on the country we have today. For example, ten postwar presidents appointed former Confederates as Supreme Court justices, secretaries of the U.S. Navy, attorneys general, and a secretary of the interior. Dozens of former Southern soldiers were named U.S. ambassadors and consuls, and eight were appointed generals who commanded troops during the Spanish-American War. Former Confederates were elected mayors of such unlikely cities as Los Angeles, Minneapolis, and Santa Fe, and served as governors of multiple non-Confederate states and territories. Ex-Southern soldiers became presidents of professional societies including the American Bar Association and the American Medical Association, to name only a few. Others paved the way in science and engineering by leading the American Society of Civil Engineers, the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the Geological Society of America. One former Confederate co-founded the environmental preservation group Sierra Club, and another was president of the Society for Classical Studies. Former soldiers in gray founded or co-founded many colleges and universities—some exclusively for women and newly freed African-Americans. Other former Rebels served as presidents of prominent institutions, including the University of California, Berkeley, and taught at universities outside the South including Harvard, Yale, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Johns Hopkins, and Amherst College. Several others served on the governing boards of the United States Military Academy at West Point and the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis. Every reader of Patriots Twice has benefited from the post-Civil War reconciliation when former combatants put down their swords, picked up their plowshares, and accepted the invaluable contributions of these (and thousands of other) former Confederates. The men who carried the bayonets found common cause and moved on together. This is an important concept everyone should—no, must—embrace to keep America united, strong, and free.

Confederate Generals in the Western Theater ultimately comprise several volumes that promise a host of provocative new insights into not only the South's ill-fated campaigns in the West but also the eventual outcome of the larger conflict. --Book Jacket.

When the popular musical Hamilton showcased the celebrated duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, it reminded twenty-first-century Americans that some honor-bound citizens once used negotiated, formal fights as a way to settle differences. During the Civil War, two prominent Kentuckians—one a Union colonel and the other a pro-Confederate civilian—continued this legacy by dueling. At a time when thousands of soldiers were slaughtering one another on battlefields, Colonel Leonidas Metcalfe and William T. Casto transformed the bank of the Ohio River into their own personal battleground. On May 8, 1862, these two men, both of whom were steeped in Southern honor culture, fought a formal duel with rifles at sixty yards. And, as in the fight between Hamilton and Burr, only one man walked away. Anatomy of a Duel: Secession, Civil War, and the Evolution of Kentucky Violence examines why white male Kentuckians engaged in the "honor culture" of duels and provides fascinating narratives that trace the lives of duelists. Stuart W. Sanders explores why, during a time when Americans were killing one another in open, brutal warfare, Casto and Metcalfe engaged in the process of negotiating and fighting a duel. In deconstructing the event, Sanders details why these distinguished Kentuckians found themselves on the dueling ground during the nation's bloodiest conflict, how society and the Civil War pushed them to fight, why duels continued to be fought in Kentucky even after this violent confrontation, and how Kentuckians applied violence after the Civil War. Anatomy of a Duel is a comprehensive and compelling look at how the secession crisis sparked the Casto-Metcalfe duel—a confrontation that impacted the evolution of violence in Kentucky.