Volume 6 brings readers more of the best first-person accounts of marches, encampments, skirmishes, and full-blown battles, as seen by participants on both sides of the conflict. Alongside the experiences of lower-ranking officers and enlisted men are accounts from key personalities including General John Gibbon, General John C. Lee, and seven prominent generals from both sides offering views on "why the Confederacy failed." This volume includes 120 illustrations, including 16 previously uncollected maps of battlefields, troop movements, and fortifications.

In July 1883, just a few days after the twentieth anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, a group of editors at The Century Magazine engaged in a lively argument: Which Civil War battle was the bloodiest battle of them all? One claimed it was Chickamauga, another Cold Harbor. The argument inspired a brainstorm: Why not let the magazine’s 125,000 readers in on the conversation by offering “a series of papers on some of the great battles of the war to be written by officers in command on both sides.” The articles would be written by generals, Union and Confederate alike, who had commanded the engagements two decades earlier—“or, if he were not living,” by “the person most entitled to speak for him or in his place.” The pieces would present both sides of each major battle, and would be fair and free of politics. In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, the most enduring entries from the classic four-volume series Battles and Leaders of the Civil War have now been edited and merged into one definitive volume. Here are the best of the immortal first-person accounts of the Civil War originally published in the pages of The Century Magazine more than a hundred years ago. Hearts Touched by Fire offers stunning accounts of the war’s great battles written by the men who planned, fought, and witnessed them, from leaders such as General Ulysses S. Grant, General George McClellan, and Confederate captain Clement Sullivane to men of lesser rank. This collection also features new year-by-year introductions by esteemed historians, including James M. McPherson, Craig L. Symonds, and James I. Robertson, Jr., who cast wise modern eyes on the cataclysm that changed America and would go down as the bloodiest conflict in our nation’s history. No one interested in our country’s past will want to be without this collection of the most popular and influential first-person Civil War memoirs ever published.

An engaging guide to the people, places, and events of America's Civil War.

“An extremely good writer, [Ayers] is well worth reading . . . on the South and Southern history.”—Stephen Sears, Boston Globe The Southern past has proven to be fertile ground for great works of history. Peculiarities of tragic proportions—a system of slavery flourishing in a land of freedom, secession and Civil War tearing at a federal Union, deep poverty persisting in a nation of fast-paced development—have fed the imaginations of some of our most accomplished historians. Foremost in their ranks today is Edward L. Ayers, author of the award-winning and ongoing study of the Civil War in the heart of America, the Valley of the Shadow Project. In wide-ranging essays on the Civil War, the New South, and the twentieth-century South, Ayers turns over the rich soil of Southern life to explore the sources of the nation's and his own history. The title essay, original here, distills his vast research and offers a fresh perspective on the nation's central historical event.

Composed almost entirely of Midwesterners and molded into a lean, skilled fighting machine by Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman, the Army of the Tennessee marched directly into the heart of the Confederacy and won major victories at Shiloh and at the rebel strongholds of Vicksburg and Atlanta.Acclaimed historian Steven Woodworth has produced the first full consideration of this remarkable unit that has received less prestige than the famed Army of the Potomac but was responsible for the decisive victories that turned the tide of war toward the Union. The Army of the Tennessee also shaped the fortunes and futures of both Grant and Sherman, liberating them from civilian life and catapulting them onto the national stage as their triumphs grew. A thrilling account of how a cohesive fighting force is forged by the heat of battle and how a confidence born of repeated success could lead soldiers to expect “nothing but victory.”

Originally published by UNC Press in 1989, Fighting for the Confederacy is one of the richest personal accounts in all of the vast literature on the Civil War. Alexander was involved in nearly all of the great battles of the East, from First Manassas through Appomattox, and his duties brought him into frequent contact with most of the high command of the Army of Northern Virginia, including Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and James Longstreet. No other Civil War veteran of his stature matched Alexander's ability to discuss operations in penetrating detail-- this is especially true of his description of Gettysburg. His narrative is also remarkable for its utterly candid appraisals of leaders on both sides.

The complete text of one of the most important speeches in American history, delivered by President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. On November 19, 1863, Abraham Lincoln arrived at the battlefield near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, to remember not only the grim bloodshed that had just occurred there, but also to remember the American ideals that were being put to the ultimate test by the Civil War. A rousing appeal to the nation’s better angels, The Gettysburg Address remains an inspiring vision of the United States as a country “conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

Beginning with an overview of the causes of the war and continuing with year-by-year chronology, looks at the major clashes of World War II and their results.

Second in the sweeping history of the Fifth Texas Infantry that fought with Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia in the Civil War. In the first volume, Secession to the Suffolk Campaign, John F. Schmutz followed the regiment from its inception through the successful foraging campaign in southeastern Virginia in April 1863. Gettysburg to Appomattox continues the regiment’s rich history from its march north into Pennsylvania and the battle of Gettysburg, its transfer west to Georgia and participation in the bloody battle of Chickamauga, operations in East Tennessee, and the regiments return to Virginia for the overland battles (Wilderness to Cold Harbor), Petersburg campaign, and the march to Appomattox Court House. The narrative ends by following many of the regiment’s soldiers on their long journey home. Schmutz’s definitive study is based upon years of archival and battlefield research that uncovered hundreds of primary sources, many never before used. The result is a lively account of not only the regiments marches and battles but a personal look into the lives of these Texans as they struggled to survive a vicious war more than 1,000 miles from home. “The Bloody Fifth”: The 5th Texas Infantry Regiment, Hood’s Texas Brigade, Army of Northern Virginia, with photos, original maps, explanatory footnotes, and important and useful appendices, is a significant contribution to the history of Texas and the American Civil War. “A scholarly work enhanced with maps and exhaustive notes, yet thoroughly accessible to readers of all backgrounds.” —Midwest Book Review

Killed in action at the bloody Battle of Shiloh, Confederate general Albert Sidney Johnston stands as the highest-ranking American military officer to die in combat. His unexpected demise had cascading negative consequences for the South’s war effort, as his absence created a void in adequate leadership in the years that followed. In The Iron Dice of Battle, noted Civil War historian Timothy B. Smith reexamines Johnston’s life and death, offering remarkable insights into this often-contradictory figure. As a commander, Johnston frequently faced larger and better-armed Union forces, dramatically shaping his battlefield decisions and convincing him that victory could only be attained by taking strategic risks while fighting. The final wager came while leading his army at Shiloh in April 1862. During a desperate gambit to turn the tide of battle, Johnston charged to the front of the Confederate line to direct his troops and fell mortally wounded after sustaining enemy fire. The first work to survey the general’s career in detail in nearly sixty years, The Iron Dice of Battle builds on recent scholarship to provide a new and incisive assessment of Johnston’s life, his Confederate command, and the effect his death had on the course of the Civil War in the West.