The State of North Carolina was not as quick or eager to secede from the Union as her southern neighbors. However, after the firing on Fort Sumter, South Carolina, and President Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops, the Old North State joined those already fighting for independence. North Carolina contributed and sacrificed more men for the Confederate cause than any other state. The first Confederate soldier killed in the war was a North Carolinian; North Carolina regiments made it farther into Union lines at Gettysburg and Chickamauga; and North Carolinians captured the last Union artillery battery, made the last charge, fired the last volley, and surrendered the last man at Appomattox Court House. North Carolina proudly earned the label: First at Bethel, Farthest at Gettysburg and Chickamauga, Last at Appomattox. Confederate Military History of North Carolina recounts the contribution and sacrifice of North Carolinians made while serving in the Army of North Virginia and the great battles in which it participated-Big Bethel, 1st and 2nd Manassas, The Peninsula Campaign, Seven Days battles, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Bristoe Station, Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Early's Valley Campaign, Petersburg, Appomattox, and many more. North Carolinians gallantly protected their state throughout the war, from Burnside's Expedition, to the battles of Fort Fisher and Kinston, and Sherman's Carolinas Campaign, ending with the battles of Averasboro and Bentonville. A few Tar Heel regiments fought in the West, seeing action at Murfreesboro, Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain, and the Atlanta Campaign.

“Bergeron has produced a book. . . essential to the serious Confederate scholar.”—Journal of American History In Guide to Louisiana Confederate Military Units, Arthur W. Bergeron, Jr., examines the 111 artillery, cavalry, and infantry units that Louisiana furnished to the Confederate armies. No other reference has the complete and accurate record of Louisiana’s contribution to the war. For each unit, Bergeron provides a brief account of its war activities—including battles, losses, and dates of important events. He also lists the units’ field officers, the companies in each regiment or battalion, and the names of company commanders. “This book should serve as a model for studies of other states in the Civil War.”—Military History of the Southwest

General John A. Wickham, commander of the famous 101st Airborne Division in the 1970s and subsequently Army Chief of Staff, once visited Antietam battlefield. Gazing at Bloody Lane where, in 1862, several Union assaults were brutally repulsed before they finally broke through, he marveled, "You couldn't get American soldiers today to make an attack like that." Why did those men risk certain death, over and over again, through countless bloody battles and four long, awful years ? Why did the conventional wisdom -- that soldiers become increasingly cynical and disillusioned as war progresses -- not hold true in the Civil War? It is to this question--why did they fight--that James McPherson, America's preeminent Civil War historian, now turns his attention. He shows that, contrary to what many scholars believe, the soldiers of the Civil War remained powerfully convinced of the ideals for which they fought throughout the conflict. Motivated by duty and honor, and often by religious faith, these men wrote frequently of their firm belief in the cause for which they fought: the principles of liberty, freedom, justice, and patriotism. Soldiers on both sides harkened back to the Founding Fathers, and the ideals of the American Revolution. They fought to defend their country, either the Union--"the best Government ever made"--or the Confederate states, where their very homes and families were under siege. And they fought to defend their honor and manhood. "I should not lik to go home with the name of a couhard," one Massachusetts private wrote, and another private from Ohio said, "My wife would sooner hear of my death than my disgrace." Even after three years of bloody battles, more than half of the Union soldiers reenlisted voluntarily. "While duty calls me here and my country demands my services I should be willing to make the sacrifice," one man wrote to his protesting parents. And another soldier said simply, "I still love my country." McPherson draws on more than 25,000 letters and nearly 250 private diaries from men on both sides. Civil War soldiers were among the most literate soldiers in history, and most of them wrote home frequently, as it was the only way for them to keep in touch with homes that many of them had left for the first time in their lives. Significantly, their letters were also uncensored by military authorities, and are uniquely frank in their criticism and detailed in their reports of marches and battles, relations between officers and men, political debates, and morale. For Cause and Comrades lets these soldiers tell their own stories in their own words to create an account that is both deeply moving and far truer than most books on war. Battle Cry of Freedom, McPherson's Pulitzer Prize-winning account of the Civil War, was a national bestseller that Hugh Brogan, in The New York Times, called "history writing of the highest order." For Cause and Comrades deserves similar accolades, as McPherson's masterful prose and the soldiers' own words combine to create both an important book on an often-overlooked aspect of our bloody Civil War, and a powerfully moving account of the men who fought it.

An in-depth look at Confederate soldiers' day-to-day lives, equipment, weapons and more, with full-color photos of reenactments and artifacts, historical documents and more.

After the feverish mobilization of secession had faded, why did Southern men join the Confederate army? Kenneth Noe examines the motives and subsequent performance of "later enlisters." He offers a nuanced view of men who have often been cast as less patriotic and less committed to the cause, rekindling the debate over who these later enlistees were, why they joined, and why they stayed and fought. Noe refutes the claim that later enlisters were more likely to desert or perform poorly in battle and reassesses the argument that they were less ideologically savvy than their counterparts who enlisted early in the conflict. He argues that kinship and neighborhood, not conscription, compelled these men to fight: they were determined to protect their families and property and were fueled by resentment over emancipation and pillaging and destruction by Union forces. But their age often combined with their duties to wear them down more quickly than younger men, making them less effective soldiers for a Confederate nation that desperately needed every able-bodied man it could muster. Reluctant Rebels places the stories of individual soldiers in the larger context of the Confederate war effort and follows them from the initial optimism of enlistment through the weariness of battle and defeat.