Abraham Lincoln: The Enigmatic President

  Memoir of Ulric Dahlgren  by Admiral Dahlgren   Like A Meteor Blazing Brightly:  The Short but Controversial Life of Colonel Ulric Dahlgren  by Eric J. Wittenberg These Ulric Dahlgren biographies present the Union and Confederate views of the Dahlgren Affair.   Here is the gist of the “Affair.” In February of 1864, a Union cavalry detachment raided Richmond in the hope of releasing imprisoned soldiers captured by the Confederacy. Colonel Ulric Dahlgren led a major arm of the assault. The raid was unsuccessful, and Dahlgren was killed in an ambush. Papers were found on Dahlgren’s body that ordered the raiding party to murder Jefferson Davis and his cabinet. The Union claimed the papers were forgeries while the Confederacy insisted they were genuine. At the time, the Dahlgren Affair became a cause célèbre. The authenticity of the papers remains unresolved.   Ulric’s father, Admiral Dahlgren, called the papers forgeries and maintained that his son would...

  Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words that Remade America by Garry Wills Lincoln at Copper Union: The Speech that Made Abraham Lincoln President by Harold Holzer Each of these books covers a single important speech by Abraham Lincoln. The Cooper Union Address set a course for his presidential quest, and the famous Gettysburg Address reset the course of the war. The speeches were delivered about 3.5 years apart. The Cooper Union Address was given in New York City on February 27, 1860, prior to Lincoln’s nomination as the Republican presidential candidate. The Gettysburg Address was delivered on November 19, 1863, about four months after the battle. Both books are highly readable and well-researched. Wills won the Pulitzer Prize for Lincoln at Gettysburg, and Holzer won the Lincoln Prize for his book on the Cooper Union Address. It might seem hard to write an entire book about a single speech, but Wills and Holzer had no difficulty filling the pages. More importantly, readers wil...

  The Myth of the Lost Cause: Why the South Fought the Civil War and Why the North Won By Edward H. Bonekemper III The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War by Thomas J. DiLorenzo This post deals with two books on the “Lost Cause.” Thomas J. DiLorenzo presents the case for the Lost Cause in The Real Lincoln : A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War, while Edward H. Bonekemper argues against the Lost Cause in The Myth of the Lost Cause : Why the South Fought the Civil War and Why the North Won. What is the Lost Cause? The basic tenants are as follows: the War of Northern Aggression had nothing to do with slavery; the South did nothing to provoke war; the Constitution included a right to secede and the South should have been allowed to leave peacefully; antebellum life in the South was prosperous, dignified, and just; slavery was already dying; Robert E. Lee deserved deification, U. S. Grant deserved demonization, t...

  LAND OF LINCOLN: ADVENTURES IN ABE'S AMERICA by Andrew Ferguson Land of Lincoln  is a fun memoir of a modern-day search for the real Abraham Lincoln. In childhood, Andrew Ferguson had been a Lincoln buff but had developed other interests in adulthood. The enigmatic and “shut-mouth” Lincoln provided pundits an open field for speculation. As a result, a plethora of interpretations have been tossed around that purport to explain his personality, beliefs, motivations, administration, family, and even sexual orientation. Glorifying tributes stand beside hate-filled censures. Ferguson trekked across the country to get a fix on the man. He traversed the Lincoln Heritage Trail with his family, visited major and lesser-known memorials, interviewed Lincoln collectors, gawked at Lincoln impersonators, and spoke with guides, academics, and park rangers. Lincoln remained elusive, but Ferguson’s wit and lively writing style kept the quest entertaining and educational … although the reader...

  The Lincoln Myth by Steve Berry When writing a historical book, sometimes you need a recess from hard history. I thought The Lincoln Myth by Steve Berry would provide an appropriate break. Instead of relaxing, I found the book annoying. The Lincoln Myth interlaces Mormon history and a trendy premise about Abraham Lincoln into a modern-day thriller. The premise probably came from The Real Lincoln by Thomas J. DiLorenzo, a popular 2009 book that argued that the South had a right to secede and that the Civil War was unnecessary. DiLorenzo went further, stating that eliminating slavery was not a goal of the conflict and was only afterwards used as a justification. I believe this premise is an oversimplification. What drew me to the book was the intertwining of Lincoln and the Constitution's history throughout the story. I wrote my own Lincoln mystery/thriller ( The Shut Mouth Society ) and a novelization of the Constitutional Convention ( Tempest at Dawn ), so I found it jarr...

    Confederates in the Attic Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War  Tony Horwitz Confederates in the Attic is a present-day (1998) memoir of a Civil War tour. The book is appropriately titled. When you rummage around an attic, you find all kinds of junk. Junk that’s past its prime, odd reminders of bygone days, nostalgic twaddle, and utter fantasies. Tony Horwitz, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, finds all of these and more. Unfortunately, he spends too much time in the shadowy recesses of his metaphorical attic. The encountered characters and whimsical writing make the tour fascinating, but there’s not much substance added to the lore of this bloody conflict. That’s not a criticism because the book’s intent is to investigate lingering sentiments, not to uncover facts or artifacts. The narrative actually references a great deal of Civil War history, and I found no errors of note. (The characters in this memoir would prefer the War Between the States, or even bett...

  The Truth of the War Conspiracy of 1861 A Reassessment of Why the American Civil War Began by H W Johnstone   This booklet was published in 1921 by a Civil War veteran. The author’s intent is to advocate for The Lost Cause and expose the “truth.” I’ve read several modern-day defenses of The Lost Cause, but I wanted to get the perspective of someone closer in time to the conflict. A participant was even better, although Johnstone served for only an unexplained eight months. Unfortunately, time and participation provided few novel insights. I shouldn't have been surprised because years earlier, Jefferson Davis had articulated the dogma of The Lost Cause in his two histories of the Confederate States of America. Johnstone argues that a duplicitous President Lincoln started the war by reinforcing Forts Sumter and Pickens, the last Union military presence in the seceded states. First, the duplicitous part. In his inaugural, Lincoln said, “The power confided to me will be used to...

    Bitterly Divided: The South's Inner Civil War by David Williams  Bitterly Divided by David Williams makes sense. If the political establishment in a bunch of states decided to secede, there would obviously be inhabitants who retained a stronger loyalty to the United States of America. After all, they had been proud U.S. citizens for their entire lives. I bet you saw a but coming. The but is that although Williams presents voluminous evidence of insurgence within the CSA, it is not clear that it materially hampered the Confederacy’s war efforts until the last year or so. The catchphrase, ‘rich man’s war, poor man’s fight,’ may have been a truism, but Southern men continued to fight until victory became hopeless or they received news from home that their families were starving. Williams contends that slaveholders masterminded the war, but, for the most part, non-slaveholders fought it. Three-fourths of southern whites owned no slaves, so arithmetic alone proves Wi...

  Mr. Lincoln’s High-Tech War: How the North Used theTelegraph, Railroads, Surveillance Balloons, Ironclads, High-Powered Weapons,and More to Win the Civil War Thomas B. Allen & Rodger MacBride Long title and a bit of a misnomer because this book also deals with the  use of technology by the  Confederate States of America. Granted, the Confederacy was limited by its scarce industrial capability, but it focused what it had on its navy, including the first ironclad in combat and the first submarine. Both were effective when let out of the barn, but neither lasted much beyond their first engagement. That’s the way it goes with military innovation; failures often precede a workable design. Most people view the American Civil War as a series of bloody battles fought with muskets and cannons. It all looks so backward from a modern perspective. In truth, the American Civil War changed warfare dramatically through technological advances. Before the Civil War, Napoleon de...

  Dixie Betrayed, How the South Really Lost the Civil War  by Davis J. Eicher To understand the Civil War period, it is necessary to study the war from both sides. Dixie Betrayed by Davis J. Eicher provides the view from the Confederate side. Dixie Betrayed is a different book than the title implies. The last words of Eicher’s book are “Jefferson Davis had lost his power as Confederate president — but not before the whole cause of the Confederacy was lost. Dixie was Betrayed.”  The title and these final words actually betray the worth of this book.  Nearly twenty thousand books have been written about Lincoln and almost a hundred thousand about the Civil War. Less than an estimated twenty percent of these were written from a Confederate perspective, and many of those were Lost Cause screeds. Since the Confederacy lost, official documents were often destroyed, requiring historians to rely on sources like newspapers, letters, and memoirs—and these are not nearly as w...

  Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William T Sherman   In turns fascinating and boring. General Sherman wrote a valuable memoir for historians, but too much minutia for the casual Civil War buff. Sherman includes innumerable orders and other correspondence and describes his entire command structure every time there is a significant change or battle. Although historians, especially military historians, will find this invaluable, it can often be dull reading. Sherman frequently allows these documents to tell the story without presenting a description in his narrative. This means the reader must at least review the correspondence to gain a sense of the events. Disappointedly, Sherman seldom shares his opinions or even thoughts about significant issues. It’s sort of the Jack Webb version of his life. When Sherman does express an opinion, it’s pure gold, especially the chapter when he recounts what he believes are the military lessons from the Civil War.

  Abraham Lincoln and The Second American Revolution  by James M. McPherson This book is a collection of seven essays on the Civil War. Originally, these essays were lecture notes. They are well-written and thoughtful. The common theme is that the Civil War was a second revolution because it brought revolutionary transformations to the country and was followed by a counter-revolution a couple of decades after Appomattox. Each essay covers a single premise and can be read separately. Slavery divided the nation in 1787 and severed the country in 1860. Many have said that the Civil War settled the key issue that the Constitutional Convention kicked down the road. Did the Civil War finish the Founders’ work or was it in and of itself revolutionary? Read Abraham Lincoln and The Second American Revolution and decide for yourself. Ending slavery in the United States was horrendously difficult. It took a four-year war with about 620,000 deaths. The politics were byzantine, and t...

Lincoln by David Herbert Donald Lincoln by David Herbert Donald is worthy of all the praise and awards it has received. As the cover exclaims, Lincoln was a New York Times Bestseller, the book won the Lincoln Prize, and Donald had previously won the Pulitzer Prize twice. Published in 1995, it was called the best single-volume biography of Lincoln to date and can arguably still claim that distinction. Donald’s book title indicates that he had nothing less in mind. Merely, Lincoln , with no subtitle. All of this acclaim does not mean the book is flawless. I read a trade paperback edition that was 600 pages long, with another 114 pages of back matter. I hadn’t seen paper so thin since the Bible. I constantly checked page numbers to ensure I hadn’t flipped two pages by mistake. Yes, the book is comprehensive, thorough, and encyclopedic. Yet never boring. Donald’s writing is clean and unadorned. He does not intrude on Lincoln’s story, and it is such a good story that the reader is pulled t...

  Bitterly Divided: The South's Inner Civil War by David Williams Bitterly Divided by David Williams makes sense. If the political establishment in a bunch of states decided to secede, there would obviously be inhabitants who retained a stronger loyalty to the United States of America. After all, they had been proud U.S. citizens for their entire lives. I bet you saw a but coming. The but is that although Williams presents voluminous evidence of insurgence within the CSA, it is not clear that it materially hampered the Confederacy’s war efforts until the final year or so. The catchphrase, ‘rich man’s war, poor man’s fight,’ may have been a truism, but Southern men continued to fight until victory became hopeless or they received news from home that their families were starving. Williams contends that slaveholders masterminded the war, but, for the most part, non-slaveholders fought it. Three-fourths of southern whites owned no slaves, so arithmetic alone proves Williams correct. S...

  Grant Takes Command 1863-1865 by Bruce Catton When asked what sort of man Grant was, Lincoln replied that Ulysses S. Grant was “the quietest little fellow you ever saw. The only evidence you have that he’s in any place is that he makes things git! Wherever he is, things move." Lincoln explained that every other general briefing him before a battle told him that he was short of some crucial resource to ensure victory, but, if ordered, they would proceed anyway. This essential resource was almost always cavalry, and Lincoln claimed their real purpose was to shift responsibility to him. When Grant took charge, he immediately reassigned twenty thousand horseless cavalrymen to the infantry. Since there was no way to acquire horses for every man designated as cavalry, these soldiers were held idle as a handy excuse. Recognizing the duplicity, Grant removed the excuse before his first battle. In this biography, Pulitzer Prize-winning Bruce Catton does an excellent job of describing the...

  Abraham Lincoln, The Boy The Man by Lloyd Ostendorf This book, illustrated by the author and enhanced with photographs, tells the story of Lincoln's life through pictures and brief narratives. As noted in the acknowledgments, it targets younger readers. (First published in 1962.) When I write a historical novel, I find books aimed at younger readers invaluable. They provide three benefits. First, books for youths tell history as a story, just as a historical novel does. Second, they focus on highlights which can provide an outline for a more extensive narrative. Third, they present the popular view and mythology of historic events. This is valuable because a historical novelist must know when he or she is diverting away from common perceptions. Without proper setup, running counter to general belief can jar the reader out of the story, and the cardinal rule for storytelling is never pull the audience out of the story. Abraham Lincoln: The Boy The Man accurately portrays Li...

  A World on Fire, Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War by Amanda Foreman Few Civil War history books convey another country’s perspective. Amanda Foreman has done history buffs a service by offering a British perspective on our great conflict. Along with fascinating details about spy operations in Canada, Foreman supplies information on French, Irish, and German participation as diplomats, soldiers, and observers. The book may not quite depict a world on fire, but it’s eye-opening to learn how much our civil war affected other nations. A World on Fire 's greatest contribution is its insight into the issue of British and French recognition of the Confederate States of America—arguably the war's most significant political battle. Abraham Lincoln ultimately thwarted Jefferson Davis in this contest, which many considered an easy Confederate win. Had recognition been granted, the South likely would have achieved independence. A World on Fire   is a dazzling research...

Lincoln’s Sanctuary Abraham Lincoln and the Soldiers’ Home   By Matthew Pinsker Lincoln’s Sanctuary offers a fresh vantage point on Lincoln. With thousands upon thousands of Lincoln books available, pulling off something new is a feat—yet Pinsker succeeds. In this work, he explores Abraham Lincoln’s time at the Soldiers’ Home, a cottage in the heights of Washington that served much as Camp David does today. From 1862 to 1864, Lincoln and his family spent summers at the cottage to escape the heat and city pressures. To paint a vivid picture of Lincoln’s personal and political life during this period, Pinsker, a historian, draws on primary sources. The book links the cottage to key wartime events—such as the Emancipation Proclamation, the firing of General McClellan, and Lincoln’s evolving public image. Lincoln buffs looking for a revealing, intimate perspective into Lincoln’s private life and decision-making moments will find this book compelling.

  The Radical and the Republican, Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and the Triumph of Antislavery  Several books study the relationship between Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. I have not read Brian Kilmeade’s The President and the Freedom Fighter , so I cannot compare them. The Radical and the Republican is a balanced view of a pair of critically important men in American history. Since Lincoln and Douglass did not meet until nearly two and a half years into Lincoln’s first administration, the book mostly reports their personal histories and views separately, as if they were on parallel tracks toward the same goals. Except that the tracks were not parallel. The strategy and tactics were so wide apart that Douglass doubted that Lincoln was an ally in his cause. Although you could not prove it by Lincoln’s utterances, their slavery goals were the same. The following two quotes from the book succinctly summarize how Lincoln crafted his strategy. The first is from Lin...

  Abraham Lincoln by Lord Charnwood To get a clearer perspective on the Civil War, it helps to read books from multiple viewpoints. Lord Charnwood wrote only fifty years after the war (1916), bringing an almost contemporaneous perspective to his depictions. His biography has the advantage of proximity, but with enough time elapsed to dampen the passions of the moment. More importantly, as an English depiction, it is simultaneously a distant point of view. It is a distance of more than nautical miles. Lord Charnwood also brings his English noble bias to his descriptions.  This book is essential for understanding the diplomatic imperative for both sides. The Confederacy desperately sought European recognition of its legitimacy, while Lincoln did everything in his power to deny international recognition and suppress arms and funding from abroad. Lincoln’s success was arguably pivotal to the eventual victory. Abraham Lincoln  can be a tough read. A simple, declarative sentenc...