Abraham Lincoln: The Enigmatic President

  On April 6, 1858, Abraham Lincoln delivered his lecture on “Discoveries and Inventions” before the Young Men's Association of Bloomington, Illinois. Throughout the year, he gave the lecture four more times in Illinois towns. His law partner, William H. Herndon, explained, “He began preparation in the usual way by noting down ideas on stray pieces of paper, which found a lodgment inside his hat, and finally brought forth in connected form a lecture.” Lincoln was highly interested in inventions. Ten years earlier, he received a patent for an invention that lifted boats over shoals. Herdon claimed that Lincoln stopped giving the lecture because it was not well received. Five presentations in a fairly short time call that notion into question. Lincoln last presented “Discoveries and Inventions” just five days before his memorable Cooper Union address. It seems more likely that the celebrated New York City speech provided a robust launch for Lincoln’s presidential campaign, and that h...

"Best’s attention to how Lincoln was forced to navigate political posturing and public opinion demonstrates the genius of the president’s decision-making ... The novel also shines in highlighting how the American Civil War foreshadowed modern warfare and how challenging it was for both sides to adapt to the era’s increasingly devastating technological advances in weaponry. The tensions and promises of a time reshaped by modern technology are palpable on the page." Kirkus Reviews

  Nonfiction history books have a clear and disciplined structure. Historical fiction is a recognized genre with its own well-established norms. This book calls itself a biographical novel. I suppose it is a historical novel about one person’s life, but I found the book neither fish nor fowl. The narrative sometimes seemed like a history book without endnotes, and at other times like a novel absent the art of storytelling.  The dialogue is unnatural, the pacing is sometimes slow, and the narrative is emotionless. Skimin has the facts right, and the book gives a good perspective on Grant’s life. Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this book.  

Bruce Chadwick's Two American Presidents should have been a perfect reference book for Maelstrom . Maelstrom  chapters alternate between the two presidents to show how each dealt with the same issues, countered the other’s moves, led their respective governments, and used their political powers to sway the outcome. Unfortunately, Chardwick's book was infested with so many errors that I discarded it less than halfway through. Two American Presidents is haphazardly  written  and poorly edited. It is hard to follow the chronology and is occasionally outright wrong in the sequence of events. There are too many good books out there to recommend this one. 

  Jefferson Davis, American William J. Cooper Jr.   Jefferson Davis, American (2000) was published four years after William C. Davis’s Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour (1996). In this reviewer’s opinion, American is a superior biography compared to The Man and His Hour . (More provocatively titled as well.) I judge biographies by if I feel I know the person afterward. After reading The Man and His Hour , I knew what Jefferson did, but after American , I felt I understood this complicated man. Cooper is sympathetic toward Davis and sometimes comes across as an apologist. However, it’s this very sympathy that lifts the book from a dry biography, offering a glimpse of the man in his time. Davis is a difficult subject for a biography. When the Confederacy fled Richmond, most of the records were burned. Consequently, there are far fewer primary sources available to a biographer of a Confederate figure than there are for a Unionist biographer. Thus, Confederate historians re...

  Book 2 in the American Exceptionalism Series Maelstrom, A Civil War Novel , is now available for Kindle preorder. Release Date June 1, 2026 (Hardcover and paperback will also be available on June 1, 2026) “I enjoyed this.”  Harold Holzer, Lincoln Prize winner and Chair of The Lincoln Forum “See Lincoln as you've never seen him before as he navigates the maelstrom of the Civil War.”  Larry Schweikart, NYTimes #1 bestselling author Maelstrom tells the story of the greatest rivalry in American history. Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis led their nations in a must-win fight, and Maelstrom shows how each dealt with the same issues, countered the other’s moves, led their respective governments, and used their political powers to sway the outcome. Read the first chapter free HERE .

  William C. Davis’s Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour is a major contribution to Civil War history. To get the full picture of a major historical event, you need to study both sides of an issue.  Davis helps us by presenting the Confederate view. (Since the author and subject have the same last name, although unrelated, I will use the term “author” for William C. Davis.) This highly researched book presents fascinating details of Davis’s life and actions. The writing is smooth and easy to understand. It gives a reasonable account of Confederate and Davis’s views. Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour is a good way to learn about the conflict from the secessionist perspective. The biography falters in its attempt to rationalize Davis’s personality flaws. The author seeks sympathy for Jefferson Davis, but his arrogance, combativeness, and stubbornness undermine this effort. At times, the author seems almost surprised by Davis’s failings, excusing them as "insecurity." Ul...

  The American Founding documents contend that people have a natural right to form and reform governments. The Declaration of Independence states, "Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."  Under that principle, elections are sacrosanct. Despite a raging Civil War, the United States held elections on November 4, 1863. As Commanding General of the U.S. Army, Ulysses S. Grant had to set the policy for military voting. On September 27, he wrote the following letter (abridged) to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. "The exercise of the right of suffrage by the officers and soldiers of armies is a novel thing. It has, I believe, generally been considered dangerous to constitutional liberty and subversive of military discipline. But our circumstances are novel and exceptional. A very large proportion of legal voters of the United States are now either under arms in the field, or in hospitals, or otherwise engaged in the mi...

During the American Civil War, soldiers were allowed to vote by mail. This was the first instance of mail-in ballots in the nation's history. At the time, of course, only men had the right to vote. In the 1862 mid-year elections, many soldiers were given leave to return home to vote. It was detrimental to the war effort, so in 1864 the Union tried a new concept: mail-in ballots. Lincoln felt this was important to his reelection because a higher proportion of Republicans enlisted.  On September 27, 1864, Ulysses S. Grant wrote to the Secretary of War Edwin Stanton: The exercise of the right of suffrage by the officers and soldiers of armies is a novel thing. A very large proportion of legal voters of the United States are now either under arms in the field, or in hospitals, or otherwise engaged in the military service of the United States … they are American citizens, having still their homes and social and political ties binding them to the States and districts from which they come...

The American Civil War was a technology incubator. Rifled weapons, repeaters, telegraphs, trains, balloons, and more became common in the military. Naval warfare was revolutionized by steam engines, screw propulsion, iron cladding, underwater boats, and torpedoes. When I went to school, one of my favorite history lessons was about the battle between the Monitor and the Merrimack . Nowadays, it's the Monitor versus the  Virginia . The Confederacy captured the Merrimack, modified it internally ,  clad it in iron, and rechristened it the CSS Virginia . The full story of these two ships is full of mystery, drama, and clandestine skullduggery. In its short life span of approximately ten months, six naval officers captained the Monitor. This link takes you to the Google Books page where you can  download a study of these six men. From the introduction: One additional point is worthy of emphasis: these officers were together involved in most of the major actions of the Civil Wa...

  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...

    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...

    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.

  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...