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Summary: Beyond the Battlefield
Review: Battle Cry of Freedom details the multiple complex factors, North and South, that led up to the war. It is very even handed, depicting economic, social, and moral values, as well as the weaknesses, material and ethical of both sides.Battles are covered (some in detail), but the emphasis in this book is the cultural, moral, political, and economic factors that determinded the outcome of the war. It starts with the 1840's, and looks at the Mexican War and the overall mood of the country. For example, the origin of the Republican Party, which opposed the spread of slavery to the new territories and was basically abolitionist in intent, sprang mainly from the defunct Whig Party, considered the rich man's, or business interest's party. I found that particularly fascinating in light of the similarities to the party of today. The book covers the entire Civil War, including civil unrest in the North and the South, Jefferson Davis' and Abraham Lincoln's
quite different ways of governing, the nearly identical Confederate Constitution, the similar way Confederate and Union Congresses reacted to crises, etc. The book is very long, but reads faster than most novels, though it is thoroughly documented with footnotes. Every one of its 800 or so pages is gripping. This is a wonderful book if you want to understand that era - and
America today.
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Summary: The one book
Review: I've read it twice. The bibliography is a good place to start a research project. If you read one book on the Civil War, it should be this one
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Summary: My first book on The war of northern aggression
Review: Ive often wondered who was right in the so called Civil War ,,and after reading this GREAT book and many others.. I have come to believe that the South was the side that should have won the war .
This book is a must read for anyone wanting to know all the details from the northern point of view.
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Summary: Best combination of Military & Political Civil War history
Review: The Civil War era of the Oxford history series is covered magnificently with McPherson's epic account. Nowhere does one get a better explanation of the political environment of the 1850's and 1860's and how it segues into the start of the War. The debate over slavery and State's rights prior to the War is covered in clear and concise detail as is the secession process and abolitionist theories...the reader really gets the context with which the War started. As in other Oxford histories, the War is summarized in adequate detail (although military history buff's will not be impressed with the battle details), but this book's attraction is how the political and social climate interact with the on-going war...we get the conflict as we all know it overlayed with "everyday life" of the 1860's and it gives a unique and pleasing perspective...one that deserves the Pulitzer Prize (won for History in 1988). Some surprisingly new details (to me) are also presented such as: Lincoln's political maneuvering (McPherson shows him to be a masterful politician)...Jefferson Davis's administration and the woeful shape of the Confederate economy (one wonders how they were able to prosecute the War for as long as they did) and a wonderful description of Sherman's march from Atlanta to Savannah and into South Carolina...many details of the country-wide destruction and the annihilation of the southern army's will to wage war were new and enjoyable to me. Finally, U. S. Grant's "Overland Campaign" (the final battle sequences from the Wilderness to Petersburg and Appomattox...my favorite battle sequence) is vividly described and wonderfully placed in context with the end of the war in the Western theatre. To say that this book belongs in the essential Civil War reading library is an understatement...this account should be one of the first read for any enthusiast or general reader and I recommend it highly.
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Summary: Don't miss this one
Review: I have a fairly extensive library on the Civil War, but this one volumn brought me to a better understanding of this period of time than any I have read. Novice readers will come away with a need to study the war further. Serious Civil War students will realize they have been treated to one of the bests narratives ever written.
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Summary: Battle Cry of Freedom
Review: Battle Cry of Freedom remains one of the most important works on the Civil War in print. It is carefully researched and organized into the single volume that any Civil War student should read. The opening chapter, "The United States in 1850" is so captivating that the reader comes away with more information that many books dedicated to this same topic. McPherson is a first rate researcher and scholar who has the ability to reach out across educational boundaries and give anyone who reads this work an understandable, informative view of the Civil War era.
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Summary: A GREAT EXAMPLE OF WHAT CAN BE DONE WITH WORDS
Review: I've just put my battered, first edition [British] copy of the Battle Cry of Freedon down, having read it for about the twelth time in as many years. I have a Masters in History with Distinction from the London School of Economics. I have read thousands of history books on every conceivable subject from Ancient Sumeria to post-cold War Africa, taking in the economics of canals in England and the role of sex in the fall of the British Empire along the way. None of them compare to The Battle Cry of Freedom. It is quite simple the single most impressive book I have ever read. It combines comprehensive knoweldge, Solomonic judgement and an easy narrative style into an extraordinarly effective whole. Just as the Ken Burn's 'Civil War' was a masterpiece of television, rather than a history of one particular conflict, so McPherson shows what can be done with words married to knowledge. Admittedly the subject matter, the American Civil War, is unusally rich with triumph and tragedy, high ideals and low politics, heros and villans. But McPherson brings the very best out of them. It gets a 5 because there is no button for six. Read this book or miss out on an extraordinary experience.
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Summary: Riveting
Review: Although I love history and have an MA in ancient history, I have never been a Civil War buff. I'm one of those people who considers "modern history" to be everything after 1200 BC (No, that's not a mistake, I did say BC!) However I recently took a class on Civil War history---mostly because it was the only history course in the context offered that I hadn't already taken---and Battle Cry of Freedom by James M. McPherson was the primary course text. All I can say is "I'm converted!" The book well deserves the Pulitzer prize it received. It reads like a novel, pulling one from chapter to chapter through all of its 862 pages with a "can hardly put it down" forcefulness. Even though I know the outcome, as who doesn't, the events described create an ambiance of "being there" that leaves the heart thumping.
The author underscores the critical importance of the inability of the US founding fathers to deal head on with the incongruity of slavery in the midst of the world's first democracy. When framing the Constitution in the 18th Century, they chose to skirt the issue of slavery publically, while privately hoping that it would go away by deferring the problem to a later generation. Having undergone a war of revolution with the sacrifices that it entailed, these men were loath to force their new constituency to make further sacrifices. They also left the Constitutional document itself vague enough to produce a variety of interpretations; both the Constitution's greatest strength and its greatest weakness. This flexibility left the issue of the preeminence of states' rights versus federal sovereignly open for debate. And debates there were, to the point of violence in the halls of Congress! The author discuses the early 19th Century social, demographic, and political background of the war, setting the stage for the drama that follows. His narrative describes a vigorous young country expanding in all directions, many times with that characteristic lack of concern over the rights and well being of others of many adolescents. Like a skilled novelist, McPherson introduces the central characters of the Civil War conflict as they arose on the scene during the Mexican-American War. This venue was a good choice. Nearly all of the Civil War generals of significance had also participated in this event. Furthermore the Mexican-American war itself and the territory it gained the young country were key to setting the stage for the lengthy struggle that was to follow. Both the issues of slavery and that of States' Rights were forced into the public eye by the possible addition of new states to the union as slave or free. The outcome of this process had the potential of imbalancing the US legislature in favor of one political entity or the other. Almost every event of political importance in the US, both foreign and domestic, occurring between the years after the Mexican War and before the Civil War arose as a result of this political reality. Although the author devotes a goodly amount of his narrative to the discussion of the chief Civil War personalities, he does not neglect the common soldier. He discusses the character, motivation, and responses of the recruit and quotes from personal letters of the common man as well as from the correspondence of the more noted players in the conflict. Battle sites and the movements of personnel on them are described but not belabored. The development of Lincoln's stand on the slavery issue is also discussed in some detail, not in a block as a topic but within the body of the narrative against the backdrop of events within which it occurred. The bibliography is extensive and written in narrative form, giving titles according to topic with some comments on them by group. As the author states, the subject of the Civil War is a popular one, with some 50,000 books and pamphlets available on the war years, and "more works in English on Abraham Lincoln than on any other persons except Jesus of Nazareth and William Shakespeare (p. 865)." For those, like myself, who have only just developed an interest in the subject, this will be a gold mine of sources for further reading. Although the book is a little lengthy and complex, it might well make a good focus for a senior high class in American and world history. One might look at the development of US world politics and the part that the Civil War played in that development; how these years effected subsequent and more recent relations between the US and various countries, most particularly Cuba and Nicaragua. There were a number of changes in technology that presaged the modern world during this time and one might investigate the way in which these developments brought about our own way of life. One might also discuss whether slavery might have died out in the United States, without the major loss of human life, as it had in other countries, and the subject of racial equality and its path from Emancipation Proclamation to the Civil Rights movements of the 1960s. In all, a suburb book.
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Summary: A very good entry
Review: Knowing nothing regarding the civil war period, I was looking for a book that would give me an overview on that time. I found it in this book and got much more. Not only the single campaigns were described (wich interessted me), but also the causes of the war and the status of the society before and during the war. Important persons are well displayed, not only their actions during war, but their personal backgrounds were unveiled briefly. So, a must for all beginners, and a summary for the professionals.
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Summary: The Civil War but Not a Military History
Review: It has been said elsewhere that this is the best one-volume history of the American Civil War. It is both more and less than that. McPherson has covered the years leading up to the war, more a political and social history, which takes up a significant portion of the book. The political and social aspects of the 1861-1865 period is covered in more detail than the military progress of the war. This gives a well-rounded approach to the subject. This is not a military history. It is a full account of an era in American history. It is well-written, well-documented, and an engaging work. It is a terrific complement to Shelby Foote's three-volume narrative history and to the more recent single-volume military history of the war (The Longest Night by David Eicher -- itself said to be written as a complement to McPherson's book).
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