Witness to War

From the first shots at Fort Sumter to the mourning of Lincoln’s death—experience the Civil War as it happened, through the voices of those who were there.

History comes to life in the words of those who lived through the American Civil War.

The Civil War was one of the great events of United States history, and the widespread literacy of the mid-nineteenth century made it possible for an unprecedented number of Americans to record their thoughts, observations, descriptions, and opinions of the war. This book prints more than 500 letters—all of them in print for the first time—to reveal life during the Civil War.

Presented chronologically from Abraham Lincoln’s election in 1860 through his assassination in 1865, the letters follow the entire arc of the Civil War as it unfolds in real time through the words of everyday people—military and civilian, Union and Confederate, white and black, men, women, and even a few children. In their own words, they offer deeply held opinions about Lincoln, slavery, abolition, and the war; sometimes humorous observations on the course of the conflict and its leaders; poignant expressions of grief for the fallen and longing for the absent; and unforgettable descriptions of combat from First Manassas to Antietam, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, and more.

Highlights from the letters include:

• “People about here talk of nothing now but pork and politics. Pork, however, will soon be all sold, and then we’ll hear of nothing but secession. South Carolina needs a good mauling.”
• “Them damn abolitionists are a blowing their horn, ‘Why don’t the army move?’ I would like to have some of them down here with a knapsack on that weighs about 200 lbs. I would run them on the double quick all day long.”
• “I don’t care how soon you desert and come home and your folks don’t care either. How I wish you would have taken my advice and stayed at home with me. Oh Joe, desert and come home.”
• “I was under the enemy’s fire for 7 days. You said something about the woods burning. They was burning some as the cannon fired them. We fought through the fires and whipped them back.”
• “The nation has met with a sore bereavement by the sudden death of our President. I hope they will find the vile assassin that perpetrated the hellish deed and make him stretch hemp on the first tree that they come to after they catch him.”

Witness to War lets the participants speak for themselves, offering a fresh, human perspective on a war that still holds and haunts us more than 150 years later.