The Experiences of Small “Communities” in the Civil War

This festschrift – anthology -- in honor Prof. Daniel E. Sutherland was inspired by his essay “Getting the ‘Real War’ into the Book,” which in turn was inspired by a phrase from Walt Whitman that “the real war would never get in the books,” referring not to the battles and commanders, but to the war as it affected ordinary people and their communities.

After a Foreword and an Introduction, the twelve papers and the “Afterword” in this volume examine the war as experienced by various “communities,” broadly defined, as some examples will demonstrate.

• ·   The men of 125^th New York, who despite an outstanding battlefield record always felt, both during and well after the war, the dishonor of having surrendered at Harper’s Ferry
• ·  The war and Fauquier County, Virginia, in 1862.
• ·  The “Reluctant Yankees” of the Lower Green River region of Kentucky, Confederate sympathizers who found themselves under Union control in 1861.
• ·  A Black refugee community at Helena, Arkansas, in 1862-1863.
• ·  A community of Confederate veterans settled in Central America.

All of the essays are well written, deeply researched, and throw considerable light on hitherto obscure corners of the war. One, “Capitals and Communities in War and Revolution,” examines the wartime experience of Vienna during the Revolution of 1848 and that of Richmond in 1861-1865, a good bit of comparative history.

Though Hundreds of Little Wars is perhaps primarily for the Civil War specialist, armchair historians may find individual essays of interest.

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Note: Hundreds of Little Wars is also available in e-editions.

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