Okie: thanks a bunch, and it would indeed be a shame if our enemies prevailed, but it would also be our shame and not of those who fought in the Civil War. Their almost unimaginable bravery and courage places them far above us. Would that we had a thousandth of their stalwart dedication and will.

Yes, Foote’s work is a fine epic, and epic is what it surely is. A true masterpiece. One can almost smell the powder and hear the tumult. I think that only a southern intellectual of his generation could pull this off.

We should never forget how that war shaped us. The Europeans were shaped by ww1, and this haunts and bedevils us to this day. We were not so shaped. It was the Civil War that forged our national consciousness and temperament, and this is true down to this day. This is the source of much confusion between Americans and Europeans, and nowhere is this more clear than in the issues of society, governments, nations and the individual.

If you do not know of it, let me recommend this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Battle-Cry-Freedom-Civil-War/dp/0345359429

It is perhaps the best one volume work on the Civil War and gives a wonderful overview.

It comes more from the sides of political economy and technology than the side of close battle descriptions, orders of battle, etc. It does, of course discuss the great battles, but it has not the rousing flourishes of Foote’s work, nor its focus on the raw battles of the war. Neither It does not delve so richly into the personalities of the soldiers who fought them. Still, it is well written and there is a bit of poetry to the prose. It is a reasonable and complimentary companion to Foote’s work.

Incidentally, My great grandfather fought under Grant and was wounded at Shiloh. He fought through most of the War, and many of the large battles.