True story based on letters written during the American Civil War between a young Confederate soldier and his loving wife. Fifty-five letters in their entirety in this factual archive.
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Civil War History Books & Novels
We regret we do not list genealogy books; there are just too many of them. We also will not knowingly list books that are inflammatory in any way or that espouse one philosophy or religion as the only "correct" one. Let's keep our religious and political preferences to ourselves, like my mother taught me. For details on getting your book on this page, see our requirements below.
Missouri in Flames (I rode with Jesse James)
By: W.R. Benton
Surviving four long and bloody years fighting for the Confederacy during the Civil War, James Light served under partisan leader William Quantrill and the black flag. It was with the raiders he meets Jesse and Frank James, as well as Cole Younger. Little did he realize the impact these hard and honorable men were to have on the rest of his life. A fictionalized account of riding with Quantrill and Jesse James through the bloody war years and after. |
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A Southern Moon Rising
By: Melanie D. Calvert
While Edmond Anderson is working as a spy for President Lincoln, to undercover an assassination attempt, he's threatened with death by the plotters. Requesting safety from the President, he's quickly posted to the army and then to Vicksburg, Mississippi, for protection. Near Vicksburg, as the battle rages ferociously, he suffers a severe wound to his head. As he recovers from his injury, he is ordered to carry dispatches and suffers a bloody wound to his side. Seeking shelter at an isolated cabin, he meets a beautiful Southern Belle, Sara Wainwright, who steals his heart, which already belongs to another. While she detests all things Union, she discovers all Yankee's are not the same and falls in love with Edmond. |
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The Red Cavalier
by Brian K Waite
September, 1863. The Confederacy has just won the Battle of Chickamauga. But in spite of this impressive victory, the treasury of the Confederacy is near empty and its economy is on the verge of collapse. General Braxton Bragg devises a plan to seize two million dollars in Union gold which is a board a train bound for Washington D.C. By employing the combined talents of three of his most skilled generals, Nathan Bedford Forrest, Joseph Wheeler, and British Army & Crimean War veteran Charles Tomlin, Bragg orders these men to destroy General Rosecrans' supply lines, disrupt his communications and capture the gold which is being stored at the rail yard in Murfreesboro, TN |
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Kelley's Island 1862-1865 Civil War, the Island Soldiers, & the Island Queen
by Leslie Korenko
On April 15, 1861 President Lincoln issued a proclamation calling for 75,000 militiamen. A week later the first Kelley's Island men answered that call. The South had succeeded from the Union. Before the war finally ended, 100 men would be sent from the shores of Kelleys Island Ohio to fight for the reunification of the country serving in the 3rd Ohio Cavalry; the 38th, 100th, and 101st Ohio Infantries; 1st Ohio Heavy Artillery; and the 130th Ohio Volunteer Militia. By 1864, 100 of the 600 residents of Kelleys Island had enlisted.
The stories are told through the first-hand accounts by the soldiers themselves. This book contains 420 pages and over 250 photos and illustrations. |
 
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Volunteer for Glory
by Alice Lynn NOW AVAILABLE IN PAPERBACK!
When Rachel's husband, Stuart, joins the volunteer cavalry after Fort Sumter, she knows she'll have to find the grit to bear their coming child and survive on a small Illinois farm. What she doesn't expect is to fall in love with Jared Westbrook, a handsome young neighbor. The daughter of a Boston minister, Rachel tries to deny her feelings and remain faithful to her husband. The men, meanwhile, are molded by their wartime experiences. Sensitive, poetic Jared finds he can be a formidable line officer. Stuart pursues an old dream of glory. United in war, the two men are divided by love for the same woman. Who will Rachel choose? Or will the war itself make the decision for her? |
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A Thirst for War
by Raymond Gustavson
At the start of the American Civil War, Professor John Ulysses Martin of Clarksville, Tennessee, and his students march off to face the harsh reality of battlefield combat. As his students die one by one, John questions his lofty convictions and, after losing a leg at Antietam, realizes he has made a fool of himself. He concludes that war is nothing more than the butchery of innocents. During his convalescence at Armory Square Hospital, John makes notes in a pocket Bible of Yankee troops and artillery heading south for an attack on Richmond. Caught spying, he is taken to the Old Capitol Prison to be hanged, but manages a harrowing escape. When he reaches Richmond and turns in his notes, General Hood realizes John’s value to the war effort and rewards him with a perilous assignment: destroy the railroad bridge over the Cumberland River at Clarksville, Tennessee |
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Free to Stay
by Nan Hayden Agle
The true story of Eliza Benson and the family she stood by for three generations.
"I had to write Eliza's story. If I hadn't it might have been lost, and that would never do. 'No-sir-ree Bob, horsefly in the buggy,' as Eliza would say." "Slaveholder Marse Bradford Harrison, a citizen of St. Michaels, Maryland, gave four-year-old Eliza Ann Benson to his daughter Braddie in 1841. Eliza would be a friend and a slave to her infant owner in Harrison's way of thinking. But a friendship began and a promise was made." "Eliza was all good things rolled into one package...and she was smart, too. She could size up a situation and straighten it out 'before you could say boo to a goose.' She was warm when warmth was needed, strong when strength was needed, and brave when only bravery could lift sorrow above heartbreak." "That Eliza was born a slave is beside the point. Small in body and monumental in character, she was a 'Worthy of Maryland' for three generations."
...Nan Hayden Agle, Author & Granddaughter of Braddie (now 100 years young)
Eliza Benson's portrait is in the permanent exhibit of the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African-American History and Culture, Inner Harbour, Baltimore. |
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Broken Promises
by Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman
Winner of the San Diego Book Award for Best Historical Fiction
Director’s Mention, Langum Prize for American Historical Fiction
1861: The war that’s been brewing for a decade has exploded, pitting North against South. Fearing that England will support the Confederate cause, President Lincoln sends Charles Francis Adams, son of John Quincy Adams, to London. But when Charles arrives, accompanied by his son Henry, he discovers that the English are already building warships for the South. As Charles embarks on a high-stakes game of espionage and diplomacy, Henry reconnects with his college friend Baxter Sams, a Southerner who has fallen in love with Englishwoman Julia Birch. Julia’s family reviles Americans, leaving Baxter torn between his love for Julia, his friendship with Henry, and his obligations to his own family, who entreat him to run medical supplies across the blockade to help the Confederacy. As tensions mount, irrevocable choices are made—igniting a moment when history could have changed forever. |
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Corn Silk Days
by Linda Pendleton
The dramatic story of two families, four generations, during a time when the United States is seriously divided by war, North against South, neighbor against neighbor, brother against brother, son against father; slave against slave-owner—a distressful time of upheaval, tragedy, heartbreak, and death.
In the summer of 1862, Iowa farmer, Silas Storm, volunteers for the Union Army and his wife, Elizabeth Jane, pregnant with their second child, must maintain their farm and meet the many challenges the absence of her husband creates.
Four generations of Silas's family and extended family discover their lives changing drastically while facing adversity and challenges: family secrets, denials, fears, forbidden love, death, and grief. Like Silas Storm on the battlefield finding courage to dodge the next Rebel bullet, they, too, must deal with their fears and transform those fears into courage.
Will they be able to survive? Or will it be their defeat?
Available in print and Kindle editions. Get a Kindle Wireless Reading Device, Wi-Fi, 6 for just $139 |
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The Spur & The Sash
by Robert Grede,
Oct 1, 2010 Three Towers Press
This novel is about a real person. Sergeant George B. Van Norman, a Yankee, was wounded in one of the last battles of the Civil War, at Nashville. Left behind to convalesce as the armies moved on, he was assigned to guard a local plantation from January to July, 1865, where fell in love with the owners daughter. That much is fact.
The fiction begins with his wounding at the battle, and follows him to the plantation where he meets the woman, her family, and the people living there, former slaves who have been emancipated yet have no place to go. He befriends a former Confederate soldier and, together, they overcome displaced mobs of wandering blacks, deserters from both sides, carpetbaggers, and bushwhackers marauding throughout Middle Tennessee, including precursors of the Ku Klux Klan. All meticulously researched for accuracy using letters, diaries, and Official Records.
George left behind a spur and a sash, given to him by the woman he loved, passed down to the authors father who knew George, who learned his story as a small boy. This is that story. |
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The Uncivil War: Battle in the Classroom
by Nick K. Adams
The Uncivil War demonstrates how history can become magically alive and meaningful when students become personally involved.
Morgan Huddleston and Jeremy Wiggins have shared a classroom for three years, disliking each other the whole time and in constant competition. Then a fourth grade social studies assignment reveals they are directly connected by tragic events that occurred 150 years earlier. Morgan and Jeremy contact their relatives and learn they both had a great-great-great-grandfather present at the Civil War Battle of Chickamauga – but on opposite sides. Morgan’s distant grandfather fought for the Confederacy while Jeremy’s distant grandfather was a Union soldier who was killed in the battle. So the big “What if…?” question is raised in the classroom. How the two students arrive at a resolution that ends their own uncivil war is the heartening conclusion to the story. The Uncivil War melds its contemporary setting with flashbacks that draw on historical characters, preserved family letters, and actual battlefield events, bringing history to life. |
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Undaunted Heart:
The True Story of a Southern Belle & a Yankee General
by Suzy Barile
When a brigade of General Sherman’s victorious army marched into Chapel Hill in 1865, the Civil War had just ended. One of Sherman’s generals called on David Swain, University of North Carolina president, to inform him the town was under Union occupation.
Against this unlikely backdrop began a passionate and controversial love story still vivid in town lore. Swain’s daughter Ella met the Union general, and life for these young people, who had spent the war on opposite sides, was forever altered. When General Atkins met Ella, the two “‘changed eyes’ at first sight and a wooing followed.”
Author Suzy Barile, a descendant of Ella Swain and Smith Atkins, tells their story, separating facts from the embellishments the famous courtship and marriage have taken on over the generations. Excerpts from Ella’s unpublished letters are interwoven throughout Undaunted Heart, revealing a loving marriage that transcended differences and scandal. |
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Crossroads of the Conflict: The Defining Hours for the Blue and Gray
by Donald W. McLaughlin, a Gettysburg Battlefield Guide for 16 years.
The book
offers the reader important information about the Battlefield that is a chronological study of the monuments in the order in which the events took place as the battle progressed. This book provides the factual recordings of the inscriptions on the monuments of the Battlefield at Gettysburg.
The book can be used to provide the reader with a hands-on reference while touring the Battlefield by bus, car or on foot. It also serves to offer the reader an historical account of the significance of each monument, brigade marker and flank marker (left and right) on the battle grounds. In addition, the author has included numerous hand-drawn maps throughout the book to assist the reader in understanding how, the Battle itself, unfolded. These are the monuments that stand as a symbol to Americans struggle to survive as a nation. Through this book the Battlefield and the words upon the monuments come to life as a lasting memorial to those who died during this conflict. |
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Tales of Travis Hawkins McLeod, A Texan in the War Between the States
by Dale Roberts
A fast-moving, vivid and intriguing tale of a young man caught up in a mind-rupturing, soul-searing swirl of bizarre events that thrusts him into a world he has never imagined. Totally unprepared, he must cope with this strange new world of yesteryear.
About the author:
Dale Roberts has long been fascinated by the history of the War Between the States era. He has been involved in reenactment and living history events for some years as well as entertaining at public and private schools as a living history actor depicting life of a soldier in various wars. With a wonderfully active imagination, he enjoys writing fiction as well as serious articles. He currently resides in Crockett, Texas. |
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A Beckoning Hellfire
by J D R Hawkins
During the bloody American Civil War, the stark reality of death leads one young man on a course of revenge that takes him from his quiet farm in northern Alabama to the horrific battlefields of Virginia and Pennsylvania.
On Christmas Eve 1862, David Summers hears the dreaded news: his father has perished at the Battle of Fredericksburg. Reeling with grief and thoughts of vengeance, David enlists and sets off for Richmond to join the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.
But once in the cavalry, David’s life changes drastically, and his dream of glamorous chivalry becomes nothing but a cold, cruel existence of pain and suffering. He is hurled into one battle after another, and his desire for revenge wanes when he experiences first-hand the catastrophes of war. A haunting look at the human side of one of America’s most tragic conflicts, A Beckoning Hellfire speaks to the delusion of war’s idealism. |
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In their Honor - Soldiers of the Confederacy - The Elmira Prison Camp
by Diane Janowski with photographs by Allen C. Smith
In Their Honor respectfully remembers these men and boys, and tells their stories. Research by the author has brought awareness of the soldiers’ relationships - brothers, fathers and sons, cousins and friends. Descendants of the soldiers have contributed harrowing stories of survival or despair. They were captured together. Some made it home.
In their Honor includes narratives from prisoners’ families, and a complete revised list of the Confederate dead at Woodlawn National Cemetery. |
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