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Union soldiers left home in 1861 with expectations that the conflict would be short, the purpose of the war was clear, and public support back home was universal. As the war continued, however, Union soldiers began to perceive a great difference between what they expected and what was actually occurring. Their family relationships were evolving, the purpose of the war was changing, and civilians were questioning the leadership of the government and Army to the point of debating whether the war should continue at all. Separated from Northern civilians by a series of literal and figurative divides, Union soldiers viewed the growing disparities between their own expectations and those of their families at home with growing concern and alarm. Instead of support for the war, an extensive and oft-violent anti-war movement emerged. Often at odds with those at home and with limited means of communication to their homes at their disposal, soldiers used letters, newspaper editorials, and political statements to influence the actions and beliefs of their home communities. When communication failed, soldiers sometimes took extremist positions on the war, its conduct, and how civilian attitudes about the conflict should be shaped. This book reveals the wide array of factors that prevented the Union Army and the civilians on whose behalf they were fighting from becoming a united front during the Civil War. It illustrates how the divided spheres of Civil War experience created social and political conflict far removed from the better-known battlefields of the war.

The Civil War is a much plumbed area of scholarship, so much so that at times it seems there is no further work to be done in the field. However, the experience of children and youth during that tumultuous time remains a relatively unexplored facet of the conflict. This book seeks a deeper investigation into the historical record by and giving voice and context to their struggles and victories during this critical period in American history. The chapters explore issues important to both the Civil War era and to the history of children and youth, including the experience of orphans, drummer boys, and young soldiers on the front lines, and even the impact of the war on the games children played. Each chapter places the history of children and youth in the context of the sectional conflict, while in turn shedding new light on the sectional conflict by viewing it through the lens of children and youth. The book touches on some of the most important historiographical issues with which historians of children and youth and of the Civil War home front have grappled over the last few years.

At its core, the Civil War was a conflict over the meaning of citizenship. Most famously, it became a struggle over whether or not to grant rights to a group that stood outside the pale of civil-society: African Americans. But other groups—namely Jews, Germans, the Irish, and Native Americans—also became part of this struggle to exercise rights stripped from them by legislation, court rulings, and the prejudices that defined the age. Grounded in extensive research by experts in their respective fields, this is the first book to collectively analyze the wartime experiences of those who lived outside the dominant white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant citizenry of nineteenth-century America. The chapters examine the momentous decisions made by these communities in the face of war, their desire for full citizenship, the complex loyalties that shaped their actions, and the inspiring and heartbreaking results of their choices—choices that still echo through the United States today.

At least 8,000 Jewish soldiers fought for the Union and Confederacy during the Civil War. A few served together in Jewish companies while most fought alongside Christian comrades. Yet even as they stood “shoulder-to-shoulder” on the front lines, they encountered unique challenges. This book assembles scholarship on Jews and the Civil War, little known even to specialists in the field. The chapters are grouped into seven thematic sections—Jews and Slavery, Jews and Abolition, Rabbis and the March to War, Jewish Soldiers during the Civil War, The Home Front, Jews as a Class, and Aftermath—each with an introduction. Together they reappraise the impact of the war on Jews in the North and the South, offering a rich and fascinating portrait of the experience of Jewish soldiers and civilians from the home front to the battle front.