Sarah Purcell is L.F. Parker Professor of History at Grinnell College. This interview is based on her new book, Spectacle of Grief: Public Funerals and Memory in the Civil War Era (University of North Carolina Press, 2022). JF: What led […]
Civil War
Who was Jim Limber and what was his connection to the Confederate Lost Cause?
Here is Sydney Trent at The Washington Post: The little Black boy in the Civil War-era photograph stands atop a gilded chair, grasping its tall back with his small fist. His clothing is quotidian — striped pants and a matching […]
Episode 94: “Gettysburg, 1963”
Our guest in this episode is Gettysburg College historian Jill Ogline Titus. Her new book, Gettysburg 1963, tells the story of the centennial celebration of the Civil War in the Pennsylvania town of Gettysburg. Through an examination of the experiences of political […]
The Author’s Corner with Jonathan White
Jonathan White is Associate Professor of American Studies and Director of the Pre-Law Program at Christopher Newport University. This interview is based on his new book, A House Built by Slaves: African American Visitors to the Lincoln White House (Rowman […]
The Author’s Corner with John Harris
John Harris is McDonald-Boswell Assistant Professor of History at Erskine College. This interview is based on his new book, The Last Slave Ships: New York and the End of the Middle Passage (Yale University Press, 2020). JF: What led you […]
Allen Guelzo on Noah Feldman on Abraham Lincoln
In November we called your attention to Noah Feldman’s argument about Lincoln and the Constitution in his new book The Broken Constitution: Lincoln, Slavery and the Refounding of America. In that book, the Harvard Law professor argues that Lincoln violated […]
Another time capsule is found in Richmond’s Robert E. Lee monument
They have been looking for this thing since September. Here is ABC News: After a time capsule found last week proved to be a letdown, another one has been found in the pedestal of a now-removed Robert E. Lee state […]
The Author’s Corner with Dillon Carroll
Dillon Carroll is an Instructor at Butte Community College. This interview is based on his new book, Invisible Wounds: Mental Illness and Civil War Soldiers (LSU Press, 2021). JF: What led you to write Invisible Wounds? DC: I’ve always been attracted […]
The Author’s Corner with Jack Noe
Jack Noe is Teaching Associate at the Queen Mary University of London. This interview is based on his new book, Contesting Commemoration: The 1876 Centennial, Independence Day, and the Reconstruction-Era South (LSU Press, 2021). JF: What led you to write Contesting […]
The Author’s Corner with John Sacher
John Sacher is Associate Professor of History at the University of Central Florida. This interview is based on his new book, Confederate Conscriptions and the Struggle for Southern Soldiers (LSU Press, 2021). JF: What led you to ​write Confederate Conscription and […]
The Author’s Corner with Damian Pargas
Damian Pargas is Professor of the History and Culture of North America at Leiden University. This interview is based on his new book, Freedom Seekers: Fugitive Slaves in North America, 1800–1860 (Cambridge University Press, 2021). JF: What led you to […]
800,156 Americans have died of COVID-19
According to NBC News. The number of deaths due to COVID-19 in the two years the virus has been in the United States is now higher than some of the most liberal estimates of the number of deaths in the […]
The Author’s Corner with William Kiser
William Kiser is Associate Professor of History at Texas A&M University. This interview is based on his new book, Illusions of Empire: The Civil War and Reconstruction in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021). JF: What led you […]
Do you think America is divided today? Consider the first Thanksgiving
The first official Thanksgiving in the United States did not take place in 1621. (How could it? There was no United States in 1621). It happened in 1863 when Abraham Lincoln, on October 3, proclaimed that Thursday, November 26 would […]
The bones of Sullivan Ballou
If you have watched the Ken Burns documentary The Civil War you might remember Sullivan Ballou. The Union officer stole the show with the letter he wrote to his wife Sarah a week before he was killed at the First […]
The Author’s Corner with J. Matthew Gallman
J. Matthew Gallman is Professor of History at the University of Florida. This interview is based on his new book, The Cacophony of Politics: Northern Democrats and the American Civil War (University of Virginia Press, 2021). JF: What led you […]
The Author’s Corner with Fay Yarbrough
Fay Yarbrough is Professor of American History at Rice University. This interview is based on her new book, Choctaw Confederates: The American Civil War in Indian Country (University of North Carolina Press, 2021). JF: What led you to write Choctaw Confederates? […]
Did Abraham Lincoln break the Constitution?
Harvard law professor Noah Feldman believes that he did, and it had little to do with his support of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendment. Here is a taste of his recent piece at The New York Times: In April […]
Allen Guelzo on how to tell the story of Robert E. Lee
One of our generation’s best historians of the Civil War is the author of the forthcoming Robert E. Lee: A Life. In a recent piece at The New York Times, Allen Guelzo writes about the challenges of writing a biography […]
The Author’s Corner with Christopher Grasso
Christopher Grasso is Professor of History at the College of William & Mary. This interview is based on his new book, Teacher, Preacher, Soldier, Spy: The Civil Wars of John R. Kelso (Oxford University Press, 2021). JF: What led you […]