Ashe County's Civil War: Community and Society in the Appalachian South

by Martin Crawford

Overview

Distinguished from traditional historical narrative by its balanced portrayal of wartime experiences both at home and on the battlefield and flavored by its vivid portrayal of a divided Appalachian community, Ashe County's Civil War: Community and Society in the Appalachian South breaks new ground in Southern social, political, and economic history.

Martin Crawford contends that the experiences of Ashe County's men and women during the Civil War era were shaped as much by their membership in the wider American society as by uniquely local factors. Through a thoughtful blending of family correspondence, local and state historical documents, and the broader news of the divided country, Crawford re-creates the lives of Ashe County's citizens. Among them are teenager Selina Howell, whose suicide draws the reader into an intimate portrayal of kin and community dynamics, and Tom Crumpler, the young lawyer-politician who made the ultimate sacrifice for a cause he initially opposed.

These people and their stories bring to life the very human side of the Civil War, carrying Crawford's narrative well beyond ordinary social history.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813920344
Publisher:	University of Virginia Press
Publication date:	07/29/2001
Series:	A Nation Divided
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	238
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.25(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Martin Crawford is Reader in U.S. History in the School of American Studies at Keele University, Staffordshire, England, and the author or editor of several publications, including William Howard Russell's Civil War: Private Diary and Letters, 1861-1862, and American Nineteenth Century History.

Editorial Reviews

A thorough and judiciously argued study that adds greatly to our understanding of the Civil War's impact in the southern mountains.

Journal of American History

This is the kind of local, intimate portrait that has a measurable impact on the way we view regional history and thus ground contemporary issues.

Georgia Historical Quarterly

"This is the kind of local, intimate portrait that has a measurable impact on the way we view regional history and thus ground contemporary issues. "—author of Georgia Historical Quarterly

"A thorough and judiciously argued study that adds greatly to our understanding of the Civil War's impact in the southern mountains. "—author of Journal of American History

From the Publisher