English Civil War

The Civil War represented a momentous change in the character of war. It combined the projection of military might across a continent on a scale never before seen with an unprecedented mass mobilization of peoples. Yet despite the revolutionizing aspects of the Civil War, its leaders faced the same uncertainties that have vexed combatants since the days of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War.

Political violence rips apart several towns in southwest Texas. A far-right militia plots to kidnap the governor of Michigan and try her for treason. An armed mob of Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists storms the U.S. Capitol. Are these isolated incidents? Or is this the start of something bigger? Barbara F. Walter has spent her career studying civil conflict in places like Iraq, Ukraine, and Sri Lanka, but now she has become increasingly worried about her own country.

With hindsight, the victory of Parliamentarian forces over the Royalists in the English Civil War may seem inevitable, but this outcome was not a foregone conclusion. Timothy Venning explores many of the turning points and discusses how they might so easily have played out differently.

Two-time Christy Award winner Lynn Austin is hailed for her inspiring historical novels. As in Candle in the Darkness Austin transports us back to the turbulence of the Civil War.

The Civil War: 1860 - 1865 examines the people and events involved in the bloody war that pitted the Northern states against those that seceded to form the Confederacy.

For the past half century, John Keegan, the greatest military historian of our time, has been returning to the scenes of America’s most bloody and wrenching war to ponder its lingering conundrums: the continuation of fighting for four years between such vastly mismatched sides; the dogged persistence of ill-trained, ill-equipped, and often malnourished combatants; the effective absence of decisive battles among some two to three hundred known to us by name.

Winner of the 2001 Christy Award, Lynn Austin captures the turmoil of the Civil War in this stirring novel. From vast plantations to the cramped closets of the Underground Railroad, it follows one young woman's inspiring journey of risk and sacrifice.

General Sherman's 1864 burning of Atlanta solidified his legacy as a ruthless leader. Yet Sherman proved far more complex than his legendary military tactics reveal. James Lee McDonough offers fresh insight into a man tormented by the fear that history would pass him by, who was plagued by personal debts, and who lived much of his life separated from his family.

Reminiscences of the Civil War is John Brown Gordon’s firsthand account of the war as seen through the eyes of the prominent officer. Gordon was trusted and admired by many, including Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis. The work begins with him being elected as the commander of the “Raccoon Roughs” and his recollection of the Battle of Manassas. He also describes the South’s surrender at Appomattox, in which he participated. He recounts his role in individual battles such as Antietam, Chancellorsville, Spotsylvania, and Gettysburg.

New York Times bestselling author Alan Furst is widely recognized as master of the historical spy novel. Furst’s works are vivid evocations of long-forgotten heroes and feature plots that unfold to the inexorable cadence of history. Night Soldiers is a simultaneously thrilling and illuminating tale of espionage set in 1934.

Faced with an overwhelming infestation of living dead on the US mainland, the US Pacific Fleet manages a strategic withdrawal of civilians and supplies. Aboard the USS Ronald Reagan, Dr. Henry Damico advises the remnants of the civilian government and military leadership on how to survive in a world overrun with zombies.

In this brilliantly written epic novel, Jeff Shaara traces the lives, passions, and careers of the great military leaders from the first gathering clouds of the Civil War.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Battle Cry of Freedom and many other award-winning books, James M. McPherson is America's preeminent Civil War historian. Now, in this collection of provocative and illuminating essays, McPherson offers fresh insight into many of the most enduring questions about one of the defining moments in our nation's history.

Amid the many catastrophes of the 20th century, the Spanish Civil War continues to exert a particular fascination among history buffs and the layperson alike. This Very Short Introduction integrates the political, social, and cultural history of the Spanish Civil War. It sets out the domestic and international context of the war for a general audience. In addition to tracing the course of war, the book locates the war's origins in the cumulative social and cultural anxieties provoked by a process of rapid, uneven, and accelerating modernism taking place all over Europe.

First published in 1875, General William T. Sherman's memoir was one of the first from the Civil War and was offered to the public because, as Sherman wrote in his dedication, "no satisfactory history" of the war was yet available. Although Memoirs has been revised and corrected many times over the years, Sherman famously never changed the original text of his recollections.

Storm clouds are approaching Culpeper County, Virginia, in early January 1861. The troublesome Fogarty brothers have been raising havoc across the countryside, and when the local lawman, Will Brannon, returns from another futile attempt to track them down, he finds the townspeople abuzz. South Carolina has seceded from the Union, and rumor has it more states will follow, perhaps even Virginia.

In volume 2, Burlingame examines Lincoln's presidency and the trials of the Civil War. He supplies fascinating details on the crisis over Fort Sumter and the relentless office seekers who plagued Lincoln. He introduces listeners to the president's battles with hostile newspaper editors and his quarrels with incompetent field commanders. Burlingame also interprets Lincoln's private life, discussing his marriage to Mary Todd, the untimely death of his son, Willie, to disease in 1862, and his recurrent anguish over the enormous human costs of the war.

Oliver Otis Howard thought he was a man of destiny. Chosen to lead the Freedmen's Bureau after the Civil War, the Union Army general was entrusted with the era's most crucial task: helping millions of former slaves claim the rights of citizens. He was energized by the belief that abolition and Reconstruction, the country's great struggles for liberty and equality, were God's plan for himself and the nation.

Chancellorsville is the fourth book in a series of historical novels spanning the Civil War and describing its effects on one southern family.

January 1864: General Robert E. Lee faces defeat. The Army of Northern Virginia is ragged and ill-equipped. Gettysburg has broken the back of the Confederacy and decimated its manpower. Then, Andries Rhoodie, a strange man with an unplaceable accent, approaches Lee with an extraordinary offer. Rhoodie demonstrates an amazing rifle: its rate of fire is incredible, its lethal efficiency breathtaking - and Rhoodie guarantees unlimited quantities to the Confederates. The name of the weapon is the AK-47.