from lamour

If you wish to know how the soldiers viewed the war, the issues, their life in the conflict and how those views changed as their situation changed, this is a wonderful source. McPherson presents the letters from both sides of the conflict discussing the same issue so you can see how the soldiers'...

from antiquary

This slim book is a distillation of 25,000 soldiers; letters and 20 diaries, and analyzes the variety of reasons Civil War soldiers fought --emphasize fought --McPherson focused chiefly on soldiers who did front line fighting (and in any cases died in battle); he did his best to mirror the percen...

from missmath144

McPherson wrote a shorter version of this called WHAT THEY FOUGHT FOR. I liked that so much that I read this later, longer version. It is an excellent explanation of why men fought in the Civil War. He covers northern and southern motivations and differentiates between reasons to enlist and motiv...

from ckoller

Really great insight into the reason why soldiers fought in the Civil War. Great read!

from sgerbic

Reviewed Dec. 2006 My first Civil War book of the season it surly won't be the last. McPherson uses over 1000 letters and diaries of Union and Southern soldiers to answer the questions: Why did you enlist..."duty, patriotism, honor and ideology." How did they sustain motivation to fight..."impuls...