The Wars of Reconstruction: The Brief, Violent History of America's Most Progressive Era
- ISBN-10
- 1608195740
- ISBN-13
- 9781608195749
- Category
- History
- Pages
- 352
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2014-01-21
- Publisher
- Bloomsbury Publishing USA
- Author
- Douglas R. Egerton
Description
A groundbreaking new history, telling the stories of hundreds of African-American activists and officeholders who risked their lives for equality-in the face of murderous violence-in the years after the Civil War. By 1870, just five years after Confederate surrender and thirteen years after the Dred Scott decision ruled blacks ineligible for citizenship, Congressional action had ended slavery and given the vote to black men. That same year, Hiram Revels and Joseph Hayne Rainey became the first African-American U.S. senator and congressman respectively. In South Carolina, only twenty years after the death of arch-secessionist John C. Calhoun, a black man, Jasper J. Wright, took a seat on the state's Supreme Court. Not even the most optimistic abolitionists thought such milestones would occur in their lifetimes. The brief years of Reconstruction marked the United States' most progressive moment prior to the civil rights movement. Previous histories of Reconstruction have focused on Washington politics. But in this sweeping, prodigiously researched narrative, Douglas Egerton brings a much bigger, even more dramatic story into view, exploring state and local politics and tracing the struggles of some fifteen hundred African-American officeholders, in both the North and South, who fought entrenched white resistance. Tragically, their movement was met by ruthless violence-not just riotous mobs, but also targeted assassination. With stark evidence, Egerton shows that Reconstruction, often cast as a “failure” or a doomed experiment, was rolled back by murderous force. The Wars of Reconstruction is a major and provocative contribution to American history.
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 2014-01-21
- 438 pages
- Paperback
- Bloomsbury Publishing USA
-
- 2015-10-13
- - pages
- Paperback
- Bloomsbury Press
Similar books
-
Ordeal by Fire: The Civil War and Reconstruction
By James M. McPhersonThe Civil War is the central event in the American historical consciousness. While the Revolution of 1776-1783 created the United States, the Civil War of 1861-1865 preserved this creation from...
-
The Jackson County War: Reconstruction and Resistance in Post-Civil War Florida
By Daniel R. WeinfeldExplains why citizens of Jackson County, Florida, slaughtered close to one hundred of their neighbors during the Reconstruction period following the end of the Civil War; focusing on the Freedman's Bureau, the development of African ...
-
Historical Dictionary of the Civil War and Reconstruction
By William L. RichterWilliam L. Richter. Small, Sandra E. “The Yankee Schoolmarm in Freedmen's Schools: An Analysis of Attitudes.” Journal ofSouthern History 45 (1979): 381—402. Smallwood, James. Time of Hope, Time of Despair: Black Texans during ...
-
The A to Z of the Civil War and Reconstruction
By William L. RichterWellman, Manley Wade. Giant In Gray: A Biography of Wade Hampton of ... POWELL CLAYTON (1833–1914) Boatner, Mark M., III. ... HARRISON REED (1813–1899) Brown, Canter, Jr. Ossian Bingley Hart: Florida's Loyalist Reconstruction Governor.
-
Let Us Have Peace: Ulysses S. Grant and the Politics of War and Reconstruction, 1861-1868
By Brooks D. SimpsonHistorians have traditionally drawn distinctions between Ulysses S. Grant's military and political careers. In Let Us Have Peace, Brooks Simpson questions such distinctions and offers a new understanding of this often enigmatic leader.
-
The Great Task Remaining Before Us: Reconstruction as America's Continuing Civil War
By Paul A. Cimbala, Randall M. MillerThrough informative case studies, this illuminating book remaps considerations of the Civil War and Reconstruction era by charting the ways in which the needs, interests, and experiences of going to war, fighting it, and making sense of it ...
-
The Civil War and Reconstruction in Indian Territory
By Bradley R. ClampittThese carefully crafted essays by leading scholars such as Amanda Cobb-Greetham, Clarissa Confer, Richard B. McCaslin, Linda W. Reese, and F. Todd Smith will help teachers and students better understand the Civil War, Native American ...
-
The Civil War and Reconstruction [Second Edition]
By Prof. J. G. Randall, Prof. David Donald{752} T. Harry Williams, Lincoln and His Generals, 301. {753} K. P. Williams, Lincoln Finds a General, V, 277. {754} Lincoln, Collected Works, VII, 239. {755} Williams, Lincoln and His Generals, 302-303. {756} E. Channing, Hist, ...
-
The War after the War: A New History of Reconstruction
By John Patrick DalyUnCivil Wars Weirding the War : Stories from the Civil War's Ragged Edges EDITED BY STEPHEN BERRY Ruin Nation ... Buying and Selling Civil War Memory in Gilded Age America EDITED BY JAMES MARTEN AND CAROLINE E. JANNEY The War after the ...
-
The Long Reconstruction: The Post-Civil War South in History, Film, and Memory
By Frank J. Wetta, Martin A. NovelliThis engaging book is essential reading for anyone interested in the history of Reconstruction, historical memory, and popular culture.