North Carolinians in the Era of the Civil War and Reconstruction

“Contributors provide a number of interesting windows on North Carolinians' experiences during the Civil War. . . . The quality of the research and writing make this collection a welcome addition to the literature.” — Journal of Southern History

“Exceptional among the countless edited collections of Civil War scholarship because it achieves what every collection editor strives for: consistently strong essays that illuminate developments on the local level while contributing to broader historiographical debates in meaningful ways.” — Civil War History

“This collection of essays is a valuable addition to the study of North Carolina during a period of revolutionary change. Paul Escott has enlisted an impressive group of mature and new scholars who explore a variety of pathbreaking and classic topics that tell us more than we ever knew about the years between 1860 and 1900. I learned something new and intriguing from every contribution — including some articles that covered topics that I had researched myself. It is a pleasure to recommend this well-written volume to specialists and interested lay readers alike.” — Gordon McKinney, author of Zeb Vance: North Carolina’s Civil War Governor and Gilded Age Political Leader

“This volume very effectively shows how North Carolinians fought amongst themselves — over land, labor, family, and control of the state government — as well as against the Yankees during the Civil War. Contributors also demonstrate in fascinating detail how, after the war ended, those conflicts continued to play out in local courts and voting booths until powerful whites developed a new Confederate culture that subsumed and eventually buried all opposition to the rule of white Democrats. In doing so, they destroyed for generations any hopes poor whites and freedpeople in North Carolina had entertained for political equality and economic equity. I can see J.G. de Roulhac Hamilton spinning in his grave now.” — Wayne K. Durrill, University of Cincinnati