Early United States History

In a transaction that doubled the size of the United States, this book investigates not only the physical boundaries but the financial agreements between the United States and Napoleon Bonaparte, and the importance of New Orleans, Florida and the Missouri River in the western expansion of the United States. The author delves into the rapidly changing financial aspects and how they affected the expansion, from the fur trade inherited from the French, the discovery of gold and other minerals in the 1800's, the “invention” of the Pony Express, to the completion of the transcontinental railroad.

No American city's history better illustrates both the possibilities for alternative racial models and the role of the law in shaping racial identity than New Orleans, Louisiana, which prior to the Civil War was home to America's most privileged community of people of African descent. In the eyes of the law, New Orleans's free people of color did not belong to the same race as enslaved Africans and African-Americans. While slaves were “negroes,” free people of color were, creoles of color, or simply creoles. New Orleans's creoles of color remained legally and culturally distinct from “negroes” throughout most of the nineteenth century until state mandated segregation lumped together descendants of slaves with descendants of free people of color. As its title suggests, Making Race in the Courtroom argues that race is best understood not as a category, but as a process. It seeks to demonstrate the role of free people of African-descent, interacting within the courts, in this process.

In this long overdue collection, Sanford Levinson and Bartholomew Sparrow bring together noted scholars in American history, constitutional law, and political science to examine the role that the Louisiana Purchase played in shaping both the expansionist policies of the nineteenth century and critical interpretations of the Constitution. As the nation continued to expand westward and into the Pacific and Caribbean, critical social, political, and constitutional questions would arise that would greatly test American resolve and the principles on which it was based.

In the early 1830s, after decades of relative peace, northern Mexicans and the Indians whom they called "the barbarians” descended into a terrifying cycle of violence. For the next fifteen years, owing in part to changes unleashed by American expansion, Indian warriors launched devastating attacks across ten Mexican states. Raids and counter-raids claimed thousands of lives, ruined much of northern Mexico's economy, depopulated its countryside, and left man-made "deserts” in place of thriving settlements. Just as important, this vast interethnic war informed and emboldened U.S. arguments in favor of seizing Mexican territory while leaving northern Mexicans too divided, exhausted, and distracted to resist the American invasion and subsequent occupation.

Tells the story of women on both sides of the Mexican-American War (1846-48) as they were propelled by the bloody conflict to adopt new roles and expand traditional ones. American women 'back home' functioned as anti-war activists, pro-war supporters, and pioneering female journalists. Others moved west and established their own reputations for courage and determination in dusty border towns or bordellos. Women formed a critical component of the popular culture of the period, as trendy theatrical and musical performances drew audiences eager to witness tales of derring-do, while contemporary novels, in tales resplendent with heroism and the promise of love fulfilled, painted a romanticized picture of encounters between Yankee soldiers and fair Mexican senoritas.

Looks at the efforts of America's Democratic Party and Catholic leadership to use the service of immigrant volunteers in the U.S.–Mexican War as a weapon against nativism and anti-Catholicism. Each chapter focuses on one of the five major events or issues that arose during the war, finishing with how the Catholic and immigrant community remembered the war during the nativist resurgence of the 1850s and in the outbreak of the Civil War. Johnson's book uncovers a new social aspect to military history by connecting the war to the larger social, political, and religious threads of antebellum history.

This critical assessment of the Mexican-American war and its divisive role in U.S. politics also evaluates its impact on the careers of James Polk, Henry Clay, and Abraham Lincoln and how it set the stage for the American Civil War.

The United States-Mexican War encompasses the decade of the 1840s, focusing on the war years of 1846-1848. More than a dozen maps were drawn for this book, some of which depict major regions and localities over which armies of both nations moved great distances to position for battle, and others that depict major battlefields from the first engagement to the last. The dictionary itself contains hundreds of thoroughly researched entries describing the war's personalities, battles and campaign trails, armaments, support systems, political factions involved in the conflict in both nations, and an array of other topics related to the war.

The Perilous West tells this riveting story in depth for the first time, focusing on each of the seven explorers in turn – Ramsay Crooks, Robert McClellan, John Hoback, Jacob Reznor, Edward Robinson, Pierre and Marie Dorion. More importantly, they forged the Oregon Trail–a path destined to link the Atlantic coast with the Pacific, spurring national expansion as it carried trappers, soldiers, pioneers, missionaries, and gold-seekers westward. The Perilous West begins in 1806, when Crooks and McClellan meet Lewis and Clark, and the vast expanse from the Dakotas to the Pacific coast appears a commercial paradise. The story ends in 1814, when a band of French Canadian trappers rescue Marie Dorion, and even John Jacob Astor's well-financed enterprise has ended in violence and chaos.

In 1845, an estimated 2,500 emigrants left Independence and St. Joseph, Missouri, for the Willamette Valley in what was soon to become the Oregon Territory. It was general knowledge that the route of the Oregon Trail through the Blue Mountains and down the Columbia River to The Dalles was grueling and dangerous. About 1,200 men, women, and children in over two hundred wagons accepted fur trapper and guide Stephen Meek's offer to lead them on a shortcut across the trackless high desert of eastern Oregon. Those who followed Meek experienced a terrible ordeal when his memory of the terrain apparently failed. Lost for weeks with little or no water and a shortage of food, the Overlanders encountered deep dust, alkali lakes, and steep, rocky terrain. The Meek Cutoff moves readers back and forth in time, using surviving journals from members of the 1845 party, detailed day-to-day maps, aerial photographs, and descriptions of the modern-day exploration to document an extraordinary story of the Oregon Trail.

Available as a print book

Heavenly Merchandize offers a critical reexamination of religion's role in the creation of a market economy in early America. Focusing on the economic culture of New England, it views commerce through the eyes of four generations of Boston merchants, drawing upon their personal letters, diaries, business records, and sermon notes to reveal how merchants built a modern form of exchange out of profound transitions in the puritan understanding of discipline, providence, and the meaning of New England.

Available as ebook and print
Americans have been schooled to believe that their forefathers, the Pilgrims, were somber, dark-clad, pure-of-heart figures who conceived their country on the foundation of piety, hard work, and the desire to live simply and honestly. But the truth is far from the portrait painted by decades of historians. They wore brightly colored clothing, often drank heavily, believed in witches, had premarital sex and adulterous affairs, and committed petty and serious crimes against their neighbors in surprisingly high numbers. Beginning by debunking the numerous myths that surround the landing of the Mayflower and the first Thanksgiving, James Deetz and Patricia Scott Deetz lead us through court transcripts, wills, probate listings, and rare firsthand accounts, as well as archaeological finds, to reveal the true story of life in colonial America.

Henry B. Carrington reviews the military career of General George Washington, tracing his life and military ascendancy from the militias of Virginia to the victory over Cornwallis at Yorktown.

Rhodehamel examines George Washington as a public figure, arguing that the man—who first achieved fame in his early twenties—is inextricably bound to his mythic status. Solidly grounded in Washington's papers and exemplary in its brevity, this approachable biography is a superb introduction to the leader whose name has become synonymous with America.

Here, he takes us back to the very founding of the republic to apply the same yardsticks to the first seven presidents from Washington to Andrew Jackson, giving his no-nonsense assessment of the qualities that did and did not serve them well in office. For each president, Greenstein provides a concise history of his life and presidency, and evaluates him in the areas of public communication, organizational capacity, political skill, policy vision, cognitive style, and emotional intelligence.

Although they came together to fight a war, the colonies were far from a unified nation. In George Washington: Uniting a Nation, Don Higginbotham argues that Washington's greatest contribution to American life was creating a sense of American unity. In clear and concise prose, Higginbotham shows that as Revolutionary War commander, proponent of the Constitution, and president, George Washington focused on building national identity and erecting institutions to cement the fledgling nation.

Standard narratives of Native American history view the nineteenth century in terms of steadily declining Indigenous sovereignty, from removal of southeastern tribes to the 1887 General Allotment Act. Focusing on political moments when viable alternatives to federal assimilation policies arose. In these moments, Native American reformers and their white allies challenged coercive practices and offered visions for policies that might have allowed Indigenous nations to adapt at their own pace and on their own terms. Examining the contests over Indian policy from Reconstruction through the Gilded Age.

The Cherokee are one of the largest Native American tribes in the United States, with more than three hundred thousand people across the country claiming tribal membership and nearly one million people internationally professing to have at least one Cherokee Indian ancestor. In this revealing history of Cherokee migration and resettlement. Beginning in the eighteenth century, the author transports the reader back in time to tell the poignant story of the Cherokee people migrating throughout North America, including their forced exile along the infamous Trail of Tears (1838–39).

Explains how traditional Cherokee women's roles were destabilized, modified, recovered, and in some ways strengthened during three periods of great turmoil. American Indian women have traditionally played vital roles in social hierarchies at the family, clan, and tribal levels. In the Cherokee Nation, specifically, women and men are considered equal contributors to the culture. With this study, however, we learn that three key historical events in the 19th and early 20th centuries—removal, the Civil War, and allotment of their lands—forced a radical renegotiation of gender roles and relations in Cherokee society.

In this gripping telling of the first "great and terrible" battle of the Civil War, Groom describes the dramatic events of April 6 and 7, 1862, when a bold surprise attack on Ulysses S. Grant's encamped troops and the bloody battle that ensued would alter the timbre of the war.

Introduction : the story of Shiloh -- Historians and the Battle of Shiloh : one hundred and forty years of controversy -- Oft-repeated campfire stories : the ten greatest myths of Shiloh -- Confusion and chaos : Alexander P. Stewart's brigade and the soldiers' Battle of Shiloh -- Gallant and invaluable service : the United States Navy at the Battle of Shiloh -- A siege from the start : the spring 1862 campaign against Corinth, Mississippi -- The handsomest cemetery in the South : Shiloh National Cemetery -- Shiloh's monument dedication speeches and the rhetoric of reunion -- David Wilson Reed : the father of Shiloh National Military Park -- DeLong Rice : Shiloh's poet preservationist -- Conclusion : the Story of Shiloh continues.

Originally published in 1909, this biography by Isabel Wallace recounts the life of her adoptive father, the little-recognized William Hervy Lamme Wallace, the highest-ranking Union officer to fall at the battle of Shiloh. Wallace was appointed brigadier general for his performance at Fort Donelson, the first notable Union victory in the Civil War. Wallace's troops had saved the day, although the Eleventh Illinois had lost nearly two-thirds of its men. He then moved with his troops to Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, where Confederates launched a surprise attack on the forces of Major General Ulysses S. Grant at Shiloh Church on Sunday, April 6, 1862. Isabel Wallace traces her father's life from his upbringing in Ottawa through his education, his service in the Mexican War, his law practice, his courtship of and marriage to her mother, and his service in the Eleventh Illinois until his mortal injury at Shiloh. She also details his funeral and her and her mother's life in the postwar years. Based on the copious letters and family papers of the general and his wife, the biography also provides historical information on federal politics of the period.

Ulysses S. Grant once remarked that the Battle of Shiloh “has been perhaps less understood, or, to state the case more accurately, more persistently misunderstood, than any other engagement... during the entire rebellion.” In Rethinking Shiloh, Timothy B. Smith seeks to rectify these persistent myths and misunderstandings, arguing that some of Shiloh's story is either not fully examined or has been the result of a limited and narrow collective memory established decades ago. Continuing the work he began in The Untold Story of Shiloh, Smith delves even further into the story of Shiloh and examines in detail how the battle has been treated in historiography and public opinion. The nine essays in this collection uncover new details about the battle, correct some of the myths surrounding it, and reveal new avenues of exploration. Smith's careful analyses and research bring attention to the many relatively unexplored parts of Shiloh such as the terrain, the actual route of Lew Wallace's march, and post-battle developments that affect currently held perceptions of that famed clash between Union and Confederate armies in West Tennessee. Studying Shiloh should alert readers and historians to the likelihood of misconceptions in other campaigns and wars—including today's military conflicts. By reevaluating aspects of the Battle of Shiloh often ignored by military historians, Smith's book makes significant steps toward a more complete understanding and appreciation of the Shiloh campaign in all of its ramifications.

Some 100,000 soldiers fought in the April 1862 battle of Shiloh, and nearly 20,000 men were killed or wounded; more Americans died on that Tennessee battlefield than had died in all the nation's previous wars combined. The eight talented contributors dissect the campaign's fundamental events, many of which have not received adequate attention before now. John R. Lundberg examines the role of Albert Sidney Johnston, the prized Confederate commander who recovered impressively after a less-than-stellar performance at forts Henry and Donelson only to die at Shiloh; Alexander Mendoza analyzes the crucial, and perhaps decisive, struggle to defend the Union's left; Timothy B. Smith investigates the persistent legend that the Hornet's Nest was the spot of the hottest fighting at Shiloh; Steven E. Woodworth follows Lew Wallace's controversial march to the battlefield and shows why Ulysses S. Grant never forgave him; Gary D. Joiner provides the deepest analysis available of action by the Union gunboats; Grady McWhiney describes P. G. T. Beauregard's decision to stop the first day's attack and takes issue with his claim of victory; and Charles D. Grear shows the battle's impact on Confederate soldiers, many of whom did not consider the battle a defeat for their side. In the final chapter, Brooks D. Simpson analyzes how command relationships—specifically the interactions among Grant, Henry Halleck, William T. Sherman, and Abraham Lincoln—affected the campaign and debunks commonly held beliefs about Grant's reactions to Shiloh's aftermath. The Shiloh Campaign will enhance readers' understanding of a pivotal battle that helped unlock the western theater to Union conquest.

Although previously undervalued for their strategic impact because they represented only a small percentage of total forces, the Union and Confederate navies were crucial to the outcome of the Civil War. In War on the Waters, James M. McPherson has crafted an enlightening, at times harrowing, and ultimately thrilling account of the war's naval campaigns and their military leaders. McPherson recounts how the Union navy's blockade of the Confederate coast, leaky as a sieve in the war's early months, became increasingly effective as it choked off vital imports and exports

In the Shenandoah Valley and Peninsula Campaigns of 1862, Union and Confederate soldiers faced unfamiliar and harsh environmental conditions--strange terrain, tainted water, swarms of flies and mosquitoes, interminable rain and snow storms, and oppressive heat--which contributed to escalating disease and diminished morale. Using soldiers 'letters, diaries, and memoirs, plus a wealth of additional personal accounts, medical sources, newspapers, and government documents,

To understand the long march of events in North Carolina from secession to surrender is to understand the entire Civil War--a personal war waged by Confederates and Unionists, free blacks and the enslaved, farm women and plantation belles, Cherokees and mountaineers, conscripts and volunteers, gentleman officers and poor privates. In the state's complex loyalties, its sprawling and diverse geography, and its dual role as a home front and a battlefield, North Carolina embodies the essence of the whole epic struggle in all its terrible glory

Engineering Victory brings a fresh approach to the question of why the North prevailed in the Civil War. Historian Thomas F. Army, Jr., identifies strength in engineering—not superior military strategy or industrial advantage—as the critical determining factor in the war's outcome. Army finds that Union soldiers were able to apply scientific ingenuity and innovation to complex problems in a way that Confederate soldiers simply could not match. During the war, their rapid construction and repair of roads, railways, and bridges allowed Northern troops to pass quickly through the forbidding terrain of the South as retreating and maneuvering Confederates struggled to cut supply lines and stop the Yankees from pressing any advantage.

Material objects lie at the crux of understanding individual and social relationships in history, and the Civil War era is no exception. Before, during, and after the war, Americans from all walks of life created, used, revered, exploited, discarded, mocked, and destroyed objects for countless reasons. The essays in this volume consider a wide range of material objects, including weapons, Revolutionary artifacts, landscapes, books, vaccine matter, human bodies, houses, clothing, and documents. Together, the contributors argue that an examination of the meaning of material objects can shed new light on the social, economic, and cultural history of the conflict.

Pulitzer Prize-winning historian James M. McPherson considers why the Civil War retains such a hold on our national psyche and identity. The essays consider variously the war's causes and consequences; the morality and cost of the war in comparative context; the naval war; slavery and its abolition; and Abraham Lincoln as emancipator, political leader, and commander in chief, among many other topics. Ultimately, McPherson illuminates the impossibility of understanding the issues of our own time unless we first understand their roots in the era of the Civil War: slavery and its abolition; the conflict between the North and South; the struggle between state sovereignty and the federal government; the role of government in social change-these issues, McPherson shows, are as salient and controversial today as they were in the 1860s.

In early 1863, in the aftermath of Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, Massachusetts began recruiting black soldiers to serve in the Civil War. Burt Green Wilder, a Boston-born, Harvard-educated doctor-in-training, was among the first white officers commissioned to staff the 55th Massachusetts. Like other officers serving in the state's African American units, Wilder was selected for his military experience, his 'firm Anti-Slavery principles,' and his faith in the value of black troops He described the day-to-day activities of a Civil War surgeon, the indignities suffered by black enlisted men at the hands of a War Department that denied them the same treatment offered to white troops. After the war he completed his medical studies at Harvard and joined the faculty of Cornell University, where he became a distinguished professor of zoology as well as an outspoken advocate of racial equality