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In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863
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Music Books > Kevin Ayers > Item 3
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In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863
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by Edward L. Ayers
Sales Rank: 96469
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List Price: $16.95
$11.53
At Amazon
on 12-29-2007.
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Features
Paperback: 471 pages
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company August 30, 2004
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0393326012
ISBN-13: 978-0393326017
Product Dimensions:
8 x 5.4 x 1.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
From Publishers Weekly
Two counties, one in Virginia and one in Pennsylvania, are united by the vast Shenandoah Valley, but divided by the Mason-Dixon line. As late as 1859, these border counties, and by extension their respective states, saw themselves not on opposite sides of a divided nation but as the historic and contemporary heart of a country where such forces as a shared history and a common language made civil war inconceivable. The inhabitants of both counties initially prided themselves on resisting provocation by fire-eaters in the far North and the deep South. Ironically, they eventually committed themselves fully, sacrificing blood and wealth unstintingly to a conflict few of them welcomed. That process, however, was by no means straightforward, as Ayers (The Promise of the New South) brilliantly shows. If Confederate supporters in Augusta County, Va., ultimately accepted slavery as the touchstone of their social order, they also insisted they were fighting for the right to be left alone, free of a Northern influence perceived as increasingly alien. Their counterparts in Pennsylvania's Franklin County went to war not to destroy slavery but to prevent the South from destroying the Union by leaving it. Emancipation grew from the contingencies of war-and not the least of these was the increasing determination of black Americans to take charge of their own destinies, thereby challenging at its roots the social contract established by the revolution of 1776. Ayers tells his complex story with a master's touch, shifting smoothly between North and South, and between the lesser worlds of his two counties and the wider events of the war that changed them both utterly. He pauses with Lee's invasion of Pennsylvania in 1863, just before the Battle of Gettysburg-a decision both intellectually and aesthetically satisfying. This volume lays the groundwork; we are left to anticipate the climax and the denouement to be presented in its successor.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
*Starred Review* Two towns--Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, and Staunton, Virginia, at opposite ends of the Shenandoah Valley, itself bisected by the Mason-Dixon Line--are historian Ayers' settings for his exploration of how sectionalism burst into civil war. The cities' urbane citizens--lawyers, editors, preachers--thought of themselves as sane Unionists in the intensifying crisis that ensued from John Brown's raid of 1859, yet they became, with the onset of fighting at Fort Sumter in 1861, as uncompromising as abolitionists of the North or fire-eaters of the South. Complexity collapsed into simplicity overnight; local newspapers fulminated against the enemy's iniquities; and exulted or despaired, as the results of battles warranted, in the fates of local boys gone soldiering. Ayers unfolds this historical process with penetrating analysis and relevant quotations, emphasizing the anxiety, excitement, and misery that the war provoked. He suspends his narrative (pending a sequel) with Staunton lawyer and now Confederate general John Imboden occupying Chambersburg and enslaving any black person, fugitive or free, his men could capture. Certain to absorb the Civil War set, Ayers' comparison of two towns reverberates with the local manifestations of the war's origins and direction. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Owner Reviews, Ratings, Comments and Criticism
This review is from: In the Presence of Mine Enemies: War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863 (Hardcover)
This is the first book from The Valley of the Shadow Project and may become the classic Civil War home front book. Two counties, one in Pennsylvania one in Virginia were selected and life during the war closely documented. Very few of the people in this book are even minor players in the war, which is the books greatest strength. Without "important" figures, the story concentrates on what's in the newspapers, changes in prices and local problems, in other words the normal daily life of the people living in the counties. An excellent introduction tells us about counties and the people free, slave, white, black, rich, middle class or poor. We learn how they make a living, farmers for the most part, what industry and jobs are open to them. How they learned of the events beyond the county and how they reacted to them. We are taken through the election of 1860 and into war. We gain an understanding of a war that isn't generals and battles but separation, death and sadness. Battles are reported in terms of local men killed, wounded or missing and in letters that are printed in the paper or passed from house to house. Fear of the enemy army and invasion is very real and happens. Politics is very important and the divisions in the North contrast with the solidarity in the South. As Pennsylvania's Democrats and Republicans fight for power and over emancipation. While in Virginia, the papers report the problems as evidence the North's war effort is failing. This is a book for the serious student of the war and for a person who wants to learn about life in America 140 years ago. This is one of the most informative books on the Civil War that I've read and recommend it to you.
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In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863
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