Drawn with the Sword: Reflections on the American Civil War Book

James M. McPherson is a preeminent commentator on the Civil War whose book Battle Cry of Freedom was a Pulitzer Prize-winning, national bestseller. Now, in Drawn with the Sword, McPherson offers a series of thoughtful and engaging essays on some of the most enduring questions of the Civil War, written in the masterful prose that has become his trademark.

Filled with fresh interpretations, puncturing old myths and challenging new ones, Drawn with the Sword explores such questions as why the North won and why the South lost, whether Southern or Northern aggression began the war, and who really freed the slaves, Abraham Lincoln or the slaves themselves. McPherson offers memorable portraits of the great leaders who people the landscape of the Civil War, and discusses often-ignored issues such as the development of the Civil War into a modern "total war" against both soldiers and civilians, and the international impact of the American Civil War in advancing the cause of republicanism and democracy in other countries. Of special interest is the final essay, entitled "What's the Matter With History?," a trenchant critique of the field of history today, which McPherson describes here as "more and more about less and less."

Each essay reveals McPherson's own profound knowledge of the Civil War and of the controversies among historians, presenting all sides in clear and lucid prose and concluding with his own measured and eloquent opinions.