Description: "The essays approach the period through the expansive lens of military history, grounded in both traditional and pioneering methodologies. By offering fresh areas of inquiry and demonstrating the potential of military history to provide invaluable insights, the collection seeks to realign military scholarship on the American Civil War with other scholarly avenues of inquiry"--
Brief description: Gary W. Gallagher is the John L. Nau III Professor in the History of the American Civil War Emeritus at the University of Virginia. He is the author or editor of more than forty books on the Civil War and its memory.
Review Quotes: Military operations, by their very nature, have always assumed a complexity that few other historical events possess. The essays featured in Upon the Fields of Battle capture the myriad of ways that warfare permeated the social and political life of Civil War America without pushing Union and Confederate armies to the periphery of the main story. The contributors to this essential volume, through innovative methodologies and compelling writing, have battered down the ancient walls of tradition that have long isolated Civil War military history from its natural allies in cultural and social history. Upon the Fields of Battle is a triumph.--Peter S. Carmichael, author of The War for the Common Soldier: How Men Thought, Fought, and Survived in Civil War Armies