Description: Eleven iconoclastic scholars take aim at many of the accepted interpretations of the Civil War North in this provocative new anthology
Brief description: Michael Thomas Smith is an assistant professor of history at McNeese State University. He is the coeditor of Letters from a North Carolina Unionist: John A. Hedrick to Benjamin S. Hedrick, 1862-1865 (North Carolina Division of Archives and History, 2001), and the author of A Traitor and a Scoundrel: Benjamin Hedrick and the Cost of Dissent (University of Delaware Press, 2003) and The Enemy Within: Fears of Corruption in the Civil War North (University of Virginia Press, 2011). His articles have appeared in American Nineteenth Century History, the New England Quarterly, and other journals.
Review Quotes: One of the strengths of the volume is the consistent quality of its submissions. That said, the volume succeeds in its stated goal of challenging assumptions and sparking debate. The essays are uniformly well researched and provocative, and many contain very thorough discussions of the suggesting avenues for future research. 'This Distracted and Anarchical People' successfully provides Civil War scholars with a useful, thought provoking resource.-- "--The Journal of Southern History"