Marcus Spiegel, a German Jewish immigrant, served with the 67th and 120th Ohio Volunteer regiments during the Civil War. He saw action in Virginia, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Louisiana, where he was fatally wounded in May 1864. These letters to Caroline, his wife, reveal the traumatizing experience of a soldier and the constant concern of a husband and father. Jean Powers Soman is a great-great-granddaughter of Marcus Spiegel. Her coeditor, Frank L. Byrne, is a professor of history at Kent State University and the editor of several books, including Haskell of Gettysburg: His Life and Civil...

All students of the Civil War are indebted to Frank Haskell for his classic description of the battle of Gettysburg. A lieutenant on the staff of John Gibbon, Haskell stood at the focus of the Confederate assault on July 3, 1863. He wrote of the battle in a letter to his brother. When it came to light after the war it became and remains probably the most read and repeated account of Civil War combat written by a participant. It captures wholly the terrible fascination that the Civil War--and Gettysburg--holds for all Americans. Haskell wrote other letters (thirty-one in this collection) and...

Scholars and general readers alike will enjoy these superbly edited letters. At once insightful and entertaining, they vividly illustrate the reactions of both Union soldiers and Southern civilians to the hardships and fortunes of war. Daniel E. Sutherland, University of Arkansas
Under the careful editorial eye of Frank Byrne, Harvey Reid s letters have re-emerged, and for scholars seeking to bring the war in the West into its proper political and social context, this volume will be of special interest. Stephen D. Engle, Florida Atlantic University
As a noncommissioned officer and...