Read Anywhere and on Any Device!

Subscribe to Read | $0.00

Join today and start reading your favorite books for Free!

Create Free Account

I Never Was a Coward: Questions of Bravery in a Civil War Regiment

Lesley J. Gordon

3/5 ( ratings)

In popular imagination, the American Civil War remains a conflict in which all soldiers acted out of personal bravery and self-sacrifice. Communal memory and historical scholarship have insisted that every soldier was a hero. But there were men, not paragons but humans, who did not perform admirably or heroically. Many were shirkers, skulkers and deserters; those who fled from battle, or slipped away during long marches. I Never Was a Coward focuses on a single northern regiment to highlight broad questions about bravery and cowardice. The wartime record of the 16[superscript th] Connecticut Infantry Regiment includes candid accusations, confessions and observations of cowardice in battle, in camp, at home, and in prison. By examining letters, dairies and newspapers, we learn firsthand how this regiment defined and redefined cowardice. Their story provides fresh insight into a topic rarely explored by Civil War historians.

Language: English

Pages: 43

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Marquette University Press

Release: December 12, 2005

ISBN: 0874623383

ISBN 13: 9780874623383

I Never Was a Coward: Questions of Bravery in a Civil War Regiment

Lesley J. Gordon

3/5 ( ratings)

In popular imagination, the American Civil War remains a conflict in which all soldiers acted out of personal bravery and self-sacrifice. Communal memory and historical scholarship have insisted that every soldier was a hero. But there were men, not paragons but humans, who did not perform admirably or heroically. Many were shirkers, skulkers and deserters; those who fled from battle, or slipped away during long marches. I Never Was a Coward focuses on a single northern regiment to highlight broad questions about bravery and cowardice. The wartime record of the 16[superscript th] Connecticut Infantry Regiment includes candid accusations, confessions and observations of cowardice in battle, in camp, at home, and in prison. By examining letters, dairies and newspapers, we learn firsthand how this regiment defined and redefined cowardice. Their story provides fresh insight into a topic rarely explored by Civil War historians.

Language: English

Pages: 43

Format: Paperback

Publisher: Marquette University Press

Release: December 12, 2005

ISBN: 0874623383

ISBN 13: 9780874623383

More books from Lesley J. Gordon

The Myth of the Lost Cause and Civil War History

3.7/5 ( ratings)

General George E. Pickett in Life and Legend

3.5/5 ( ratings)

A Broken Regiment: The 16th Connecticut's Civil War

4.6/5 ( ratings)

Intimate Strategies of the Civil War: Military Commanders and Their Wives

4.2/5 ( ratings)

Writing History with Lightning: Cinematic Representations of Nineteenth-Century America

Civil War History, Vol. 58, No. 2

Civil War History, Vol. 58, No. 1

Civil War History, Vol. 58, No. 3

Inside the Confederate Nation: Essays in Honor of Emory M. Thomas (Conflicting Worlds: New Dimensions of the American Civil War)

Reinterpreting Southern Histories: Essays in Historiography

Rate this book!

Write a review?