This volume narrates the major battles and campaigns of the conflict, conveying the full military experience during the Civil War. The military encounters between Union and Confederate soldiers and between both armies and irregular combatants and true non-combatants structured the four years of war. These encounters were not solely defined by violence, but military encounters gave the war its central architecture. Chapters explore well-known battles, such as Antietam and Gettysburg, as well as military conflict in more abstract places, defined by political qualities (like the border or the West) or physical ones (such as rivers or seas). Chapters also explore the nature of civil-military relations as Union armies occupied parts of the South and garrison troops took up residence in southern cities and towns, showing that the Civil War was not solely a series of battles but a sustained process that drew people together in more ambiguous settings and outcomes.
1. Introduction. The Cambridge History of the American Civil War Aaron Sheehan-Dean; Part I. Major Battles and Campaigns: 2. The battles of Virginia, 1861 Hunter Lesser; 3. The battles of Tennessee, 1862 Timothy B. Smith; 4. The battles of the Trans-Mississippi, 1861-1863 William L. Shea; 5. The Peninsula Campaign Glenn D. Brasher; 6. The Shenandoah Valley Campaigns of 1862 and 1864 Kathryn J. Shively; 7. The Second Bull Run Campaign John Hennessy; 8. The Antietam Campaign D. Scott Hartwig; 9. The Western Theater, 1862-1863 Kenneth W. Noe; 10. The Battle of Fredericksburg Elizabeth Parnicza; 11. The Chancellorsville Campaign Christian B. Keller; 12. The Gettysburg Campaign Carol Reardon; 13. The Vicksburg Campaign Terrence J. Winschel; 14. The Battles of Tennessee, 1863 Daryl Black; 15. The Overland Campaign Gordon C. Rhea; 16. The Georgia Campaign Robert L. Glaze; 17. The Carolinas Campaign Lisa Tendrich Frank; 18. The Tennessee Campaign, 1864 William Lee White; 19. The Petersburg and Appomattox Campaigns William Marvel; Part II. Places: 20. War on the rivers Gary D. Joiner; 21. War on the waters Kurt Hackemer; 22. The blockade Robert Browning, Jr; 23. The border war Aaron Astor; 24. War in the Deep South Andrew F. Lang; 25. War in Appalachia Brian D. McKnight; 26. War in Arkansas, Texas, and Louisiana Donald S. Frazier; 27. War in the West Kevin Adams; 28. War in Indian country Kevin Waite.
