Essays on the most vital conflict in our nation's history written by renowned historians and presented by the editor of the acclaimed What If?With My Face to the Enemy is a provocative and wide-ranging anthology of essays on the Civil War-our nation's defining struggle and the first modern war in history. In thirty-five illuminating essays and one hundred and fifty thousand words, it examines the war from the perspectives critical to its outcome-the larger-than-life personalities of the important players from Lincoln to Lee, and the national strategies and key battle tactics that shaped the four-year-long crisis. Contributors include the leading lights of Civil War scholarship: James M. McPherson, Stephen W. Sears, Gary W. Gallagher, David Herbert Donald, and twenty others.James M. McPherson's essays ponder three diverse, yet fascinating subjects: Abraham Lincoln's use of language and its role in his victory; Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee's failed Southern strategies; and Ulysses S. Grant's memoirs as a reflection of his superlative generalship. Stephen W. Sears, in four essays, describes the daring flanking maneuvers of Stonewall Jackson at Chancellorsville, and presents the last word on Lee's infamous "lost order," among other topics. Other highlights include David Herbert Donald on Lincoln's early command; Gary W. Gallagher on Lee's record before his ascension as a Southern icon; John Bowers on Chickamauga; Noah Andre Trudeau on the battle of the Wilderness; Thomas Fleming on West Point, and much more.