Wilderness Of War : Civil War Letters

George W. Squier was one of the thousands of men from Indiana who heeded Lincoln's call for volunteers at the onset of the Civil War.

As a soldier in the 44th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, he fought in the Western theater -- seeing action at Fort Donelson, Shiloh, Stones River, and Chickamauga -- and rose to the grade of captain by the late winter of 1865.

Throughout his service, he wrote detailed, eloquent, and often unusually candid letters to his wife, not only describing battles and army life but also espousing strong views on slavery and emancipation, Lincoln's leadership, the use of black soldiers, and the causes and direction of the war.

This Wilderness of War brings Squier's Civil War correspondence to print for the first time.Squier's letters underscore the depth of his love for his family, his devotion to the Union cause, and his commitment to antislavery ideology.

They also yield some surprising details not often found in soldiers' writings to their families: Squier described, for example, the mutilation of the dead and wounded and acknowledged the practice of robbing the enemy dead (something he himself even admitted to doing).

Revealed as well are Squier's growing disillusionment and cynicism as the war dragged on.

Though he vehemently opposed slavery and welcomed emancipation, after the war he often found himself in sharp disagreement with the views of the Radical Republicans.

In particular, he came to feel that white southerners were increasingly being discriminated against and that African Americans should not be lifted immediately to a full state of political power.

It was an attitude that typified the ambivalence of many white northerners toward the course ofReconstruction policy. Squier's outspoken views on the politics of his day combine with his vivid recountings of his wartime experience to make this volume a unique and important contribution to the literature of the Civil War.