This is a most interesting book about the period of reconstruction. The carpetbaggers did not make this process any easier for our Nation that had been torn apart. Race was a problem before the war, during the war, during reconstruction, and it is today. The war was over but the hate was still there. There were four years of the bloodiest war we have ever experienced. Families had been split apart, neighbors, states, and a nation. The Mason and Dixon line was still drawn. With reconstruction came the terror that resulted in hangings and political turmoil. Lincoln's untimely death was part of the terrorism that flooded the South. By Ruth Thompson author of "Natchez Above The River" and " The Bluegrass Dream"

Writing as a Small BusinessQualifying Laps: A Brewster County NovelSins of the Fathers: A Brewster County NovelTravelersNatchez Above The River: A Family's Survival In The Civil WarThe Bluegrass Dream: A Wilderness Adventure of Early Settlers

This account of some of the worst atrocities perpetrated on free negros and their white allies in the decade following the Civil War by Klansman and their kinsmen brings to mind the difficulties the USA has now in occupying Iraq. If the majority culture in the land being occupied is willing to kill to keep its power, the occupier is doomed to eventual defeat. You just can't kill every mayor, shopkeeper and farmer in the land you want to "reform", and in the American South after 1865, that's what it would have taken for the Yankees to prevail in the "peace." The KKK justified its terrorism via The Bible, and their traditional culture, and stalled off racial Democracy in their states for an additional century. When their leaders told lies, even obvious ones, their people supported them because they did not want to give up their former privileges and powers. "We lost the uniformed war, but we don't have to lose the political war" seemed to be the slogan of the hour. This is worth reading if you have an interest in the Reconstruction, or if you want to understand better the hardships our troops and our diplomats face in the Middle East.

Stephen Budiansky has written a popular history of the Reconstruction era. His is no easy task, as Reconstruction falls far behind the Civil War as a subject of popular interest, despite their closeness on the historical timeline, and despite the fact that many of the Civil War's main players (such as James Longstreet, who's featured here) were very active in both. "The Bloody Shirt" is a well-researched and well-written account that focuses on several individuals and events rather than try to examine the period as a whole. The author explores Reconstruction in Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina--the Deep South states that were the heart of the large plantation economy.

The main problem I had with the book was its emphasis on description rather than analysis. It reads like dispatches from the Reconstruction "front." That's fine, to a point, but at times it is more a string of primary sources than a monograph. Very often, letters and newspaper editorials, frequently printed whole, are left to speak for themselves. Much of this information could've been boiled down--and more importantly, should've been commented upon. For example, at one point, one Southern newspaper makes reference to "Colfax." Those familiar with the Reconstruction period will know this means the "Colfax Massacre" of 1873, which happened in Louisiana (if one wants to read about that, he/she can read the recent book "Redemption" by Nicholas Lemann).

Most importantly, the book lacks sufficient political context. The last portions of the book deal with the infamous Hamburg massacre (or, as Democrats fashioned it, the Hamburg "riot") in South Carolina. Budiansky unfortunately, doesn't give us much context about Reconstruction politics in that state. Despite the violence there, it was one of the last Reconstruction governments to fall and was the only one to have a mostly black legislature. The Republicans survived in South Carolina largely because of the state's majority black population. Budiansky doesn't lay this out, and makes it seem as if African Americans were merely victims of some last-minute white terror. By that point, however, Reconstruction had failed, and it was not because of events in South Carolina alone.

The extent to which Democrats resorted to violence and fraud was inexcusable, but Budiansky doesn't examine some of the faults of the Reconstruction governments. Republican mismanagement and corruption were some one of the subjects upon which Democrats built their case for overthrowing Republican rule (on this subject, check out Thomas Holt's "Black Over White" about the Reconstruction government in South Carolina). As overstated or even outright false as many of these claims were, there was mismangement and corruption among Republicans. This is not to justify the Democratic backlash, but even the Republican governments' legitimate expenses--for things as seemingly basic as public education and infrastructure projects--were hotly debated by Southerners.

Nevertheless, Budiansky is correct in saying that the real cause for overthrowing Reconstruction was not fiscal conservatism--which he addresses in the case of the Republican Governor Ames of Mississippi--but white anger with "Negro rule." And he is also correct in showing that African Americans were eventually abandoned by Northerners who had grown tired with events in the South. Once the Federal government decided blacks weren't worth defending, the radical Republican governments could not succeed.

If Budiansky's sympathies are with the right people, another problem I had with the book was its fragmented nature. As soon as we are introduced to some figures and events in Reconstruction, we are whisked away to somewhere else. The passages about James Longstreet are well written, but Longstreet feels dropped in from nowhere. No sooner does he appear then he is gone.

In sum, Budiansky's description of the violence of the period is well done, and he certainly is passionate in his defense of the white-black Republican Reconstruction governments. This is a good place to start for someone who is not well versed in the Reconstruction period. If I were to suggest an academic book about terror after Lee's surrender, I would suggest Richard Zuczek's "State of Rebellion," about Reconstruction in South Carolina. As a work of popular history, Budiansky's book illustrates some of the features of Reconstruction, but it doesn't break any new ground in the field of study. And those looking for a more comprehensive study might want to check out Eric Foner's "Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution."

My hat goes off to Mr. Budiansky for writing a sad and harrowing tale of terrorism on America's home front immediately following the Civil War. This book holds your attention throughout retelling the stories of a few of the people, black and white, who tried to create a new society in the old Confederacy. To say they were tilting at windmills is to put it mildly. Those of you who have read Eric Foner's dry tome about Reconstruction will find this book a perfect supplement. Unfortunately, Professor Foner I feel failed to get across to the reader the absolute violence and terror of the times. This book sadly remedies that oversight. Mr. Budiansky is correct in saying this era of US history is one of the few left where so little has been written about. I urge all graduate students in US history to make Reconstruction their concentration. The voices of tens of thousands of freedmen, as well as Republican carpetbaggers are crying to be heard.

The North won the Civil War in 1865. The South suffered a military defeat and was about to suffer a political defeat at the national level. Under Reconstruction the South's pre-war leaders were swept from office when the majority of whites lost their vote and Freeman were given the vote. During this time, Southern states elected Republicans at both the state and national level. White voters were subject to a variety of restrictions and loyalty oaths while Congress and the President fought over how Reconstruction would proceed. During this time, the Solid South comes into being with a way of looking at the war, the North and race relations set in stone. We are still dealing with the results of these years and may deal with them for another hundred years or more.
Depending on your outlook, this book is about the overthrow of the legal government in Mississippi and South Carolina or how white Southerners reclaimed the political life of their states. The author's position is that terror overthrew the legal governments. This book documents the removal of Adelbert Ames, former Union General, from the governor's office in of Mississippi. Other Northerners who settled in the state, after the war, and the enfranchised Freemen, elected Ames. All of the Northerners are forced to flee when local whites rise in rebellion and the U.S. Government refuses to station sufficient troops to control the population. In South Carolina, the Freeman controlled town of Hamburg is destroyed during a nightlong battle with multiple deaths.
This is a book on violence and the politics of terror that sides with the Reconstruction governments. The white locals consider this a government of occupation and rise up to destroy its' supporters and overthrow the government by driving the Northerners out of the state. The book focuses on the mob's racism and how much they hate a government comprised of Northerners and Negros. The book says nothing about why Southern whites might feel this way or why Washington failed to support these governments. This book, like many published lately, blames the failure of Reconstruction on the White South and fails to ask if the "goals" of reconstruction were possible or even wanted.
This is a very readable account of the end of reconstruction governments in two Southern states as the 1870s ended. It is an honest unvarnished account and well worth reading.

"The Bloody Shirt" is an excellent book that at least for me, shed new light on a part of the Civil War era that I only read about in high school history classes. People who stubbornly cling to the myths of "the Lost Cause" (that the war was about states rights and not about slavery) would do well to read it...but I have a feeling most won't.

If you read this book, you will have a point driven home violently to you: the Civil War did not end at Appomattox Courthouse, only the Southern states' bid for independence and effort to formally preserve slavery did. In the South of the Reconstruction, the vast majority of whites steadfastly refused to accept the new order of things which allowed black men to vote. Tragically, the US government at the time lacked the will to protect the rights of the freedmen. So through a campaign of intimidation and violence, the whites overthrew the Reconstruction, imposed Jim Crowe law, and hurled the emancipated blacks down to the bottom of the social order where they never complained...because nobody dared.

There is a temptation when you read some of the newspaper articles from Southern papers at the time of the "redemption" (the violent overthrow of the Reconstruction government) to think that those who committed those crimes and the Federal government that stood by while it happened were evil or apathetic to evil. I don't feel that way. Slavery only ended in the South because of force. It would be naive to think that Southern whites would passively accept this. I have no doubt that many members of the Ku Klux Klan and other groups genuinely saw themselves as heroes rescuing their beloved society from a terrible threat. I also think it would be naive to expect that the North, with its own racial problems, would be committed to resisting the "redemption."

What I don't think is excusable is that anyone alive today in the South or any other part of the country apart from people like David Duke could really think that "If the South had won the war, we'd have it made." Far from it, if that had happened, I think what the Confederate States of America would have amounted to would have been a clone of apartheid-era South Africa.

In closing, lest anyone say that I'm just a "yankee," I have been a life-long resident of Virginia and have great affection and admiration for the brave deeds of the Army of Northern Virginia and the South's other legions. I have a Don Troiani painting of the Lone Star Brigade fighting in the cornfield quadrangle at Antietam on my wall, and I see nothing wrong with the display of the Confederate battle flag, provided it isn't used as a sort of "Jolly Rogers" of racists. But I do believe that anyone alive today who really believes that things would have been better had the South won the war is at best a fool and at worst a racist with attitudes that are completely incompatible with the values upon which the United States is built.

Terror works.

It's the traditional and very effective weapon of a defeated but still defiant people against their conquerors. Americans didn't invent terrorism; it's a natural rebellion which may arise in any people, and is launched by a few with the quiet assent of most. This book is much more than the 'Reconstruction' era; it's about the world today and the revolt of the powerless against their overlords.

Quite simply, there are two dominant attitudes about the U.S. Civil War, or "The War Between the States". Northerners fought to preserve the Union, and both Union and Confederate forces accepted that outcome in 1865. Southerners fought to keep Blacks "in their place" and used a terror campaign lasting at least 10 years after Appomattox to achieve that goal. It still has echoes in the Republican 'Southern Strategy' and the politics of the Clintons.

This book helps clarify the upsurge of terrorism from Palestinians to the civil war in Iraq and the Taliban in Afghanistan. In the U.S., the Northern attitude was, "Can't we all get along?" Southerners defiantly asserted, "Yes, as long as THOSE people stay in their place". The civil war in Iraq is an example; suicide bombers are merely updated versions of the Klu Klux Klan and other terrorists who believe democracy or religious freedom or economic opportunity are wonderful if limited to "the proper socio-economic classes".

Budiansky says at least 3,000 Americans were murdered in the 1865 to 1876 terror campaign. But terror isn't an end in itself; ideas imposed by terror need more terror to survive. Thousands died in lynchings and other murders that lasted into the 1960s with the killings of civil rights workers in Mississippi. To this day, "race" continues to be a sharp divide; the candidacy of Barack Obama draws heavier Black support than Anglo.

In the 1830s, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote 'Democracy in America' about the basic insistence of people to control their own destiny. This book introduces 'Race in America' and the base instinct of some to keep others in their place. This instinct is horrifying, brutal, racist, but it's not unique. British history, to cite one example, is largely various "tribes" of Anglos who fought constantly among themselves to protect their status, power, prestige and destiny.

Compared to the terror to keep people "in their place" in other societies, America may be the most benign -- to use Sen. Patrick Moynihan's benign description. European societies periodically slaughtered outsiders in their midst; the Southern goal was just as real but milder in impact. In Kenya today, as in Uganda in the 1990s, terror campaigns were used to keep others in their place. It's a universal condition of mankind, which makes it all the more infuriating, appalling and inevitable.

This is a brilliant book with graphic details of how a terror campaign was won, with profiles of the courage of those who resisted and the pure animal hatred of those who inflicted it. It is the bitter bloody reality of terror. It doesn't justify it, but tells how it becomes a cancer on the soul of otherwise generous, hospitable and decent people.

Echoes of "the bloody shirt" are already heard in this year's politics.

Parts of thsi tale have been told elsewhere but this book finally does the story justice by putting them all in one place. The story of General Adelbert Ames is especially interesting. However the great downfall of this book is the sensationalizing of the topic. Rather than examining what actually took place in the struggle between the Union reconstructionists and the local southerners and the newly freed blacks, this book puts itself solely on the side of history, which as we know is only 20/20 in retrospect, and describes a history of 'good' and 'evil' between good Yankees and bad southern 'terrorists'.

History is surely more nuanced. The KKK is relegated to a terrorist organization, an irony considering most news outlets today refer at Al Quaida as a group of 'militants'. Modern interpretations of 'terrorism' and its origins usually claim it has its roots in dictatorship and U.S 'foreign policy' and 'crusades'. Such was the history of terrorism and militants in the South. The Union army was viewed as a colonial power and it was viewed as forcing a dictatorship upon the local southern whites by stripping them of the right to vote since many had served in the Confederate army.

Was it a surprise that a 'blowback' took place and that the KKK emerged and that eventually the majority white southerners were able to legislate themselves back into power through democratic means. It is no surprise and it would have been better had this book examined why the KKK is called a 'terrorist' organization, which it surely was, while Hamas and Al Quaida are called 'militant' or insurgent organizations.

Seth J. Frantzman

One of the abiding misconceptions about the American Civil War is that the opposing armies parted with dignity, mutual respect, and even a certain degree of amiability at war's end. Joshua Chamberlain, the hero of Little Round Top, famously writes that he ordered his men to salute the brave Confederate soldiers who laid down their arms at Appomattox. Thus began the myth of a happy ending.

But historians have long recognized that civil wars are especially violent and acrimonious, and even after peace accords are signed, aftershocks of rage and recrimination continue. Given its horrible bloodletting, it would be strange if the American Civil War were an exception to this general rule. Author Stephen Budiansky, in one of the most horrifying books I've ever read, documents the decade following Appomattox and concludes two things: the war didn't really end in 1865, and the North didn't achieve the victory it thought it did.

When the "official" war ended, die-hard Confederates and secessionists seethed with anger and a stubborn refusal to submit. John Richard Dennett, a young "Nation" reporter who traveled through the South for 8 months after the war ended, concluded that nearly every Southerner he encountered was convinced that the emancipation of the slaves had reversed the natural order of things, and would eventually mean that an "inferior" race, bolstered by Republican carpetbaggers, would dominate a "superior" one. Given that a black revolt was one of the antebellum South's worst nightmares, this post-war conviction was a powerful incentive to violence.

The violence grew so rapidly over the next ten years, with some 3,000 black and white elected officials murdered, elections rigged, communities terrorized by Ku Klux and "rifle society" members, and Federal laws regulating local treatment of freedmen contemptuously ignored, that Budiansky doesn't hesitate to refer to the period as one of terrorism. The atrocities he documents are staggering. Over and over I found myself comparing them to recent human rights violations in Bosnia or Africa.

In September 1874, for example, Louisiana fire-eaters revolted. Citizens refused to accept the legally-elected Republican governor. A neo-Confederate puppet state government was set up and fighting broke out in the streets of New Orleans between state militia loyal to the Federal government (commanded by no less a figure than James Longstreet) and members of the infamous White League. Longstreet's militia were trounced. The "Shreveport Times," as well as other regional papers, explicitly advocated killing any Republicans or blacks elected to public office.

Or take the predominantly black town of Hamburg, South Carolina, most of whose elected officials were freedmen. in 1876, white toughs disrupted a July 4th town parade. The commander of the black militia that was marching in the parade protested, and just a few days later a white army, led by two ex-Confederate generals and a thug who would later become a U.S. senator, invaded Hamburg. The town sheriff was murdered and mutilated, nearly 30 members of the black militia were rounded up, and seven of them were singled out and murdered. Then the white thugs vandalized the town.

These and scores of other acts of terrorism went largely unpunished. Southern grand juries refused to indict; indicted defendants were usually acquitted or given laughably light sentences. By 1876, when Federal troops officially withdrew from the South, ex-slaves had been put in their place. As one southerner of the time observed, blacks were better off as slaves than as freedman. As slaves, they were valuable property. As freedmen, they weren't worth the dirt it took to bury them after they were murdered.

Budianksy's book is a sober but essential read, especially for anyone who believes that the Civil War "fixed" the plight of the southern black, that erstwhile blue and gray enemies clasped hands in friendship when the war ended, or that slavery wasn't the real cause of the war. But his book is also inspiring in its documentation of the men and women, black as well as white, who did their best (but for the most part failed) to bring law and order to the violence-torn South. All in all, highly recommended. Readers who find Budianksy's book interesting may also want to read Nicolas Lemann's Redemption: The Last Battle of the Civil War.
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* Testimony of a 30-year old mulatto man beaten nearly to death by white terrorists who insisted that he hand over his guns. The mulatto repeatedly told his attackers he had no guns. Then, sobbing, he told the court: "I hasn't got anything in the world but myself, for I hasn't got any family, nor any parents, nor any land, nor any money, and I know I is not to be any worse off in the grave than I is now."