The Bloody Shirt: Terror after Appomattox

I'm not entirely sure if the overly dramatic and emotional way in which this book was presented is more due to the narrator or the author and the selections chosen by the author. Either way I was disappointed with this book.

It addresses an interesting and important topic and while I generally have no objections to narrative histories which make extensive use of contemporary sources to help tell the story, the effect here was counter productive. In the case of the worst chapters, it seems the author completely gave up any attempt at analysis or explanation, threw up hands in despair and gave the reader a long string of inflammatory articles from newspapers of the time designed to spark the appropriate feelings of disgust.

The universal discrimination, violent acts of terror, and reprehensible views held by many of the Southern protagonists all deserve mention and quotation, but the assemblage of characters and their portrayal came across in such a polarizing and unbalanced way this book cannot but anger and disgust anyone who might have some sympathies for the predicament of defeated southerners in the aftermath of the civil war. The result may unfortunately lead to the opposite of the desired effect: many people for whom a book of this topic would be an ideal read will be completely put off not only this work but the whole topic.

Another frustrating aspect of this book was that less than half of the book focuses on the terror itself. We get long, rambling, and often completely irrelevant looks at the lives and loves of the “heroes” of the story, using valuable space in the book that might have been better dedicated to understanding the character of southern society, economy, and the origins and rise of a culture of discrimination and violence.