What distinguishes McPherson's work is his fluid writing style and his able use of anecdote and human interest to flesh out his portrait of the times. The author also addresses arguments about the root origins or that war and pinpoints major causes: hatred of slavery and blind regional prejudice. And McPherson's coverage of the Civil War is just as strong and clear. McPherson delineates the issues that galvanized and divided the American public from the end of the Mexican War in 1848 to the opening of the Civil War in 1861, providing thorough explanations of the pre-war period's gravest crises-the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and the prairie guerrilla war it started the national clamor over the Dred Scott case anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant violence and the brief life of the nativist Know-Nothing Party and the panic over John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859. From there, the narrative speeds through 28 chapters that draw a precise and lively picture of what America and Americans were like in mid-19th century. The volume begins with a deft description of the ragged American army trudging into Mexico City in 1847. With this major work, McPherson (History/Princeton Ordeal by Fire) cements his reputation as one of the finest Civil War historians.
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