Quote:
Originally Posted by Quietus
I'm halfway through a 2000 novel by James Carlos Blake called "Wildwood Boys." It's a sympathetic portrayal of the life and times of a Missouri partisan who we have come to know as "Bloody Bill Anderson."
I'm reluctant to praise the writing talents of fiction writers, but Blake writes well. Besides telling well a story, he is pretty accurate about the making of paper cartridge loads for cap and ball revolvers, and the carrying of spare loaded cylinders for the pistols.
The book does trouble me some, because it makes me think about how thick (or thin) the veneer of what we think of as our USA civilization might be. Knowing of riots and of post-Katrina behavior does not in any way compare to the way participants from both sides of this relatively recent conflict, treated their enemies. I had known from reading, about what a bad place Missouri was during the war between the states. This book gets down in the dirt, regarding what we now call "atrocities", done right here.
|
Missouri was a really bad place during the civil war. There were few "big" battles, but lots of house burning, looting and murder.
However, if you want to see a different side of the Civil War, take a look at "Better Angels of Our Nature", written by a guy named Halleran. Talks about Freemasons during the Civil War. Interesting to read about such civility amongst all the bloodshed.