A STUNNING NARRATIVE THAT CAPTURES THE EXPERIENCES OF THE MEN AND WOMEN WHO WITNESSED THE TUMULTUOUS FALL OF THE PROUD CONFEDERATE CAPITAL
By April 1865, General Robert E. Lee realized that he must order his army to retreat from the Confederate capital of Richmond and that Jefferson Davis's government must flee. As the southern s soldiers moved out they set the city on fire, leaving a blazing ruin to greet the entering Union troops. National newspapers and private journals were filled for weeks with tales of Richmond's burning. Nelson Lankford draws upon a wealth of these items – Civil War-era diaries, letters, memoires, and newspaper reports-to bring vivid immediacy to this pivotal event. From unforgettable scenes of Abraham Lincoln's voyage up the James River on his way to the Confederate White House to Lee's return to Richmond to survey the ruins, this stunning work will make readers feel that they are themselves eyewitnesses to history.
'Engaging and beautifully crafted, the book us a stellar achievement.'
- Richmond Times-Dispatch
'Unlike many of his predecessors, Lankford is able to see [the fall of Richmond] without Lost Cause blinders or magnolia-suffused sentimentality.'
- JONATHAN YARDLEY, The Washington Post
