Excerpt from The Civil War, Vol. 1: The American Iliad as Told by Those Who Lived It The American Iliad is not intended to be just another story of the Civil War. Instead, it aims to present this heroic period as a panorama, letting the events pass before the reader's eyes much as they passed before the eyes of the men and women who lived at that time. The Civil War beyond most wars went deep into every aspect of life and was much more than a series of battles. It affected every living being, both north and south of the Mason and Dixon Line and produced many strange human experiences, some of which we have woven into this narrative as an integral part of the picture. We did not write this book. Dozens of people wrote it, people who witnessed a stirring contemporary scene and tell about it in their own words. They may have been commanding generals or soldiers in the ranks, newspaper reporters, statesmen or housewives. If they observed well, wrote honestly, entertainingly and - this is where we lay our emphasis - with dramatic suspense, we have drawn on their contributions in the compilation of this volume. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.