After Lincoln: How the North Won the Civil War and Lost the Peace

Langguth (Patriots: The Men Who Started the American Revolution) takes a warts-and-all approach in profiling the major figures of the Reconstruction. Bitter rivalries within the Republican Party, the impeachment of an accidental president, and the unlikely hanging of a female assassination conspirator all resulted in a tumultuous post–Civil War period that also kick-started what would later become the Civil Rights movement. Langguth employs brief biographical sketches of key figures to describe the turf wars that arose in the aftermath of Lincoln’s assassination, the fight to protect newly freed slaves, and the internal administrative battle over the degree of punitive efforts towards the South. His primarily chronological vignettes range from those on Lincoln’s bickering cabinet members and antagonistic legislators to former CSA president Jefferson Davis, iconic newspaperman Horace Greeley, and the first African-American governor, P.B.S. Pinchback of Louisiana. Langguth’s well-placed and humanizing personal details about the strident men orchestrating Reconstruction and Johnson’s impeachment add depth and immediacy to the significant struggles of reuniting North and South, while clearly showing the harsh results of their actions in a post-Lincoln United States. 20 b&w illus. Agent: Lynn Nesbit, Janklow & Nesbit. (Sept.)