Through excerpted letters, diary entries, newspaper accounts, and official records, Wiley offers the reader a complete portrait of the ordinary foot soldier in the Union Army during the Civil War.
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Through excerpted letters, diary entries, newspaper accounts, and official records, Wiley offers the reader a complete portrait of the ordinary foot soldier in the Union Army during the Civil War.
Read Less
Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $1.25, good condition, Sold by Once Upon A Time Books rated 3.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Tontitown, AR, UNITED STATES, published 1992 by Louisiana State Univ Pr.
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This is a used book in good condition and may show some signs of use or wear. This is a used book in good condition and may show some signs of use or wear.
Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $2.11, good condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Atlanta rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Brownstown, MI, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Louisiana State Univ Pr.
Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $2.11, good condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Reno rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Reno, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Louisiana State Univ Pr.
Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $2.11, good condition, Sold by ThriftBooks-Baltimore rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Halethorpe, MD, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Louisiana State Univ Pr.
Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $2.13, fair condition, Sold by Goodwill rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Brooklyn Park, MN, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Louisiana State University Press.
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Add this copy of Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union to cart. $2.20, good condition, Sold by The Maryland Book Bank rated 5.0 out of 5 stars, ships from baltimore, MD, UNITED STATES, published 1979 by Louisiana State University Press.
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Bell Irvin Wiley (1906-1980) enjoyed a distinguished career as a professor at the University of Mississippi and Emory University and as the author or editor of over 20 books on the Civil War. His "The Life of Billy Yank: the Common Soldier of the Union" (1952) is, together with its companion volume "The Life of Johnny Reb, the Common Soldier of the Confederacy (1943), Wiley's best-known work. It presents an outstanding history of the day-to-day life of the soldier in the Union Army.
As Wiley stated in the preface to the book, his focus was "social rather than military". The book offers little of the military history of the various Civil War campaigns and little of the political aspects of the War. Rather, Wiley discusses soldering in the Union Army in all its detail and drudgery. It is an indispensable source for those wishing to understand the Civil War. The book would be of interest as well to reenactors wishing to get inside and recapture life in a Civil War Army.
The book is well-researched and documented. It draws upon the letters and diaries of innumerable Union soldiers, both published and unpublished and on other first-hand accounts. Much of the discussion is anecdotal, but Wiley makes good use of census and statistical data as well. The book is clearly written with an obvious empathy for the life of the Civil War soldier. The book leads the reader beyond its specific subject and encourages reflection of the Civil War, its terrible human cost, and its continuing importance to our country.
Wiley begins with a discussion of the recruitment process into the Union Army following the attack on Fort Sumter. The book gives a good picture of the complex relationship between state militia units, the regular army, the volunteers and the draftees -- the various units that uneasily combined to form the Union army. Bell discusses -- in a subject that continues to fascinate historians -- the motivations of the soldiers who served in the conflict. In particular, he discusses the Emancipation Proclamation and considers the extent to which Emancipation was or became a goal for a large number of Union troops. Wiley sees the many sides of this question, and the issue remains one that is vigorously discussed.
The book describes well the rigors of training and camp life, the diseases and unhealthy living conditions which plagued the army, the boredom and enforced routines, the bad food, temptations to vice, and experience of combat. There is excellent material in the book on the organization of the Union Army. Much of the material in Wiley's study is either presupposed or otherwise not covered in other well-known studies of the military of political history of the War. The book considers the morale and fighting spirit of the men and how it varied with the fortunes of war and with the support of people at home. Again, anticipating more recent studies, Wiley discusses the ambiguous, complicated relationships that developed during the War between the Union troops and their enemies in gray. This relationship, and the instances of fraternization during the midst of a total conflict, presaged the way for reconciliation, at long last, at the conclusion of the conflict. There is a brief discussion in the book of women soldiers who enlisted in the Union army and sometimes managed to avoid detection. This subject too has received much recent attention and it is interesting to see Wiley deal with it in his early account. The book ends with reflections on the way in which the Civil War helped forged the United States into a nation.
This is a study that wears its age well. It will bring the reader face-to-face with the life of the Union soldier during our nation's greatest combat.
