Why read A Savage Conflict?

Book cover of A Savage Conflict: The Decisive Role of Guerrillas in the American Civil War

Book description

While the Civil War is famous for epic battles involving massive armies engaged in conventional warfare, A Savage Conflict is the first work to treat guerrilla warfare as critical to understanding the course and outcome of the Civil War. Daniel Sutherland argues that irregular warfare took a large toll on…

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American history

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Why read it?

1 author picked A Savage Conflict as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Lisa Alther

Author

In researching Blood Feud, I discovered that some of my ancestors were Union guerrillas who operated near the future feud area. Devil Anse Hatfield led a unit of Confederate home guards in that same region. Hatfield’s uncle, who is widely believed to have murdered Harmon McCoy in the opening salvo of the feud, was said subsequently to have killed a cousin of my father’s uncle during a guerrilla skirmish. I had always understood the Civil War to entail vast battalions of uniformed soldiers mowing each other down as they marched toward enemy lines. A Savage Conflict made me realize…

From Lisa's list on the Hatfield–McCoy feud.