THE CIVIL WAR CONTINUES TO FASCINATE HISTORIANS AND
GENERAL READERS.
Contemporary Civil War scholarship has brought to light the
important roles certain ethnic groups played during that tumultuous
time in our nation's history. Two new books, focusing on the
participation of Irish immigrants in both the Union and Confederate
armies, add to this growing area of knowledge.
While the famed fighting prowess of the Irish Brigade at Antietam
and Gettysburg is well known, in God Help the Irish! historian
Phillip T. Tucker emphasizes the lives and experiences of the
individual Irish soldiers fighting in the ranks of the Brigade, supplying
a better understanding of the Irish Brigade and why it became one
of the elite combat units of the Civil War.
The axiom that the winners of wars write the histories is especially
valid in regard to the story of the Irish who fought for the Confederacy
from 1861–1865. Throughout the course of the Civil War, Irish
Confederates made invaluable contributions to all aspects of the war
effort. Yet, the Irish have largely been the forgotten soldiers of the
South. In Irish Confederates: The Civil War's Forgotten Soldiers,
Tucker illuminates these overlooked participants.
Together, the two books provide a full picture of the roles Irish
soldiers played in the Civil War.
_________________________________________________________
PHILLIP THOMAS TUCKER, winner of the Douglas Southall
Freeman Award in 1993, has written fifteen books on Civil War,
Irish, and African American history including Irish Confederates: The
Civil War's Forgotten Soldiers (McWhiney Foundation Press, 2007).
He is an historian for the United States Air Force in Washington, D.C.,
and lives in Upper Marlboro, Maryland.
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