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An elegantly written and important book, one that helps us understand both the past and the present, Lang's study reasserts the central role of occupation in the Civil War, especially for northern soldiers. For these men, occupation duty contradicted the central tenet of how they understood republican citizenship--that social and political change should come from the people's will, not the barrel of a gun. This insightful book reveals how the ideological tensions generated by the war shaped its outcome and reminds us of the inherent difficulties democracies face when they wage war.--Aaron Sheehan-Dean, Fred C. Frey Professor of Southern Studies, Louisiana State University Winner of the Tom Watson Brown Book Award--Society of Civil War Historians In the Wake of War explores deep and abiding conflicts within the United States' republican culture through a careful study of the way that citizen-soldiers understood their role in occupations of Mexico and the former Confederacy in the middle of the nineteenth century...An important study in the burgeoning field of Civil War-era occupation, In the Wake of War speaks to the different but enduring contemporary dilemmas the United States faces today.--Gregory P. Downs, author of After Appomattox: Military Occupation and the Ends of War In the Wake of War presents an incisive reevaluation of the American citizen-soldier experience. This work highlights the challenges that violent irregular war, arduous military occupation, and the dawn of emancipation threw at idealistic volunteers steeped in a republican tradition, and how the experiences of an international war with Mexico, a domestic Confederate rebellion, and a sustained army presence in the defeated Southern states shaped Americans' understanding of patriotic service in a time of war. Readers who seek to understand the changes war wrought for the inner world of nineteenth-century soldiers will find this book a good place to start their study.--Barton A. Myers, coeditor of The Guerrilla Hunters: Irregular Conflicts during the Civil War

An elegantly written and important book, one that helps us understand both the past and the present, Lang's study reasserts the central role of occupation in the Civil War, especially for northern soldiers. For these men, occupation duty contradicted the central tenet of how they understood republican citizenship-that social and political change should come from the people's will, not the barrel of a gun. This insightful book reveals how the ideological tensions generated by the war shaped its outcome and reminds us of the inherent difficulties democracies face when they wage war. In the Wake of War presents an incisive reevaluation of the American citizen-soldier experience. This work highlights the challenges that violent irregular war, arduous military occupation, and the dawn of emancipation threw at idealistic volunteers steeped in a republican tradition, and how the experiences of an international war with Mexico, a domestic Confederate rebellion, and a sustained army presence in the defeated Southern states shaped Americans' understanding of patriotic service in a time of war. Readers who seek to understand the changes war wrought for the inner world of nineteenth-century soldiers will find this book a good place to start their study. In the Wake of War explores deep and abiding conflicts within the United States' republican culture through a careful study of the way that citizen-soldiers understood their role in occupations of Mexico and the former Confederacy in the middle of the nineteenth century...An important study in the burgeoning field of Civil War-era occupation, In the Wake of War speaks to the different but enduring contemporary dilemmas the United States faces today. Winner of the Tom Watson Brown Book Award

An elegantly written and important book, one that helps us understand both the past and the present, Lang's study reasserts the central role of occupation in the Civil War, especially for northern soldiers. For these men, occupation duty contradicted the central tenet of how they understood republican citizenship—that social and political change should come from the people's will, not the barrel of a gun. This insightful book reveals how the ideological tensions generated by the war shaped its outcome and reminds us of the inherent difficulties democracies face when they wage war. In the Wake of War presents an incisive reevaluation of the American citizen-soldier experience. This work highlights the challenges that violent irregular war, arduous military occupation, and the dawn of emancipation threw at idealistic volunteers steeped in a republican tradition, and how the experiences of an international war with Mexico, a domestic Confederate rebellion, and a sustained army presence in the defeated Southern states shaped Americans' understanding of patriotic service in a time of war. Readers who seek to understand the changes war wrought for the inner world of nineteenth-century soldiers will find this book a good place to start their study. In the Wake of War explores deep and abiding conflicts within the United States' republican culture through a careful study of the way that citizen-soldiers understood their role in occupations of Mexico and the former Confederacy in the middle of the nineteenth century…An important study in the burgeoning field of Civil War–era occupation, In the Wake of War speaks to the different but enduring contemporary dilemmas the United States faces today. Winner of the Tom Watson Brown Book Award

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Andrew F. Lang is associate professor of history at Mississippi State University.

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