Overview

On the day that Lincoln was inaugurated in 1861, twenty-seven-year-old William Dorsey Pender, en route to the provisional Confederate capital in Montgomery, Alabama, hurriedly scribbled a note to his wife, Fanny. So began a prolific correspondence between a rising Confederate officer and his cherished wife that would last until Pender was mortally wounded at Gettysburg. First published by UNC Press in 1965, Pender's letters are filled with personal details, colorful descriptions, and candid opinions of such important figures as Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, J. E. B. Stuart, and A. P. Hill. His comments on his military activities and aspirations and the challenges of command, combined with his husbandly advice and affection, sketch an intimate and unvarnished portrait of the man who was perhaps the most distinguished North Carolina commander.

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9781469602349

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An excellent picture of wartime life and marriage. -- Library Journal Pender's letters reflected as few war letters have the spirit of a man as a soldier in a cause in which he believed. . . . [Hassler] is in all ways to be commended for introducing to the public this valuable sequence of letters. -- Virginia Magazine of History and Biography Pender's letters to his wife are fascinating reading because they are filled with personal details, colorful descriptions, and candid opinions. . . . A distinguished volume. -- Historian Pender's letters to his wife provide a moving human document recording the response of a young, talented, sensitive officer to his war experiences. Well written and disarmingly candid, they provide a valuable insight into the mind of a wartime commander: his periods of elation and discouragement, his solicitude for his personal reputation, his evaluation of officers and men, his wrestling with religious beliefs, his anxiety over his wife's health and the raising of his young sons. -- Choice This book is an indispensable addition to the Civil War bookshelf. Rarely does one find a collection of letters that provides such a wealth of valuable military information while simultaneously serving as a love story, tracing one man's religious conversion in the face of battle and capturing the drama of a young officer coping with the trials presented by the Civil War. -- North Carolina Historical Review

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