For Honor, Glory, and Union: The Mexican and Civil War Letters of Brig. Gen. William Haines Lytle (review)

BOOK REVIEWS285 lous State in the Union, she sees her whole territory desolated as by fire, . . . and the whole prestige of her former power and glory passed away forever" (171). Seeking to allay the fears of Missouri's pro-slavery citizens, Lincoln's private secretary repeatedly emphasized throughout the first year and a halfofthe war that the president had no intention of interfering with slavery in the states. Highlighting Lincoln's refusal to accede to the abolitionist demands of congressional Republicans and Union generals, Hay focused attention on the president's support for financial assistance of slave states willing to emancipate gradually their slaves. When Lincoln issued his preliminary emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1 862, Hay insisted that the purpose of the decree was to persuade the citizens of the Confederate states to return to the Union by January 1, 1863, in order not to lose their slaves. Hay'sjournalistic writings also illustrate how Lincoln and his supporters utilized the press to build political support for the President in the border states, all ofwhich had voted overwhelmingly Democratic in the national election of 1860. Shortly before the fall elections of 1862, he wrote to the readers ofthe Missouri Republican that the President, who had consistently "stood between slavery and those who would destroy it," deserved "the love and gratitude of the loyal Border Slave States" (310). Hay's aim of attracting Missouri Democrats into a Union party coalition with Northern Republicans also led the anonymous correspondent to stress how lightly the Republican Congress's tax legislation of 1 862 would affect the average citizens of the state. Concerned that Congress's second Confiscation Act of July 17, 1862, which directed Union forces to seize the property of rebels, would alienate Missouri voters from the president, the anonymous correspondent emphasized how the measure would shift much of the costs of the war effort to the Confederate states. Providing detailed annotations for each of Hay's articles, Burlingame has done a fine job in editing this volume. Scholars seeking insights on President Lincoln's strategy for maintaining the loyalty of the border states to the Union and his quest for reelection in 1 864 will find Lincoln 's Journalist a rich primary source. John D. Morton The University of Virginia For Honor, Glory, and Union: The Mexican and Civil War Letters ofBrig. Gen. William Haines Lytle. Edited by Ruth C. Carter. (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1999. Pp. xiv, 244. $27.50. Although William Haines Lytle's military career was not significant enough to attract a great deal of attention from historians, this collection ofhis letters from the Mexican and Civil Wars is a useful addition to the literature on those conflicts . Scion of one of Cincinnati's elite families, Lytle went to war in 1 847 dreaming ofmartial glory. He arrived in Mexico too late to see any major fighting 286CIVIL WAR HISTORY but provided an interesting record of garrison duty in his letters home. After returning to Cincinnati, he practiced law, entered politics as a states rights Democrat , and expressed his strong romantic impulse through poetry. In 1 861 , Lytle was appointed commander of the ?oth Ohio Volunteer Infantry and saw his first service of the Civil War in western Virginia. After recuperating from a wound suffered a Carnifex Ferry and a stint as commander of a training camp in Kentucky, Lytle assumed command of a brigade. He and his command spent several months in 1 862 occupying Huntsville, Alabama, before returning to Kentucky to help turn back Braxton Bragg's invasion of the Bluegrass State. At Perryville, Lytle was taken prisoner and, after being paroled and exchanged, returned to duty with promotion to brigadier general in 1863. He then participated in William S. Rosecrans's operations in Middle and East Tennessee before dying a hero's death at Chickamauga. Lytle was, according to Ruth C. Carter, editor oíForHonor, Glory, and Union and author of a study of the Lytle family in antebellum Cincinnati, a man whose aristocratic character, romantic outlook on life, and Democratic politics "epitomized a southern cavalier rather than a Yankee" (207). Lytle's Civil War letters also reveal him to be a capable...