Mr. Tubbs' Civil War

by Nat Brandt

Charles Tubbs never actually went to war. He never volunteered nor was he drafted in the Union army, but his friends - ordinary young men from rural New York and Pennsylvania - wore the Union blue. These seventeen individuals made the Civil War come alive for Charles Tubbs, for they sent him some of the most eloquent letters to have emerged from that momentous conflict. Popular historian Nat Brandt, who has written extensively on the War Between the States, has drawn his material from more than 175 letters that Tubbs received from the seventeen friends who fought for the Union. The young soldiers vividly communicate the camaraderie of camp life and the loneliness of the soldier far from home. Their simple - at times ungrammatical - missives transport the reader to most of the major battles: Shiloh, Antietam, Gettysburg. Through their experiences - and Nat Brandt's expertise - we are given a frontline account of this crucial time in American history, from the first stirrings of war to t