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Wars change the course of history and touch in intensely personal ways the lives of everyone involved. Thankfully, surviving firsthand accounts offer modern readers a deeply personal window into earlier times. From Camp Douglas to Vicksburg: The Civil War Letters of William J. Kennedy, 55th Illinois Infantry, 1861-1863, edited and annotated by Rachael E. Mellen and David A. Powell, constitutes a rich and informative glimpse into one such life.
William J. Kennedy was a second-generation Irish-American born in New York in 1827. By 1861 he was a harness-maker running his own business in the small town of LaSalle, Illinois. When Governor Yates called for volunteers, Kennedy jumped at the chance. He even recruited many of his friends and relatives into Company G of the 55th Illinois Infantry, a new regiment being organized in Chicago under Col. David Stuart. Kennedy had ambitions to become a captain and, like most men his age, dreamed of battlefield heroics.
With a sharp eye and an even sharper wit, Kennedy played the role of embedded reporter during some of the most momentous events in the Western Theater. His letters to his wife Jane, family members, and friends are often as detailed as newspaper accounts and battle reports. His observations span the gamut, from corruption in the army and the alien culture in Tennessee and Mississippi, to his unyielding confidence in President Lincoln's judgment. Most students of the war will treasure his previously unseen descriptions of the fighting at Shiloh, the siege of Corinth, the triumphal entry into Memphis, the disaster of Chickasaw Bayou, and the misery of digging canals around Vicksburg. Sadly, it was there, on the undulating hills near the Mississippi River during the final fatal assault against that fortress, that William lost his life.
His original letters reside in the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Archives in Springfield, Illinois. A genealogical long shot led Mellen to discover the connection between her family and the letters at the library. Editors Mellen and Powell used their expertise to sift through genealogical records, histories of the war, and other regimental accounts to flesh out the people, places, and events that can now be shared with everyone. These documents have brought William Kennedy and his family back to life for their 21st century relatives and a wider audience.
From Camp Douglas to Vicksburg adds significantly to the historiography of the war and is one of the finest Western Theater letter collections to reach print in many years.
