History 331 (1860 – 1877)

The Civil War and Reconstruction

Reference (print)  |  Reference (online)  |  Books  |  Magazines and newspapers  | Web sites

Reference (print)

ABC-CLIO Companion to American Reconstruction, 1862-1877 – R 973.8 R5375 a
American Eras – vol. 5 – R 973.8 A5123
Annals of America vols. 9-10  (primary sources) – R 973 A613
Biographical Dictionary of the Union – R 973.7 B6153
Encyclopedia of the American Civil War – vols. 1-5 – R 973.7 E564
Encyclopedia of the Confederacy – R 973.713 E563
Encyclopedia of the Reconstruction Era – R 973.8 E563

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Reference (online)

American National Biography (also in print) – Portraits of more than 17,400 American men and women.

History Database Center – Includes biographies, subject entries, chronologies, primary sources, maps and charts, and  images.

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Books/Monographs

The following books are non-reference sources that deal broadly with the subject of United States History 1860 - 1877 (sometimes referred to as overviews):

The American Civil War : A Hands-On History – floor 2 – 973.7 O523 a
Days of Defiance : Sumter, Secession, and the Coming of the Civil War – floor 2 – 973.7 K645 d
A House Divided : America in the Age of Lincoln – floor 2 – 973.7 F6737 h
In the Presence of Mine Enemies: War in the Heart of America, 1859-1863 – floor 2 – 973.7 A9774 i
Reconstruction : America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 – floor 2 –  973.8 F6734 r
A Ruined Land : The End of the Civil War – floor 2 – 973.714 G6173 r
A Sunday Between Wars: The Course of American Life From 1865-1917 – floor 2 – 973.8 M1798 s

To find other relevant books, do a subject search using specific SUBJECT headings such as:

United States - History - Civil War 1861-1865
Reconstruction - U.S. History 1865 - 1877
United States - Politics and Government 1815-1861

You can also put in names of specific people or events in a keyword search. Pay attention as well to other headings given to books you find on your topic. Also browse the shelf area where you find books on your subject.

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Magazines and Newspapers

Below are magazine and newspaper sources that are available in databases online. An asterisk (*) indicates a database containing primary source material.

* American Periodicals Series Online – More than 1500 American magazines and newspapers published between 1741 and 1940.

JSTOR – Full text of more than 750 scholarly journals.

* The Nation Archive – The Nation magazine, 1865 on.

* ProQuest Historical Newspapers – Search the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Atlanta Constitution, and Boston Globe.

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Web Sites

The websites selected here are reliable, relevant sources for researching the subject of United States History 1860 – 1877 and related subjects.  An asterisk (*) indicates a site containing primary source material.

* The Abraham Lincoln Papers – Library of Congress – The complete Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress consists of approximately 20,000 documents. The collection is organized into three "General Correspondence" series which include incoming and outgoing correspondence and enclosures, drafts of speeches, and notes and printed material. Most of the 20,000 items are from the 1850s through Lincoln's presidential years.

* The African-American Mosaic: Abolition – Library of Congress - This Library of Congress site has a plentiful amount of primary source documents and an introduction to the abolitionist movement in America.

* Africans in America: Judgment Day 1831-1865 – PBS – Part of PBS's African-American Journey site, this site contains images, documents, stories, biographies, and commentaries on the experience of slavery in America. There are three other parts to explore: The Terrible Transformation: 1450-1750, Revolution: 1750-1805, and Brotherly Love: 1791-1831.

American President: An Online Reference Resource – This site is a comprehensive collection of material about the U.S. Presidents and the history of the presidency.

* America's Reconstruction: People and Politics After the Civil War – This exhibition is part of the Digital History site that contains an up-to-date U.S. history textbook; annotated primary sources on slavery, United States, Mexican American, and Native American history; and succinct essays on the history of ethnicity and immigration, film, private life, and science and technology.

* Civil War and Reconstruction – 1861-1877 – Library of Congress – This Library of Congress exhibition contains succinct overviews of several aspects of the Civil War and Reconstruction and features primary sources, maps, and images.

* Documenting the American South – University of North Carolina – Collection of sources by the University of North Carolina on Southern history, literature and culture from the colonial period through the first decades of the 20th century.  Currently, this site includes ten thematic collections of primary sources for the study of southern history, literature, and culture including Oral Histories of the American South, True and Candid Compositions: Antebellum Writings, First-Person Narratives of the American South, and North American Slave Narratives.

* Harper's Weekly: Toward Racial Equality – Materials from the magazine are presented in order to give a true historical picture of the leading 19th-century newspaper’s view of black Americans.

* Valley of the Shadow – The Valley of the Shadow depicts two communities, one Northern and one Southern, through the experience of the American Civil War. The site is a hypermedia archive of thousands of sources for the period before, during, and after the Civil War for Augusta County, Virginia, and Franklin County, Pennsylvania. Those sources include newspapers, letters, diaries, photographs, maps, church records, population census, agricultural census, and military records. Students can explore the conflict and write their own histories, or reconstruct the life stories of women, African Americans, farmers, politicians, soldiers, and families.

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