Mrs. Lincoln's Rival

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Author :
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0698148479
Total Pages : 432 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (981 download)

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Book Synopsis Mrs. Lincoln's Rival by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Mrs. Lincoln's Rival written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-01-14 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestselling author of Mrs. Lincoln's Sisters and Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker reveals Mary Todd Lincoln’s very public social and political contest with Kate Chase Sprague in this astute and lively novel of the politics of state—set against the backdrop of Civil War Era Washington. Beautiful, intelligent, regal, and entrancing, young Kate Chase Sprague stepped into the role of establishing her thrice-widowed father, Salmon P. Chase, in Washington society as a Lincoln cabinet member and as a future presidential candidate. For her efforts, The Washington Star declared her “the most brilliant woman of her day. None outshone her.” None, that is, but Mary Todd Lincoln. Though Mrs. Lincoln and her young rival held much in common—political acumen, love of country, and a resolute determination to help the men they loved achieve greatness—they could never be friends, for the success of one could come only at the expense of the other...

Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker

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Author :
Publisher : Dutton
ISBN 13 : 0142180351
Total Pages : 381 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (421 download)

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Book Synopsis Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Dutton. This book was released on 2013-09-24 with total page 381 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Chiaverini's compelling historical novel unveils the private lives of Abraham and Mary Lincoln through the perspective of the First Lady's most trusted confidante and friend, her dressmaker, Elizabeth Keckley. In a life that spanned nearly a century and witnessed some of the most momentous events in American history, Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley was born a slave. A gifted seamstress, she earned her freedom by the skill of her needle, and won the friendship of First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln by her devotion. A sweeping historical novel, Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker illuminates the extraordinary relationship the two women shared, beginning in the hallowed halls of the White House during the trials of the Civil War and enduring almost, but not quite, to the end of Mrs. Lincoln's days.

The Spymistress

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Publisher : Dutton
ISBN 13 : 0142180882
Total Pages : 376 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (421 download)

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Book Synopsis The Spymistress by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book The Spymistress written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Dutton. This book was released on 2014-03-25 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pledging her loyalty to the North at the risk of her life when her native Virginia secedes, Quaker-educated aristocrat Elizabeth Van Lew uses her innate skills for gathering military intelligence to help construct the Richmond underground and orchestrate escapes from the infamous Confederate Libby Prison.

Mrs. Lincoln's Sisters

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Publisher : HarperCollins
ISBN 13 : 0062976036
Total Pages : 368 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (629 download)

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Book Synopsis Mrs. Lincoln's Sisters by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Mrs. Lincoln's Sisters written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2020-06-02 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A fascinating glimpse into the women of an influential family on the front lines of some of the most important moments of that indelible time."--Booklist The New York Times bestselling author of Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker returns to her most famous heroine, Mary Todd Lincoln, in this compelling story of love, loss, and sisterhood rich with history and suspense. In May 1875, Elizabeth Todd Edwards reels from news that her younger sister Mary, former First Lady and widow of President Abraham Lincoln, has attempted suicide. Mary’s shocking act followed legal proceedings arranged by her eldest and only surviving son that declared her legally insane. Although they have long been estranged, Elizabeth knows Mary’s tenuous mental health has deteriorated through decades of trauma and loss. Yet is her suicide attempt truly the impulse of a deranged mind, or the desperate act of a sane woman terrified to be committed to an asylum? And—if her sisters can put past grievances aside—is their love powerful enough to save her? Maternal Elizabeth, peacemaker Frances, envious Ann, and much adored Emilie had always turned to one another in times of joy and heartache, first as children, and later as young wives and mothers. But when Civil War erupted, the conflict that divided a nation shattered their family. The Todd sisters’s fates were bound to their husbands’ choices as some joined the Lincoln administration, others the Confederate Army. Now, though discord and tragedy have strained their bonds, Elizabeth knows they must come together as sisters to help Mary in her most desperate hour.

Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule

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Author :
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0698161386
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (981 download)

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Book Synopsis Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2015-03-03 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestselling author of Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker and Mrs. Lincoln's Rival imagines the inner life of Julia Grant, beloved as a Civil War general’s wife and the First Lady, yet who grappled with a profound and complex relationship with the slave who was her namesake—until she forged a proud identity of her own. In 1844, Missouri belle Julia Dent met dazzling horseman Lieutenant Ulysses S Grant. Four years passed before their parents permitted them to wed, and the groom’s abolitionist family refused to attend the ceremony. Since childhood, Julia owned as a slave another Julia, known as Jule. Jule guarded her mistress’s closely held twin secrets: She had perilously poor vision but was gifted with prophetic sight. So it was that Jule became Julia’s eyes to the world. And what a world it was, marked by gathering clouds of war. The Grants vowed never to be separated, but as Ulysses rose through the ranks—becoming general in chief of the Union Army—so did the stakes of their pact. During the war, Julia would travel, often in the company of Jule and the four Grant children, facing unreliable transportation and certain danger to be at her husband’s side. Yet Julia and Jule saw two different wars. While Julia spoke out for women—Union and Confederate—she continued to hold Jule as a slave behind Union lines. Upon the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, Jule claimed her freedom and rose to prominence as a businesswoman in her own right, taking the honorary title Madame. The two women’s paths continued to cross throughout the Grants’ White House years in Washington, DC, and later in New York City, the site of Grant’s Tomb. Mrs. Grant and Madame Jule is the first novel to chronicle this singular relationship, bound by sight and shadow.

Lincoln

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Author :
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 0307784231
Total Pages : 673 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (77 download)

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Book Synopsis Lincoln by : Gore Vidal

Download or read book Lincoln written by Gore Vidal and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-04-13 with total page 673 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lincoln is the cornerstone of Gore Vidal's fictional American chronicle, which includes Burr, 1876, Washington, D.C., Empire, and Hollywood. It opens early on a frozen winter morning in 1861, when President-elect Abraham Lincoln slips into Washington, flanked by two bodyguards. The future president is in disguise, for there is talk of a plot to murder him. During the next four years there will be numerous plots to murder this man who has sworn to unite a disintegrating nation. Isolated in a ramshackle White House in the center of a proslavery city, Lincoln presides over a fragmenting government as Lee's armies beat at the gates. In this profoundly moving novel, a work of epic proportions and intense human sympathy, Lincoln is observed by his loved ones and his rivals. The cast of characters is almost Dickensian: politicians, generals, White House aides, newspapermen, Northern and Southern conspirators, amiably evil bankers, and a wife slowly going mad. Vidal's portrait of the president is at once intimate and monumental, stark and complex, drawn with the wit, grace, and authority of one of the great historical novelists. With a new Introduction by the author.

Mrs. Lincoln's Rival

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Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781410466181
Total Pages : 737 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (661 download)

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Book Synopsis Mrs. Lincoln's Rival by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Mrs. Lincoln's Rival written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 737 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A follow-up to Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker traces the rivalry between the daughter of an antebellum presidential cabinet member and the 16th President's wife, the former of whom becomes the bride of governor William Sprague and one of the most highly regarded women of her day. (historical fiction). Simultaneous.

Enchantress of Numbers

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Author :
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 1101985216
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (19 download)

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Book Synopsis Enchantress of Numbers by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Enchantress of Numbers written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-11-27 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Cherished Reader, Should you come upon Enchantress of Numbers by Jennifer Chiaverini...consider yourself quite fortunate indeed....Chiaverini makes a convincing case that Ada Byron King is a woman worth celebrating.”—USA Today The New York Times bestselling author of Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker and Switchboard Soldiers illuminates the life of Ada Byron King, Countess of Lovelace—Lord Byron's daughter and the world's first computer programmer. The only legitimate child of Lord Byron, the most brilliant, revered, and scandalous of the Romantic poets, Ada was destined for fame long before her birth. But her mathematician mother, estranged from Ada's infamous and destructively passionate father, is determined to save her only child from her perilous Byron heritage. Banishing fairy tales and make-believe from the nursery, Ada’s mother provides her daughter with a rigorous education grounded in mathematics and science. Any troubling spark of imagination—or worse yet, passion or poetry—is promptly extinguished. Or so her mother believes. When Ada is introduced into London society as a highly eligible young heiress, she at last discovers the intellectual and social circles she has craved all her life. Little does she realize how her exciting new friendship with Charles Babbage—the brilliant, charming, and occasionally curmudgeonly inventor of an extraordinary machine, the Difference Engine—will define her destiny. Enchantress of Numbers unveils the passions, dreams, and insatiable thirst for knowledge of a largely unheralded pioneer in computing—a young woman who stepped out of her father’s shadow to achieve her own laurels and champion the new technology that would shape the future.

American Queen

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Publisher : Da Capo Press
ISBN 13 : 0306822814
Total Pages : 416 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (68 download)

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Book Synopsis American Queen by : John Oller

Download or read book American Queen written by John Oller and published by Da Capo Press. This book was released on 2014-10-28 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Had People magazine been around during the Civil War and after, Kate Chase would have made its “Most Beautiful” and “Most Intriguing” lists every year. Kate Chase, the charismatic daughter of Abraham Lincoln's treasury secretary, enjoyed unprecedented political power for a woman. As her widowed father's hostess, she set up a rival “court” against Mary Lincoln in hopes of making her father president and herself his First Lady. To facilitate that goal, she married one of the richest men in the country, the handsome “boy governor” of Rhode Island, in the social event of the Civil War. But when William Sprague turned out to be less of a prince as a husband, she found comfort in the arms of a powerful married senator. The ensuing scandal ended her virtual royalty, leaving her a social outcast who died in poverty. Yet in her final years she would find both greater authenticity and the inner peace that had always eluded her. Set against the seductive allure of the Civil War and Gilded Age, Kate Chase Sprague's dramatic story is one of ambition and tragedy involving some of the most famous personalities in American history. In this beautifully written and meticulously researched biography, drawing on much unpublished material, John Oller captures the tumultuous and passionate life of a woman who was a century ahead of her time.

Salmon P. Chase

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Author :
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1501199234
Total Pages : 848 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (11 download)

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Book Synopsis Salmon P. Chase by : Walter Stahr

Download or read book Salmon P. Chase written by Walter Stahr and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2022-02-22 with total page 848 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From an acclaimed, New York Times bestselling biographer, a timely reassessment of Abraham Lincoln's indispensable Secretary of the Treasury: a leading proponent for black rights both before and during his years in cabinet and later as Chief Justice of the United States. Salmon P. Chase is best remembered as a rival of Lincoln's for the Republican nomination in 1860--but there would not have been a national Republican Party, and Lincoln could not have won the presidency, were it not for the vital groundwork Chase laid over the previous two decades. Starting in the early 1840s, long before Lincoln was speaking out against slavery, Chase was forming and leading antislavery parties. He represented fugitive slaves so often in his law practice that he was known as the attorney general for runaway negroes, and he furthered his reputation as an outspoken federal senator and progressive governor of Ohio. Tapped by Lincoln to become Secretary of the Treasury, Chase would soon prove vital to the Civil War effort, raising the billions of dollars that allowed the Union to win the war, while also pressing the president to emancipate the country's slaves and recognize black rights. When Lincoln had the chance to appoint a chief justice in 1864, he chose his faithful rival, because he was sure Chase would make the right decisions on the difficult racial, political, and economic issues the Supreme Court would confront during Reconstruction. Drawing on previously overlooked sources, Walter Stahr sheds new light on a complex and fascinating political figure, as well as on the pivotal events of the Civil War and its aftermath. Salmon P. Chase tells the forgotten story of a man at the center of the fight for racial justice in 19th century America.

Lincoln and Douglas

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Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 0743273206
Total Pages : 433 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (432 download)

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Book Synopsis Lincoln and Douglas by : Allen C. Guelzo

Download or read book Lincoln and Douglas written by Allen C. Guelzo and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2008 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: fill in

Fates and Traitors

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Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0525954309
Total Pages : 402 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (259 download)

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Book Synopsis Fates and Traitors by : Jennifer Chiaverini

Download or read book Fates and Traitors written by Jennifer Chiaverini and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016 with total page 402 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John Wilkes Booth's misguided quest to avenge the vanquished Confederacy led him to commit one of the most notorious acts in the annals of America. Four women were integral in his life: Mary Ann, the mother he revered above all but country; his sister and confidante, Asia; Lucy Lambert Hale, the senator's daughter who loved him; and the Confederate widow Mary Surratt, to whom he entrusted the secrets of his vengeful wrath. As their stories intertwine we witness a soul in turmoil-- and a country at the precipice of immense change.

Ways and Means

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Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0735223572
Total Pages : 457 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (352 download)

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Book Synopsis Ways and Means by : Roger Lowenstein

Download or read book Ways and Means written by Roger Lowenstein and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2023-03-07 with total page 457 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Captivating . . . [Lowenstein] makes what subsequently occurred at Treasury and on Wall Street during the early 1860s seem as enthralling as what transpired on the battlefield or at the White House.” —Harold Holzer, Wall Street Journal “Ways and Means, an account of the Union’s financial policies, examines a subject long overshadowed by military narratives . . . Lowenstein is a lucid stylist, able to explain financial matters to readers who lack specialized knowledge.” —Eric Foner, New York Times Book Review From renowned journalist and master storyteller Roger Lowenstein, a revelatory financial investigation into how Lincoln and his administration used the funding of the Civil War as the catalyst to centralize the government and accomplish the most far-reaching reform in the country’s history Upon his election to the presidency, Abraham Lincoln inherited a country in crisis. Even before the Confederacy’s secession, the United States Treasury had run out of money. The government had no authority to raise taxes, no federal bank, no currency. But amid unprecedented troubles Lincoln saw opportunity—the chance to legislate in the centralizing spirit of the “more perfect union” that had first drawn him to politics. With Lincoln at the helm, the United States would now govern “for” its people: it would enact laws, establish a currency, raise armies, underwrite transportation and higher education, assist farmers, and impose taxes for them. Lincoln believed this agenda would foster the economic opportunity he had always sought for upwardly striving Americans, and which he would seek in particular for enslaved Black Americans. Salmon Chase, Lincoln’s vanquished rival and his new secretary of the Treasury, waged war on the financial front, levying taxes and marketing bonds while desperately battling to contain wartime inflation. And while the Union and Rebel armies fought increasingly savage battles, the Republican-led Congress enacted a blizzard of legislation that made the government, for the first time, a powerful presence in the lives of ordinary Americans. The impact was revolutionary. The activist 37th Congress legislated for homesteads and a transcontinental railroad and involved the federal government in education, agriculture, and eventually immigration policy. It established a progressive income tax and created the greenback—paper money. While the Union became self-sustaining, the South plunged into financial free fall, having failed to leverage its cotton wealth to finance the war. Founded in a crucible of anticentralism, the Confederacy was trapped in a static (and slave-based) agrarian economy without federal taxing power or other means of government financing, save for its overworked printing presses. This led to an epic collapse. Though Confederate troops continued to hold their own, the North’s financial advantage over the South, where citizens increasingly went hungry, proved decisive; the war was won as much (or more) in the respective treasuries as on the battlefields. Roger Lowenstein reveals the largely untold story of how Lincoln used the urgency of the Civil War to transform a union of states into a nation. Through a financial lens, he explores how this second American revolution, led by Lincoln, his cabinet, and a Congress studded with towering statesmen, changed the direction of the country and established a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.

The Hike

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Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0399563865
Total Pages : 288 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (995 download)

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Book Synopsis The Hike by : Drew Magary

Download or read book The Hike written by Drew Magary and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2016-08-02 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The Hike just works. It’s like early, good Chuck Palahniuk. . . . Magary underhands a twist in at the end that hits you like a sharp jab at the bell. . . . It’s just that good.” —NPR.org “A page-turner. . . . Inventive, funny. . . . Quietly profound and touching.”—BoingBoing From the author of The Night the Lights Went Out and The Postmortal, a fantasy saga unlike any you’ve read before, weaving elements of folk tales and video games into a riveting, unforgettable adventure of what a man will endure to return to his family When Ben, a suburban family man, takes a business trip to rural Pennsylvania, he decides to spend the afternoon before his dinner meeting on a short hike. Once he sets out into the woods behind his hotel, he quickly comes to realize that the path he has chosen cannot be given up easily. With no choice but to move forward, Ben finds himself falling deeper and deeper into a world of man-eating giants, bizarre demons, and colossal insects. On a quest of epic, life-or-death proportions, Ben finds help comes in some of the most unexpected forms, including a profane crustacean and a variety of magical objects, tools, and potions. Desperate to return to his family, Ben is determined to track down the “Producer,” the creator of the world in which he is being held hostage and the only one who can free him from the path. At once bitingly funny and emotionally absorbing, Magary’s novel is a remarkably unique addition to the contemporary fantasy genre, one that draws as easily from the world of classic folk tales as it does from video games. In The Hike, Magary takes readers on a daring odyssey away from our day-to-day grind and transports them into an enthralling world propelled by heart, imagination, and survival.

Our American Cousin

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Author :
Publisher : BoD - Books on Demand
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 122 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (418 download)

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Book Synopsis Our American Cousin by : Tom Taylor

Download or read book Our American Cousin written by Tom Taylor and published by BoD - Books on Demand. This book was released on 2023-06-25 with total page 122 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our American Cousin is a three-act play written by English playwright Tom Taylor. The play opened in London in 1858 but quickly made its way to the U.S. and premiered at Laura Keene’s Theatre in New York City later that year. It remained popular in the U.S. and England for the next several decades. Its most notable claim to fame, however, is that it was the play U.S. President Abraham Lincoln was watching on April 14, 1865 when he was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth, who used his knowledge of the script to shoot Lincoln during a more raucous scene. The play is a classic Victorian farce with a whole range of stereotyped characters, business, and many entrances and exits. The plot features a boorish but honest American cousin who travels to the aristocratic English countryside to claim his inheritance, and then quickly becomes swept up in the family’s affairs. An inevitable rescue of the family’s fortunes and of the various damsels in distress ensues. Our American Cousin was originally written as a farce for an English audience, with the laughs coming mostly at the expense of the naive American character. But after it moved to the U.S. it was eventually recast as a comedy where English caricatures like the pompous Lord Dundreary soon became the primary source of hilarity. This early version, published in 1869, contains fewer of that character’s nonsensical adages, which soon came to be known as “Dundrearyisms,” and for which the play eventually gained much of its popular appeal.

Lincoln's Sense of Humor

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Author :
Publisher : SIU Press
ISBN 13 : 0809336146
Total Pages : 185 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (93 download)

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Book Synopsis Lincoln's Sense of Humor by : Richard Carwardine

Download or read book Lincoln's Sense of Humor written by Richard Carwardine and published by SIU Press. This book was released on 2017-10-23 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Abraham Lincoln was the first president consistently to make storytelling and laughter tools of office. This book shows how his uses of humor evolved to fit changing personal circumstances, and explores its versatility, range of expressions, and multiple sources"--

Abraham Lincoln and Civil War America

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0199857776
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (998 download)

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Book Synopsis Abraham Lincoln and Civil War America by : William E. Gienapp

Download or read book Abraham Lincoln and Civil War America written by William E. Gienapp and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2002-04-08 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Abraham Lincoln and Civil War America, historian William Gienapp provides a remarkably concise, up-to-date, and vibrant biography of the most revered figure in United States history. While the heart of the book focuses on the Civil War, Gienapp begins with a finely etched portrait of Lincoln's early life, from pioneer farm boy to politician and lawyer in Springfield, to his stunning election as sixteenth president of the United States. Students will see how Lincoln grew during his years in office, how he developed a keen aptitude for military strategy and displayed enormous skill in dealing with his generals, and how his war strategy evolved from a desire to preserve the Union to emancipation and total war. Gienapp shows how Lincoln's early years influenced his skills as commander-in-chief and demonstrates that, throughout the stresses of the war years, Lincoln's basic character shone through: his good will and fundamental decency, his remarkable self-confidence matched with genuine humility, his immunity to the passions and hatreds the war spawned, his extraordinary patience, and his timeless devotion. A former backwoodsman and country lawyer, Abraham Lincoln rose to become one of our greatest presidents. This biography offers a vivid account of Lincoln's dramatic ascension to the pinnacle of American history.