Booknotes: Iowa and the Civil War, Volume 2

New Arrival:
• Iowa and the Civil War, Volume 2: From Iuka to the Red River, 1862-1864 by Kenneth L. Lyftogt (Camp Pope Publishing, 2020).

The first volume of a planned trilogy, Kenneth Lyftogt's Iowa and the Civil War, Volume 1: Free Child of the Missouri Compromise 1850-1862, won the 2019 A.M. Pate Award for best Trans-Mississippi Civil War book of that year. Volume 1 concluded with the Battle of Shiloh, and Lyftogt's Iowa and the Civil War, Volume 2: From Iuka to the Red River, 1862-1864 picks up from there, following Iowa's soldiers through Iuka, Corinth, Davis Bridge, Prairie Grove, Vicksburg, Chattanooga, and Red River (with the future Volume 3 beginning with the Atlanta Campaign).

As was the case with Volume 1, this book also extends its discussion of Civil War Iowa off the battlefield and to the home front. From the description: "While Iowa’s soldiers marched and fought, the people back home rallied to their support. Women such as Keokuk’s Annie Turner Wittenmyer and Ann Harlan, wife of Senator James Harlan, organized aid societies that gathered tons of clothes, food, and other supplies and saw to it that they got to the Iowa troops in the field. Women, some remembered, but most lost to history, often went to war. Many Iowa regiments had wives, mothers, and other women volunteers who worked in the hospitals and in the camps. Local newspapers kept the people of Iowa informed on the battles and politics, while war rallies and celebrations kept the war fever hot. The dead, brought home from far away, and the returning sick and wounded served as daily reminders of Iowa’s commitment to the war." Accompanying the text are sixteen original maps and a host of photographs and illustrations.