Booknotes: Anatomy of a Duel

New Arrival:

• Anatomy of a Duel: Secession, Civil War, and the Evolution of Kentucky Violence by Stuart W. Sanders (UP of Kentucky, 2023).

When I think of Civil War duels, ones actually carried out and properly conducted under the agreed upon rules of the time, the only affair that immediately comes to mind is the fatal September 1863 encounter in Arkansas between Confederate generals John S. Marmaduke and Lucius M. "Marsh" Walker. Wikipedia lists a dozen other Confederate duels. It has been suggested that there were no Civil War duels between Union officers, but Stuart Sanders's Anatomy of a Duel: Secession, Civil War, and the Evolution of Kentucky Violence examines one fought between a Union officer and a civilian.

From the description: Though American dueling tradition essentially disappeared in the North long before the outbreak of the Civil War, the deadly practice remained a part of Southern culture. "During the Civil War, two prominent Kentuckians―one a Union colonel and the other a pro-Confederate civilian―continued this legacy by dueling. At a time when thousands of soldiers were slaughtering one another on battlefields, Colonel Leonidas Metcalfe and William T. Casto transformed the bank of the Ohio River into their own personal battleground. On May 8, 1862, these two men, both of whom were steeped in Southern honor culture, fought a formal duel with rifles at sixty yards." In the exchange of fire, Casto fell dead. Metcalfe continued to serve in the Union Army.

Sanders is interested in more than just the story of a single duel. Anatomy of a Duel "examines why white male Kentuckians engaged in the "honor culture" of duels and provides fascinating narratives that trace the lives of duelists." Situating the Casto-Metcalfe duel within its proper cultural and political context, Sanders's narrative "explores why, during a time when Americans were killing one another in open, brutal warfare, Casto and Metcalfe engaged in the process of negotiating and fighting a duel. In deconstructing the event, Sanders details why these distinguished Kentuckians found themselves on the dueling ground during the nation's bloodiest conflict, how society and the Civil War pushed them to fight, why duels continued to be fought in Kentucky even after this violent confrontation, and how Kentuckians applied violence after the Civil War."