Politician in Uniform: General Lew Wallace and the Civil War
Files
Description
Christopher R. Mortenson has been awarded this year’s Wiley Silver Prize for Best First Book in Civil War History for Politician in Uniform: General Lew Wallace and the Civil War (University of Oklahoma Press). Mortenson is Associate Professor and Chair, Department of History, at Ouachita Baptist University. He holds a PhD in History from Texas A&M University, College Station. The prize committee praised Politician in Uniform as follows: "Christopher Mortenson's well sourced, engaging account of political general Lew Wallace’s military career offers a trenchant reassessment of his contributions to the Union war effort, arguing that despite stumbles and misjudgments, he emerged as one of the Union's most influential military leaders. President Lincoln needed to curry nationwide support and thus offered commissions to prominent men who solidified the support of states, ethnicities, or political constituencies. Deftly combining military and political history, Politician in Uniform depicts Wallace, a lawyer and former state senator from Indiana, as an exceptionally able political general, who actually proved more valuable than many middling West Pointers. Major-General Wallace showed his mettle in important battles such as Fort Donelson and Monocacy; as an able defender of Cincinnati; and with his post-war service on the military commissions that tried the Lincoln assassins and Andersonville’s commandant, Henry Wirz. The monograph’s crisp and critical narrative also includes many instances of Wallace’s self-defeating behavior, creating tumultuous relationships with his superiors, such as U.S. Grant. Christopher Mortenson nimbly interweaves Lew Wallace’s fascinating and complicated wartime record with much needed insight and analysis of the vital importance to the Union’s cause of appointing a “Politician in Uniform.”
Publication Date
10-1-2020
Relational Format
Book
Publisher
University of Oklahoma Press
Recommended Citation
Mortenson, Christopher R., "Politician in Uniform: General Lew Wallace and the Civil War" (2020). Wiley-Silver Prize. 5.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/wiley-silver/5
