Civil War History

After reading the studies published in both The Journal of the Civil War Era and Civil War History I have a far better understanding of the many different subfields that make up the historical study of the Civil War. My response to the question which prompted this essay would be that I consider myself to be a military Civil War historian. However, I am not a military historian in the traditional sense. I am interested in studying the military strategies used by the great military minds of the Civil War, but that is not all I am interested in. I believe that the actions of both armies had such a profound and destructive affect not only on each other but on civilians as well. I believe that the best way to improve and advance the field of military history of the Civil War would be to expand the field itself. Military history should not just study the tactics and strategies used by military leaders in battle, but rather a study of the effects caused by both the Confederate and Union armies’ actions. The affects the battle had on the moral and psyche of the troops, the environmental effects of a battle in a specific geographical location. As well as how battles affected the civilians of nearby towns and civilians in general who affected in some way because of the
Environmental history of the Civil War is a growing field, which has already produced great information about the affect the war had on the environment. I am fine with environmental history becoming it’s on field and I hope it continues to grow as its own field. However, I do believe that those who wish to study the military history of the Civil War need to also study how the environment was affected by battle. After all it was not the regular civilians who destroyed acres of land and caused ecological problems it was the Union and Confederate military