Books published by University of Virginia Press

Examines how the demands of western settlers, the potential of western disunion, and local, popular politics determined the fate of slavery and freedom in the West between 1790 and 1820. This book demonstrates that local political contests and geopolitical realities were responsible for determining slavery's fate in the West.

Most Americans think of the Civil War as a series of dramatic clashes between massive armies led by romantic-seeming leaders. But in the Appalachian communities of North Georgia, things were very different. Focusing on Fannin and Lumpkin counties in the Blue Ridge Mountains along Georgia's northern border, A Separate Civil War: Communities in Conflict in the Mountain South argues for a more localized, idiosyncratic understanding of this momentous period in our nation's history. The book reveals that, for many participants, this war was fought less for abstract ideological causes than for reasons tied to home, family, friends, and community.Making use of a large trove of letters, diaries, interviews, government documents, and sociological data, Jonathan Dean Sarris brings to life a previously obscured version of our nation's most divisive and destructive war. From the outset, the prospect of secession and war divided Georgia's mountain communities along the lines of race and religion, and war itself only heightened these tensions. As the Confederate government began to draft men into the army and seize supplies from farmers, many mountaineers became more disaffected still. They banded together in armed squads, fighting off Confederate soldiers, state militia, and their own pro-Confederate neighbors. A local civil war ensued, with each side seeing the other as a threat to law, order, and community itself. In this very personal conflict, both factions came to dehumanize their enemies and use methods that shocked even seasoned soldiers with their savagery. But when the war was over in 1865, each faction sought to sanitize the past and integrate its stories into the national myths later popularized about the Civil War. By arguing that the reason for choosing sides had more to do with local concerns than with competing ideologies or social or political visions, Sarris adds a much-needed complication to the question of why men fought in the Civil War.

Examines the literatures of the Caribbean from an ecocritical perspective in all language areas of the region. This book explores the ways in which the history of transplantation and settlement has provided unique challenges and opportunities for establishing a sense of place and an environmental ethic in the Caribbean.

In this book, Curtis Badger's goals are to draw the observer beyond the armchair and reading lamp, the museum and classroom, and outdoors onto the beaches and tidal flats of the Virginia coast to experience its rich natural diversity firsthand.

Volume 12 of this series documents Washington's unsuccessful efforts to capitalize on the American victory at Saratoga and his decision to encamp the Continental army for the winter at Valley Forge.

This is the 11th part in a series of volumes containing the papers of George Washington. This particular volume contains correspondence, orders and other documents from August to October 1777, one of the most militarily active periods of America's Revolutionary War.