Sherman's March in Myth and Memory

Sherman's March in Myth and Memory examines William Tecumseh Sherman's treatment in the press, among historians, on stage and screen, and in literature, from the time of the March to the present day. The authors show us the many ways in which Sherman has been portrayed in the media and popular culture, and how his devastating March has been stamped into our collective memory.

Ed Caudill is a retired journalism professor who taught at the University of Tennessee for more than 30 years. He spent summers meandering the country, and beyond, with his two sons, and in the school year he taught editing and history. At UT, his books earned him tenure and ire, being outside the usual academic dreariness of jargon-laden journals that no one read. His numerous books have focused largely, but not exclusively, on American imagination and memory. With co-author and professor emeritus Paul Ashdown, those books have looked at Civil War figures. Caudill's other work have looked at the impact of Darwinism in American culture, from publication of On the Origin of Species in 1859 through the 1925 Scopes Trial. He continues to write between road trips around the country, especially to places that offer good fly fishing from Georgia to Alaska.

This book is a valuable resource. The breadth of coverage-history, literature, poetry, song, stage, and screen-is extremely impressive. Civil War Book Review Having read the first two excellent books-on Forrest and Mosby-in this unique trilogy, I opened this final book with high expectations of a masterful achievement. In both fact and myth, Sherman was and clearly still is multifaceted. On the eve of the Civil War Sesquicentennial, Caudill and Ashdown eloquently render a multifaceted portrait of a hell of a man. -- David Madden, founding director of the United States Civil War Center As is often true in our history, the mythology of major events has a history of its own, shaping our visions of the past. Edward Caudill and Paul Ashdown have traced this Civil War scar in Southern memory to its roots in reality, in memoirs, in histories, in the press, and in mythology, basing their story on rich primary sources and portraying events with the same elegant language they have used in other important Civil War interpretative histories. -- Donald L. Shaw, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill A major contribution to Civil War historiography... cannot be overlooked. Recommended for all history collections-Civil War, social, or intellectual-in all libraries. Library Journal Integral to the study of public history and collective memory to deliver a cutting-edge analysis. America's Civil War Perhaps the most impressive thing about mass media is their ability to shape historical memory and imagination. Sherman's March in Myth and Memory is one of the best examples now available that shows how this phenomenon works in transforming a region's understanding of itself. Professors Caudill and Ashdown are to be highly commended for this first rate work. -- Bruce J. Evensen, DePaul University Interesting and exceptionally well-sourced... Thoroughly enjoyable. It provides a worthy new addition to the now burgeoning field of scholarship about media and public memory and would be useful not only to historians but in graduate seminars for students of both history and mass communication. Journalism History Recommended. Book Review Digest The images of Gen. William T. Sherman's men marching through Georgia seemingly remain burned into the American historical memory. Edward Caudill and Paul Ashdown here provide their solidly researched look at how the myth and legends of the march have been created. Works such as this provide an important starting place for further study of those myths that still march on. -- James Klotter Journal of American History Caudill and Ashdown have constructed a useful book, filled with examples from humor and popular culture that reveal Sherman's place in history and memory. Such memory studies pertaining to the Civil War enable us to better grasp the complexities of this defining moment in American history. The Journal Of Southern History