The Harp and the Eagle: Irish-American Volunteers and the Union Army, 1861-1865
by Susannah J. Ural
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On the eve of the Civil War, the Irish were one of America's largest ethnic groups, and approximately 150,000 fought for the Union. Analyzing letters and diaries written by soldiers and civilians; military, church, and diplomatic records; and community newspapers, Susannah Ural Bruce significantly expands the story of Irish-American Catholics in the Civil War, and reveals a complex picture of those who fought for the Union.While the population was diverse, many Irish Americans had dual show more loyalties to the U.S. and Ireland, which influenced their decisions to volunteer, fight, or end their military service. When the Union cause supported their interests in Ireland and America, large numbers of Irish Americans enlisted. However, as the war progressed, the Emancipation Proclamation, federal draft, and sharp rise in casualties caused Irish Americans to question ?and sometimes abandon ?the war effort because they viewed such changes as detrimental to their families and futures in America and Ireland.By recognizing these competing and often fluid loyalties, The Harp and the Eagle sheds new light on the relationship between Irish-American volunteers and the Union Army, and how the Irish made sense of both the Civil War and their loyalty to the United States. show lessTags
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This monograph is an unsentimental examination of the realities of the Irish experience during the American Civil War, in that their real contributions could not trump the realities of conditional loyalty among Irish-Americans on one side ("...the Union as it was and the Constitution as it is...") and the hardened prejudice represented by Nativism on the other, culminating in the Irish voting bloc largely supporting George McClellan in 1864; a choice that had reverberations for a generation.
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5 Works 141 Members
Susannah J. Ural is Associate Professor of History at the University of Southern Mississippi and a Senior Fellow of the Center for the Study of War and Society. She is the author of The Harp and the Eagle: Irish-American Volunteers and the Union Army, 1861-1865 (NYU Press, 2006).
Common Knowledge
- Important events
- American Civil War (1861 | 1865)
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- Languages
- English
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- Paper, Ebook
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