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The Impact of the Civil War and Reconstruction on Arkansas

Persistence in the Midst of Ruin

Carl H Moneyhon author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:University of Arkansas Press

Published:30th Sep '02

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The Impact of the Civil War and Reconstruction on Arkansas cover

This groundbreaking study, first published in 1994, draws on a rich variety of primary sources to describe Arkansas society before, during, and after the Civil War. While the Civil War devastated the state, this book shows how those who were powerful before the war reclaimed their dominance during Reconstruction. Most importantly, the white elite's postwar commitment to a cotton economy led them to set up a sharecropping system very much like slavery, in which workers had little control over their own labor. In arguing for both change and continuity, Moneyhon reconciles contemporary accounts of the war's effects while addressing ongoing debates within the historical literature.

"Its smooth narrative style and revisionist interpretations of such key topics as slavery, emancipation, and Radical Reconstruction will guarantee it a place as a standard history of an important, if often slighted, state. . . . Moneyhon's discussion of the war years is one of the best short treatments available for any southern state." —Arkansas Historical Quarterly "A major contribution to nineteenth-century historiography." —American Historical Review "Students of both southern and national history will welcome Moneyhon's study. The research is sound, and excellent maps and informative tables enhance the text." —Southwestern Historical Quarterly

"Intriguing. . . . [Moneyhon] has tendered a penetrating portrait of Arkansas based on a wide variety of primary sources, some of which have been ignored entirely or little used. His narrative style is crisp and inviting, and his careful analysis . . . is perceptive and convincing." —Journal of American History

ISBN: 9781557287359

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: 503g

288 pages