Shortly after the Civil War, journalists began revisiting sites of battle and reporting on conditions. These reports comprise a curious, hard-to-classify literary genre of war remembrance and reportage. This research compares three contemporary personal narratives about the Civil War:
Emory Thomas, Travels to Hallowed Ground (1987)
Jerry Ellis, Marching Through Georgia: My Walk with Sherman (1995)
Tony Horwitz, Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War (1998)
Encountering history is a central objective in each work. The writers tell their stories within the narrative structure of journeys. Their journeys are undertaken quickly, leading to impressionistic drive-by history. Although each book is journalistic in nature, the writers bring different perspectives to their projects. Horwitz, a journalist, has won a Pulitzer Prize for national
reporting. Thomas is a distinguished historian, and Ellis is a travel writer and adventurer.
The books become journeys of self discovery as well as reports about the modern South. Wherever the Civil War has left "ghost marks on the landscape," the war still has a significant impact on culture, ethnicity, politics,
regionalism, education, and tourism. History, in these reports, is something more than a journalistic gloss on contemporary affairs; history matters. The writers struggle to explain the complex mythology of Southern identity.
Dr. Kittrell Rushing or Dr. David Sachsman 311 Frist Hall Communication Department The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Chattanooga, Tennessee 37403-2598 http://www.utc.edu/commdept/conference/
19th Century and Free Expression Conference Home Page.
1998 Symposium Program & Abstracts 1997 Symposium Program & Abstracts 1996 Symposium Program and Contacts 1995 Symposium Program and Contacts
U.S. Library of Congress American Memory Project: The Civil War
Return to the UTC Communication Department Index
Last updated: November 20, 1999
comments to: commdept@cecasun.utc.edu