Mourning Lincoln: Shock, Sorrow, Anger, and Glee in the Archives

Reading private letters and journals, this book-in-progress investigates personal responses to Lincoln’s assassination, encompassing Union and Confederate, black and white, men and women, soldiers and civilians, rich and poor, the well-known and the unknown. What can these responses to such a cataclysmic event tell us about the aftermath of the Civil War, and what can we learn about understanding a transformative event on a human scale?