In the spirit of Robert Adair’s cult classic The Physics of Baseball, here is a book that tackles the long-cherished myths of Civil War history—and ultimately shatters them, based on physics and mathematics. At what range was a Civil War sniper lethal? Did bullets ever “rain like hail”? Could one ever step across a battlefield by stepping only on bodies and never hard ground? How effective were Civil War muskets and rifles? How accurate are photographs and paintings?
In this genre-bending work of history, Scott Hippensteel puts the tropes of Civil War history under the microscope and says, “Wait a minute!” Combining science and history, Hippensteel reexamines much that we hold dear about the Civil War and convincingly argues that memoirs and histories have gotten it wrong.


This is a work of history and science for our era of “fake news”—and for well beyond. Readers will never look at the Civil War the same way again.



Format Inbunden Omfång 264 sidor Språk Engelska Förlag Stackpole Books Utgivningsdatum 2021-11-15 ISBN 9780811739979