"[A] thorough and comprehensive study of this tragic, almost forgotten episode of American history." ―History
"What Sherman did in Georgia and Sheridan in the Valley pales in comparison. This study truly shows the horrible cost inherent in any civil war." ―Civil War Courier
"[A] well written and compelling account of an aspect of the Civil War which has not received sufficient attention." ―Southern Historian
"Compelling..." ―Publishers Weekly
"[A] fast-paced.. .absorbing discourse... Black Flag is a highly recommended book that transports the reader to the towns and dusty highways of Kansas and Missouri during the Civil War." ―Kansas History
From 1861 to 1865, the region along the Missouri-Kansas border was the scene of unbelievable death and destruction. Thousands died, millions of dollars of property was lost, entire populations were violently uprooted. It was here also that some of the greatest atrocities in American history occurred. Yet in the great national tragedy of the Civil War, this savage warfare has seemed a minor episode. Drawing from a wide array of contemporary documents―including diaries, letters, and first-hand newspaper accounts―Thomas Goodrich presents a hair-raising report of life in this merciless guerrilla war. Filled with dramatic detail, Black Flag reveals war at its very worst, told in the words of the participants themselves. Bushwhackers and Jayhawkers, soldiers and civilians, scouts, spies, runaway slaves, the generals and the guerrillas―all step forward to tell of their terrifying ordeals. From the shocking, sensational massacres at Lawrence, Baxter Springs, and Centralia to the silent terror of a woman at home alone in the Aburnt district, Black Flag is a horrifying day-by-day account of life, death and war, told with unforgettable immediacy.

Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare on the Western Border, 1861-1865: A Riveting Account of a Bloody Chapter in Civil War History

History

Thomas Goodrich

GOODRICH, Thomas

Americas

Indiana University Press

"[A] thorough and comprehensive study of this tragic, almost forgotten episode of American history." —History
"What Sherman did in Georgia and Sheridan in the Valley pales in comparison. This study truly shows the horrible cost inherent in any civil war." —Civil War Courier
"[A] well written and compelling account of an aspect of the Civil War which has not received sufficient attention." —Southern Historian
"Compelling..." —Publishers Weekly
"[A] fast-paced.. .absorbing discourse... Black Flag is a highly recommended book that transports the reader to the towns and dusty highways of Kansas and Missouri during the Civil War." —Kansas History
From 1861 to 1865, the region along the Missouri-Kansas border was the scene of unbelievable death and destruction. Thousands died, millions of dollars of property was lost, entire populations were violently uprooted. It was here also that some of the greatest atrocities in American history occurred. Yet in the great national tragedy of the Civil War, this savage warfare has seemed a minor episode. Drawing from a wide array of contemporary documents—including diaries, letters, and first-hand newspaper accounts—Thomas Goodrich presents a hair-raising report of life in this merciless guerrilla war. Filled with dramatic detail, Black Flag reveals war at its very worst, told in the words of the participants themselves. Bushwhackers and Jayhawkers, soldiers and civilians, scouts, spies, runaway slaves, the generals and the guerrillas—all step forward to tell of their terrifying ordeals. From the shocking, sensational massacres at Lawrence, Baxter Springs, and Centralia to the silent terror of a woman at home alone in the Aburnt district, Black Flag is a horrifying day-by-day account of life, death and war, told with unforgettable immediacy.

Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare Western Border 1861-1865

Nowhere was the Civil War as savage as it was in Missouri—and nowhere did it produce a killer more savage than William Anderson. For a brief but dramatic period, "Bloody Bill" played the leading role in the most violent arena of the entire war—and did so with a vicious abandon that spread fear throughout the land. A name associated with William Quantrill and Jesse James, Bloody Bill Anderson was known for never taking prisoners. A former horse thief turned bushwhacker, he became the scourge of Kansas and Missouri with a reputation for unspeakable atrocities. Sometimes he left the bodies of dead Federal soldiers scalped, skinned, and castrated. Sometimes he decapitated them and rearranged their heads. Wherever Bloody Bill rode, the Grim Reaper rode alongside. In telling this story of bitter bloodshed, historians Castel and Goodrich track Bloody Bill's reign of terror over increasingly violent raids. He rode with Quantrill in the infamous sack of Lawrence and killed more victims than any other raider. Then he led the brutal Centralia Massacre, a blood-soaked nightmare recounted here hour-by-hour from firsthand accounts. More than compiling a chronicle of horrors, Castel and Goodrich have produced the first full-fledged account of Anderson's career. They examine his prewar life, explain how he became a guerrilla, then describe the war that he and his men waged against Union soldiers and defenseless civilians alike. The authors' disagreements on many aspects of Anderson's gruesome career add a fascinating dimension to the book. Only 26 when he was killed charging an ambush, Bloody Bill Anderson had already become a legend. This book takes readers behind the legend and provides a closer look at the man—and at the face of terror.

Bloody Bill Anderson: The Short, Savage Life of a Civil War Guerrilla

Biographies & Memoirs

Albert E. Castel

Historical

Univ Pr of Kansas

An unflinching look at the grim years of Southern reconstruction.

The Day Dixie Died: Southern Occupation, 1865-1866

Debra Goodrich

Stackpole Books

A powerful narrative of the border war between proslavery Missouri and free-state Kansas as prologue to the American Civil War.

War to the Knife: Bleeding Kansas, 1854-1861

On August 21, 1863, William Quantrill led 400 Confederate irregulars to a rise on the outskirts of Lawrence, Kansas. For two years, the 3,000 inhabitants of this prosperous frontier community had managed to escape the Civil War which raged in the East. At Quantrill’s command, the horrors of that war were brought directly into their homes. The attack began at dawn. When it was over, more than 150 townsmen were dead and most of the settlement burned to the ground. In Bloody Dawn, Thomas Goodrich considers why this remote settlement was signaled out to receive such brutal treatment. He also describes the retribution that soon followed, which in many ways surpassed the significance of the Lawrence Massacre itself. The story that unfolds reveals an event unlike anything our nation has experienced before or since.

Bloody Dawn: The Story of the Lawrence Massacre

The Kent State University Press

It was the most deadly and destructive war in human history. Millions were killed, billions in property was destroyed, ancient cultures were reduced to rubble--World War II was truly man's greatest cataclysm. Thousands of books, movies and documentary films have been devoted to the war. There has never been such a terrible retelling of the story, however, as one will find in Hellstorm. In a chilling "you-are-there" style, the author places the reader at the scene, in the moment. Throughout this book readers will see what Allied airman saw as they rained down death on German cities; or the reader will experience what those below experienced as they sat trembling in their bomb shelters awaiting that very same death from above. The reader will view up close the horrors of the Eastern Front during the last months of fighting and through the mud, blood and madness of combat they may come to understand how the same German soldiers, who only moments before had destroyed an enemy tank, could now risk their own lives to rescue the trapped Soviet crew inside. Readers will witness for themselves the fate of German women as the rampaging Red Army raped and murdered its way across Europe--all females, from "eight to eighty" feared the dreaded words, "Frau Komm." The worst nautical disasters in history which claimed thousands of lives, the greatest mass migration known to man in which millions perished, the fate of those wretched victims in post-war death camps and torture chambers, these and many other dark secrets of World War II now come to light in Hellstorm.

Hellstorm: The Death Of Nazi Germany, 1944-1947

Aberdeen Books

Millions murdered . . . Millions raped . . . Millions tortured . . . Millions enslaved . . . Millions of men, women and children cast to the winds.No matter what you have read about the Second World War, no matter what you have been told about it, no matter what you believe happened during the so-called "Good War" . . . forget it!Now, for the first time in over 70 years, learn what the war and "peace" looked like to those who lost.Discover what was done to Germany and her people in the name of "freedom, democracy, and liberation."In their own words, in graphic detail, this is their story . . .

Hellstorm: The Death of Nazi Germany 1944-1947

Military

Money Tree Publishing

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Thomas Goodrich. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Thomas Goodrich