With Fire and Sword

Samuel Hawkins Marshall ByersProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.1

Word count: 245K words
Chapters: 25

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today. With Fire and Sword by S. H. M. Byers. Author: Byers, S. H. M. (Samuel Hawkins Marshall), 1838-1933. Language: English. Class: E456: History: America: Civil War period (1861-1865). Release Date: Aug 11, 2012

Editor's review

This book is a historical document from the American Civil War, in which the author, S. H. M. Byers, draws on his own experience to record what he saw and lived through in the Union army. Its value lies not in a grand narrative of the war but in the individual perspective: camp life, marches and the details of battle, which give readers a sense of what nineteenth-century warfare felt like on the ground. The prose carries the rhetorical habits of nineteenth-century English, dwelling on events and impressions rather than on data and analysis. As a free public-domain eBook from Project Gutenberg, it works well as supplementary material for the study of the Civil War, and equally well for readers who enjoy first-hand war memoirs or nineteenth-century English texts and wish to dip in at leisure. There is no need to follow a continuous plot; chapters can be read selectively as slices of the period. For a systematic understanding of the war's background, it is best read alongside general histories.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Historians of the American Civil War seeking first-hand accounts
Military enthusiasts interested in nineteenth-century camp life and the details of warfare
Readers who want to practise reading English originals and become familiar with nineteenth-century prose

Not a good fit for

Beginners looking for a systematic general history of the Civil War and battle analysis
Readers who prefer brisk modern narrative and have little patience for old-fashioned English

Reading tips

Start with the table of contents and chapter headings, and read first the chapters dealing with marches and battles.
Keep a Civil War timeline at hand and check the year and battlefield of events as you read.
Do not look up every old-fashioned expression; grasp the sequence of events first, then return to the language.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a historical record?

It is a war memoir based on the author's own experience, a historical narrative rather than a work of fiction. The focus is on personal experience and impressions on the spot rather than a complete military history, so it should be read as a primary source, not as systematic historical conclusions.

How difficult is the English? Is it suitable for non-native readers?

The text is nineteenth-century English, with long sentences and considerable rhetoric, and is harder than modern popular writing. Readers with intermediate English or above can finish it with a dictionary; those who only want the content can also read it alongside a translation or related material in Chinese.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

It is a free public-domain eBook, easy to download and search, and suited to reading on an e-reader or making excerpts. It contains no modern scholarly notes or introduction, so readers must supply the background themselves; a general history or encyclopedia is recommended alongside it.

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About the author

Samuel Hawkins Marshall Byers Author · American · 1838–1933

Samuel Hawkins Marshall Byers (1838–1933) was an American poet, writer, and diplomat. Captured during the Civil War and held at Libby Prison, he wrote the famous poem "Sherman's March to the Sea," recording wartime experience from a firsthand perspective in sincere, plain language. After the war he served for more than twenty years as a U.S. consul in Switzerland and Italy, continuing to write alongside his official duties. His works include With Fire and Sword and Twenty Years in Europe, covering both war memories and travels in Europe. He also wrote A Layman's Life of Jesus, showing an interest in religious subjects. His writings draw largely on personal experience, with a strong documentary quality and an accessible style. Public information is limited, and a full assessment of his life and literary standing requires further research.