Description
Book SynopsisThis is an engaging study of Lincoln and how he shaped a nation.'It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us...that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth' - Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, 1863.Lincoln's life, leadership qualities and achievements have made him a figurehead of American values, ranked as one of the greatest US presidents. Thomas Crump examines how the United States was transformed - politically, economically, geographically and socially - during Lincoln's life, and how, more than anyone else, he adapted to these changes and gave them a new direction. This was essentially the beginning of the steam age, meaning that the adult Lincoln lived against a backdrop of steamboats on the great inland waterways and a continually expanding railroad network opening up the new states beyond the Appalachians. The foundations of America as an industrial state - at least in the north - were being laid.Lincoln preserved the Union with his skilful supervision of the war effort, his selection of effective commanders such as Grant and Sherman, and his powerful rhetoric to rally public support. His re-election in the 1864 presidential election was a landslide victory. Crump portrays Lincoln's America and shows how institutions, places and people changed during Lincoln's lifetime. By the time of his death the country is presented as on the verge of a great breakthrough, foreshadowed by events on the Pacific coast in the 1850s, and worked for by Lincoln.Written with clarity and insight, this is an engaging account of the true beginnings of the modern United States.
Trade ReviewThomas Crump's clear, insightful and engaging account of the beginnings of modern America explains, in many ways, how the US came to require the brave sacrifice of David Llewellyn and many others. It also compellingly describes how Americans developed the means to face one another in a dreadful conflict of mass artillery, troop movements by rail and steamboat, early machine guns and menacing industrial power. * The Marlburian Club Magazine, Winter 2009 *
Table of Contents1: The American Republic in 1809; 2: The People of the United States in 1809; 3: The British Connection; 4: The Steam Boat Revolution; 5: Illinois Land of Lincoln; 6: King Cotton; 7: The Missouri Compromise; 8: Railroads; 9: California Strikes Gold; 10: Washington 1847-48; 11: Bleeding Kansas; 12: Civil War.
