The Business of Civil War

This clearly written and detailed study of the northern procurement effort represents a fresh take on the 'sinews of war'.

The first systematic and comprehensive study, based on original archival research into both military and business records, devoted exclusively to the Union's economic mobilization.

A much-needed analysis of Union production and procurement issues.

Perhaps the highest compliment I can pay the author is to say that after I finished reading his book I felt compelled to re-write the lectures in my Civil War course that I devote to mobilization.

One of the most important Civil War books to appear in quite some time.

A concise, well-argued work of scholarship. It enlivens a potentially stolid subject in a manner that engages nonspecialists.

An excellent contribution to the general understanding of Union military institutions.

Wilson's research and core analyses are solid. For reconstituting the complexity, the tensions, and the institutional innovations of massive war supply in a horse-and-wagon economy, Wilson deserves a hearty round of thanks from historians and political scientists.

The book goes beyond a simple Civil War history and adds to the understanding of American business history, as well as the war's legacy to the Gilded Age... valuable to anyone examining nineteenth century business history or the links between the military and industry. Wilson's well written narrative and thorough research makes for compelling reading, and is a welcome addition to Civil War scholarship.

Wilson makes a compelling case.

Wilson provides an excellent treatment of the constantly evolving financial and manufacturing infrastructure that supported United States armies during the Civil War.

An excellent study of military supply on the home front during the war.

An outstanding contribution to our understanding of the military's role in society, politics, and the economy during the nineteenth century.

A compelling account of the political economy of Northern mobilization.

A fascinating account of how the North marshaled its economic might to win the Civil War.

As Wilson observes, historians 'have tended to search for the roots of American bureaucracy in virtually every field except the military'. Wilson has struck a powerful blow against this exceptionalism, and the larger exceptionalism of the state of courts and parties thesis... Wilson presents compelling evidence that they should not be ignored.

Readers will find Wilson's deeply researched account well worth the investment as a study of wartime political economy. It explores areas hitherto mostly neglected and rarely explored: readers will profit from learning how Union authorities procured the material means used to save the Union.

An impressively researched and fresh contribution to the field, Mark Wilson's The Business of Civil War illustrates the role of the military in the American political economy, detailing how the army comes to the fore as orchestrator and manager of the wartime economy and how the Civil War experience may have laid the foundation for postwar developments.