A History of the Ozarks, Volume 2: The Conflicted Ozarks

A History of the Ozarks #2

by Brooks Blevins

The Ozarks of the mid-1800s was a land of divisions. The uplands and its people inhabited a geographic and cultural borderland straddling Midwest and west, North and South, frontier and civilization, and secessionist and Unionist. As civil war raged across the region, neighbor turned against neighbor, unleashing a generation of animus and violence that lasted long after 1865. The second volume of Brooks Blevins's history begins with the region's distinctive relationship to slavery. Largely unsuitable for plantation farming, the Ozarks used enslaved persons on a smaller scale or, in some places, not at all. Blevins moves on to the devastating Civil War years where the dehumanizing, personal nature of Ozark conflict was made uglier by the predations of marching armies and criminal gangs. Blending personal stories with a wide narrative scope, he examines how civilians and soldiers alike experienced the war, from brutal partisan warfare to ill-advised refugee policies to women's struggles to safeguard farms and stay alive in an atmosphere of constant danger. The war stunted the region's growth, delaying the development of Ozarks society and the processes of physical, economic, and social reconstruction. More and more, striving uplanders dedicated to modernization fought an image of the Ozarks as a land of mountaineers and hillbillies hostile to the idea of progress. Yet the dawn of the twentieth century saw the uplands emerge as an increasingly uniform culture forged, for better and worse, in the tumult of a conflicted era.

Genres: History

320 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 16, 2019

About the author

Brooks Blevins is the Noel Boyd Professor of Ozarks Studies at Missouri State University.

Reviews

[Dorothy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I haven't read the first volume of Brooks Blevins' trilogy, but the second volume covers the civil war in the Ozarks region very thoroughly. Blevins endeavors to puzzle out the battles, personalities, and details of the war, but also describes the brutalities of both sides when it comes to collateral horrors in the people left behind in the farms and towns. There are no heroes or villains portrayed by Brooks in a simplistic manner, only good and bad acts portrayed by people with complex motives. There was more slave owning in the area than I would have thought, but there is little evidence to write their stories in a history book such as this, unfortunately. The second half of the book deals with reconstruction, and how and why the mining, railroads, and timber industries emerged after the war.
He also touches on how myths about Ozarkians emerged from newspaper and magazine stories, and the Shepherd of the Hills novel. This book is dense reading, but reveals nuggets of interesting facts from the past.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

A HISTORY OF THE OZARKS, VOLUME 2: THE CONFLICTED OZARKS by Brooks Blevins. Published September 16 2019 by University of Illinois Press.

Readers of this page will remember I reviewed Volume 1 of what will be a three volume history of the Ozarks around this time last year. I was very impressed with Brooks Blevins’ ability to pack a lot of information into a brilliant narrative of the region and its people, and I was definitely looking forward to his second volume. To say the least, I was not disappointed.

Blevins picks up the story just before the beginning of the Civil War and carries it into the 1880s. He gives us a narrative of the political, economic, social and military situation in the Missouri and Arkansas Ozarks, and he combines the stories of well-known figures in the region with the compelling stories of regular folks, and how they endured four years of conflict that really did not end in 1865.

In Blevins’ account we see large armies on the march, devastating the landscape through which they passed. We also see Union and Confederate irregular forces carrying out a war of vengeance, a war that was continued after the surrender with the rise of organizations like the Bald Knobbers and the Anti-Bald Knobbers.

Blevins also, in my opinion, gives the best single chapter analysis of the situation in the region, prior to the war, in Chapter 2 of the book. His writing and research is impeccable and concise, while at the same time being quite thorough.

In the final chapters of volume two Blevins details how political, business, and religious leaders embraced the concept of the New South, minutely detailing how people began harvesting the natural resources of the region, with encouragement of the aforementioned leaders. He just begins to tell the story of tourism in the Ozarks, and how it has played a huge part in how the residents of the region are, to this day, perceived by a large part of the outside.

If you’ve not yet read volume one of this trilogy. I encourage you to do so. Then read volume two. Then wait anxiously, as I am, for the third and final volume of what will become the definitive history of the Ozarks and its people.

[Richard Pierce · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author follows up Volume I with another beautifully written regional history. Covering the same geographical area, the Ozark Plateau, as in the first volume, he covers the Civil War and reconstruction. He provides a well researched history of the Civil War not well represented in most books about this period. A first-class read if you have any interest in the 'Ozarks'.

[Pat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book number 2 of a three part series. Civil War era and reconstruction; up to about 1900. The history is exact and documented. Being from the Ozarks for many generations makes this fascinating. I thought I knew the Ozark history, but guess I only knew it from local stories and not the whole Ozark region. Good for a reread and a keeper too.

[Dave Dishman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent view of the Civil War Ozarks. Hard to believe what people dealt with for years as guerrilla fighters and outlaws ranged the Ozarks, killing and taking what they wanted from the innocent people trapped between the Union and Confederacy.