Spies and Spymasters of the Civil War

by Donald E. Markle

"The history of Civil War espionage is usually mentioned only in passing in general accounts of the war. Lying under a cloud of romanticism, its details have had to be ferreted out in specialized sources. For his complete account of the subject, Markle draws upon just about all the available material and summarizes it with judgment, balance, clarity, and occasional wit. Among the subtopics are technology (photography for mapmaking and Confederate use of a forerunner of microfilm), the value of women spies (less subject to suspicion, they could move with greater freedom than male spies), and the roles of blacks as spies. A good case could be made that this volume is the single most valuable contribution to general Civil War literature so far this year. "--Booklist

Genres: History, Civil War, Nonfiction, Military Fiction

314 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

Reviews

[Lisa · Rating 1 out of 5]

Goodness gracious. Fascinating information, but this reads like someone's notes rather than a finished product. The way it's organized, it's not suited for just sitting down and reading as-is, but rather reading in snippets, which is shy it took so long. Shame, as like I said, the info is interesting.
Dabney and wife's clothesline system of signals (p.61) was one such interesting tidbit.

An example of this being more of a compilation of notes as a precursor to a paper or a book is when Markle mentions Dr. Walker's MoH was rescinded but not why (p.189). Also mentions it was reinstated but again, not why. Also mentions it was for her spy work, but she applied to be a spy and was rejected. Was the research incomplete? (https://www.cmohs.org/recipients/mary..., https://www.army.mil/article/183800/m...)

[STEVEN WOODS · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ingrossing

At this point, I have read most of the standard Civil War books. Expanded my knowledge about less known areas of Civil War History.

[Suzie Stevens-Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was very informative especially if you did not know how much spying went on.

[Sandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting material but boring writing

[Darrenglass · Rating 4 out of 5]

There was some irony in the fact that I moved to Gettysburg given that a) I am not a history buff by any means, b) to the extent that I do enjoy history it is definitely not military history and c) even if I am going to learn military history, I had especially little interest in the Civil War. So for seven years I have lived here and at times actively avoided the exciting (and to some people fascinating) history of the battle of Gettysburg. I havent even read Killer Angels, despite the fact that I know I should.

But I have been teaching a course on cryptography for a few years now, and I figured that I owed it to my students, some number of whom are very interested in the civil war, to learn some more about cryptographic methods used at the time. And this book certainly served that purpose, giving me some good information to pass along to students and at least one idea for a class activity to do. Markle is a solid writer, and this book is well researched with interesting information. If you are interested in the topic, then I certainly recommend the book.

But I still am not a civil war fan, and I don't plan to read much more in the area. Sorry.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this as background for a civil war story I was doing, and as I recall, it wasn't necessarily a literary masterpiece, but had a lot of interesting information and anecdotes about spies, both military and civilian, on both sides of the Civil War.

[Shala Howell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting read. I would like it better if there were fewer paragraphs ending in exclamation points. Almost invariably the exclaimed sentences state an obvious point or simply repeat a point made earlier in the paragraph-just in case I didn't catch the point the first time he wrote it, I guess.

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent reference book. I learned a lot from it and it heavily inspired my interest in Civil War espionage artists. I need to get it from the library so I can reread it.

[Shelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some interesting information but overall I felt there was just something lacking. Can't quite put my finger on it.

[Eric Olson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not too amazing, it does have a ton of details regarding so, so many of the spies efforts during the Civil War.