Campus News

Book looks at nature’s effect on Civil War

The Blue, the Gray, and the Green: Toward an Environmental History of the Civil War
Edited by Brian Allen Drake
University of Georgia Press
Hardcover: $69.95 Paper: $22.95

The Blue, the Gray, and the Green is one of only a handful of books to apply an environmental history approach to the Civil War. This book explores how nature—disease, climate, flora, fauna and other factors—affected the war and also how the war shaped Americans’ perceptions, understanding and use of nature. The contributors use a range of approaches that serve as a valuable template for future environmental histories of the conflict.

In his introduction, editor Brian Allen Drake, a lecturer in UGA’s history department, describes the sparse body of environmental history literature related to the Civil War and lays out a blueprint for the theoretical basis of each essay.

The Blue, the Gray, and the Green provides a provocative environmental commentary that enriches understanding of the Civil War.