Customer Reviews

What People Wore During the Civil War (Clothing, Costumes, and Uniforms Throughout American History)

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The American Civil War is often described as the conflict between the Blue and the Gray. Not so, according to Draper, who maintains that "When they ran out of gray dye, Southern Soldiers would use yellow dye." (YELLOW? Huh??? Perhaps she means "butternut brown" - a color which period gray dyes naturally turn after exposure to sunlight. No yellow dye involved!)

Other fanciful and utterly undocumentable statements include, "Day dresses had narrow sleeves. This was so the sleeves would not fall into a pot of soup or get caught in a piece of needlework." (actually, sleeves were narrow in the 1840s, and much wider in the 1860s) Or, that soldiers themselves dyed their civilian clothes gray "to match the other soldiers" (carrying big cast iron dyepots on their backs as they marched along, presumably?) or that they tried to boil the blue dye out of Federal uniforms (doesn't work with indigo, sorry). The author also asserts without further explanation that, "boys sometimes wore skeleton suits". (THAT ought to confuse readers! Happy Halloween!)

As well the various myths and mistatements of the author's own invention, the book also manages to perpetuate in 24 short pages many of the worst myths and false "reenactorisms" about clothing of the era -- (1) that by late war Confederate soldiers were ragged and short of clothing (all serious primary source research has debunked this), or that (2) Confederates were largely clad in the clothes of dead Federal soldiers (nope, see above) or that (3) women laced their corsets so tightly that they fainted a lot. (wrong part of the 19th c.)

The book is a veritable gallery of photographs of reenactors whom one might politely term "authenticity-challenged", including two ladies wearing bangs (no!), one of whom also has frosted nailpolish (double no!) Apart from the lady on pages 14-15 (who looks VERY good -how'd she get in here?), the overall outfits shown range from outright wrong to merely so-so mass-market sutler stuff.

The book also gives only two recommended internet links, neither of which are key Civil War costuming sites and both of which are no longer functioning. One hasn't been updated since early 1998. However, this book just came out (July 2001) - apparently nobody checked.

For a clothing history book focusing on the Civil War period. it appears the author knows next to nothing about either topic. It reads like it was thrown together in haste to meet a deadline by a non-specialist, operating on pure hearsay without any checking of facts whatsoever. What's sad is that this is meant to be a children's book for grades K-5. If it's bought by school libraries, there's a danger it will be many childrens' only exposure to this fascinating topic.

Sorry to have to be so negative, but this really IS one to avoid. Buy your children Juanita Leisch's "Civil War Civiiians" or "Who Wore What" or -- Time Life's "Echoes of Glory" instead -- even if the reading in these books is well above K-5 level, there are abundant pictures to hold a child's interest -- of REAL people of the era and of original articles of clothing. At least that way, they'd get an accurate picture of what people REALLY wore during the Civil War era.

I don't know which civil war this book refers to, but it certainly is not our American Civil War! I do not know where the author got all this information, but 99.44% is incorrect and a lot is outright laughable. If you want your children to see what people wore during the Civil War, get one of Juanita Leisch's excellent books.

Bad bad bad and WORSE. This person clearly did little (more likely NO) research before penning this monstrosity. The people photographed HAVE to be models and not real Civil War reenactors, or they'd know that what they were putting on is completely inaccurate for the period. As for the uniforms....NOBODY wore yellow! Does the "blue and the gray" mean nothing to this writer????