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Portraits of Conflict: A Photographic History of Louisiana in the Civil War

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Portraits in conflict;louisiana in the civil war,is filled with black and white photographs,mainly of persons involved,in some way,in the fighting in that state..The photograph content is generous,but the explainatory text isn't...Indeed,many of the photographs included have little in the way of reference,and are there,seemingly,because nothing else was available...take,for example,the picture of Frederick Wilkerson,to be found on page 134...sure,his picture is there,taking up half the page,but the only data given regarding his role in the louisiana campaign,,is that''At midnight he was to lead the assault"on a position known as the citadel...what he thought or did,what the outcome was for him is not disclosed..many,if not most of the photographs used in this book are given similiarly vague reference..the photos do represent persons who participated in the figiting in louisiana,but that's about all...Surely if the two authors of this book took the trouble to hunt down and then publish 355 pages worth of old photographs of soldiers who fought these battles they could also have done thier homework regarding who these people were before,during,and after the war..Seeing thier photographs makes the reader curious about them,a condition that Moneyhon and Roberts do little about...

If you want mainly to look at identified photographs of obscure soldiers and low-ranking officers then this book is for you..And while in some instances the authors do present information that tells something about the soldier in question,in most cases they do not,opting instead for the simple"he was there"approach...