From Bull Run to Appomattox: A Boy's View

This is a history of the Civil War written for his son by Luther W. Hopkins of General J.E.B. Stuart's Cavalry, 6th Virginia Regiment, C.S.A.” From the preface: “Historians have told us much about our Civil War, but they have left out the part that appeals most to the boy, and it is this part that I have tried to bring before the public. Men may read the book if they will, but it is written more particularly for the youth. The boy of today and the boy that is yet to be ought to know of the bloody sweat through which this nation passed in reaching its present position among the great nations of the earth, and the part the boy played in it. It is said that one boy is a boy; two boys a half boy and three boys no boy at all. That may be true of the boy running loose, unbridled like a colt, but gather up these boys and train them, harness and hitch them and they will move the world or break a trace. It is the boy who decides the fate of nations. I don't know the average age of our soldiers in times of peace, but when wars come and there is a call for soldiers, it is mainly the boy in his teens who responds; yet, strange to say, the historian has never thought it worth while to put much emphasis upon what the boy does in the upbuilding of a nation. Another thing that has been neglected by the historian is the brave and noble part the horse took in our war. The grays, the bays, the sorrels, the roans, the chestnuts, have not been forgotten in this story. Indeed, as I have already said, I have tried to bring to light that part of the story of our Civil War that has not been told.”