The Battle-Ground

In the course of Miss Glasgow's novels one may discover the social history of Virginia for more than fifty years. The Battle-Ground goes back to the days before the war with its picture of the great plantations and the life of the slave owners. It also pictures Richmond as the capital of the Confederacy with Jefferson Davis in the tall-pillared White House and all the great figures of the Confederacy coming and going in the city, while the Richmond belles wondered just how much longer they could make their old dresses do. The Battle-Ground is so remarkable an analysis of civil war conditions that a British general recommended it to his men for reading for this very reason.