Civil War Texas

This book is not overly ambitious but is nevertheless a good overview of a very hard period of Texas history. It should be used primarily as a synopsis leading to more detailed study of important events. Even though the book is almost an outline, I still learned things I hadn't heard before. I didn't realize, for example, that most Texas men of military men joined the Confederate military. I don't doubt the accuracy of this but believe, from a patriotism perspective, that this is remarkable. I can't think of any other war in U.S. history where men would have joined in these kinds of percentages. Granted, the Confederacy ultimately resorted to the draft but apparently most of these people were volunteers. I think that this must have been one of the reasons for the lethality of the Civil War. No doubt Northerners in some states joined with similar fervor. The result was huge armies composed of highly motivated men meeting on the field of battle--620,000 deaths--more than all other wars in U.S. history combined. Modern propagandists promote the idea that this blood bath "unified" the nation. I wonder. Ron Braithwaite, author of novels--"Skull Rack" and "Hummingbird God"--on the Spanish Conquest of Mexico