Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume Forty-three. American Newspaper Journalists, 1690-1872 , and: Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume Forty-seven. American Historians, 1866-1912 (review)

Abstract

158CIVIL WAR HISTORY concerns. With the fading of the American party she began to move into an accommodation with the Republican party. During the Civil War she produced a number of noted letters and pamphlets. In an early one in 1861, Reply to Breckinridge, she defended and supported Lincoln's actions, although not uncritically. In her War Powers, printed by the State Department for distribution to members of Congress, Carroll— despite her hatred of slavery—opposed confiscation and emancipation; she instead preferred colonization. In keeping with her position she became a lobbyist for an ill-fated project intended in British Honduras. A more lasting notoriety, however, came with the claim of authorship of the Tennessee plan—a claim that she would spend the rest of her life defending, not just for recognition but for compensation as well. Not only was the idea not original with Carroll, for she owed much of its origins to Charles M. Scott, a Mississippi riverboat pilot, but as Janet Coryell points out, such a plan was already evolving in the minds of Halleck and Grant. Even before Carroll made the suggestion, federal gunboats had probed the Tennessee River. For Coryell the crux of it was that "As always, Carroll was trying to make a living," for she was "ever possessed in her constant search for power and recognition" (79-80). In judiciously laying to rest the claims of both Carroll and Scott, the author succinctly notes that "neither one can be taken seriously by military historians as unsung heroes who saved the Union with their brilliant strategy" (88). Anna Carroll was not by any means a major figure. Yet, she does deserve proper attention. Her role in the nativist movement as well as her Unionist writings are noteworthy. For suffragists, even though she was not one, her cause became theirs and a symbol for their movement. Carroll's atypical career in that masculine world was remarkable in and of itself. Indeed, she was Neither Heroine nor Fool, but at times, perhaps a knave. Carroll is well served by Coryell, and her study is balanced and judicious. Coryell finely delineates her character, warts and all, and importantly analyzes some of her major writings. The "Lady Strategist " would undoubtedly wince at her biography, but historians will applaud it. Richard R. Duncan Georgetown University Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume Forty-three. American Newspaper Journalists, 1690-1872. Edited by Perry J. Ashley. (Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1985. Pp. 527. $108.00.) Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume Forty-seven. American Historians , 1866-1912. Edited by Clyde N. Wilson. (Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1986. Pp. 427. $88.00.) In an unpublished section of his autobiography, Mark Twain remarked that "Almost the most prodigious asset of a country, and perhaps its BOOK REVIEWS159 most precious possession, is its native literary product—when that product is fine and noble and enduring." Over the last twelve years Gale Research Company's Dictionary of Literary Biography has endorsed Twain's declaration and celebrated what its editors call "the intellectual commerce of a nation" (Volume 43, p. ix). By providing career biographies that trace an author's ideas and the evolution of his or her reputation over time, the multi-volume series has filled an important gap in our library shelves. Organized by topic, period, or genre, the profusely-illustrated volumes have focused on a broad range of influential authors. The volumes under review provide valuable biographical information to students of the middle period. The authors of the essays range from established scholars, like John Braeman and Mark E. Neely, Jr., to rising stars, such as Peter A. Coclanis and William A. Link. Carefully selected bibliographies accompany each contribution. American Newspaper Journalists, 1690-1872 profiles sixty-six men and women who shaped American journalism in its formative years. Editor Perry J. Ashley observes that by 1872 the American press already had evolved from control by government, to control by parties, to control by the public. Changes in news content and writing, as well as mechanical innovations, radically transformed American journalism. The number of daily newspapers mushroomed from 42 in 1820, to 574 in 1870. Their circulation increased from about 33,000 in 1820, to 2,601...