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ARMY OFFICIAL RECORDS SERIAL #1-130
by U. S. WAR DEPARTMENT
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| Our Price:
$2500 |
| War of the Rebellion Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies average over 1,000 pages each, or 138,000 plus pages in 70 volumes of 128 parts. Actual Shipping will be charged. Estimate Rates are as follows: West Cost $320, Colorado and Texas $248.50, Florida $221.25, New York $ $174.25, Ohio $106.50. For a limited time only, when purchasing this O.R. set, we will ship you the set of Southern Historical Society Papers for a total of 180 volumes which will take up 31 1/2 feet of shelf space. All new in publishers shrink wrapping. Please Specify in the notes if you wish to take advantage of the offer. |
| Serial numbers 112 and 113 are omitted because they were never printed by the War Dept. |
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Book Number: #1463 |
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New |
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ISBN #:0918678072 |
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Stock:6 |
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(For Reference Only) |
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Looking for an old favorite that's gone out of print? Perhaps a special edition to enhance your library?
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No one knowledgeable about the Civil War need be told of the value or the scarcity of the volumes titled, War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies and more commonly called the Official Records
Few of the original sets are extant. They were printed on cheap paper with flimsy bindings. Fire, theft, loss, and the erosions of time having taken their toll. There are only a few thousand sets remaining and these generally are in poor condition.
Yet these books are the single most-valuable, most-quoted, and most-sought-after source of Civil War history. They are the key to our knowledge of four years of conflict and of the three million men who served, fought, and died during that time. It is impossible to understand the men or their war, or to write or research meaningfully about either without the Official Records.
This vital and important set is missing from the collections of many of our important libraries and has been available in recent years only at premium prices on the rare book market. To fill this void, to make the Official Records again available to libraries, historians, and buffs, the National Historical Society, Broadfoot Publishing Company, and Morningside have reprinted all 128 volumes in their entirety in a limited, high-quality edition that corrects the many shortcomings of the originals.
Although this reprint is an awesome project, it pales when compared to the task undertaken by the War Department in accumulating, sorting, and editing the mountains of documents for the O.R.s during the 1880s and 1890s.
In 1901, the year of publication of the final volume, Secretary of War Elihu Root reported:
The papers examined were well-nigh beyond computation, being counted not by documents or boxes, but by tons, roomsfull, or the contents of buildings. The volunteer records. . . filled a large four-story warehouse; the Confederate records alone crowded an entire three-story building . . . military telegrams were almost countless, a single collection of Union dispatches alone containing over 2,000,000. . . . In addition, thousands of individual contributions were received.
The colossal amount of material--the records of the armies and governments of both North and South, and countless documents from private sources--had to be read and compared to determine suitability for publication, then placed in an easy-to-use form.
This was achieved by arranging the documents by subject, dividing them into 70 sections called "volumes," and then separating these "volumes" into 128 parts or individually-bound books. A further grouping separated formal reports and correspondence relating to military operations in the field; that relating to prisoners and prisons; correspondence and reports of Union authorities and that of Confederate authorities.
Most of the 70 "volumes" consist of one or more books, another boon to the reader. If, for example, you are reading about the Antietam Campaign, all of the battle reports will be found in one book, and relating correspondence in another. You do not have to flip back and forth in one book, but have two you can keep open for easy reference.
Each book is individually-indexed with the 128th volume as the General Index.
New Edition an Improvement
This new edition of the Official Records is a vast improvement over the government original.
This set, all 138,579 pages, has been reprinted on an excellent grade of acid-free paper which will not wear, deteriorate, or discolor, as has the paper originally used.
The negatives were produced after contacting many collectors to find the best copies available for reprinting. Special technical devices were employed to render the copy clear, dark, and even throughout. The binding is improved, using buckram of linen texture, impregnated with pyroxlin to withstand wear and tear.
Finally, the numbering system on the spines has been revised. In the original, volume numbers appeared on each book in Roman numbers. We will use both Roman and Arabic numerals throughout.
The O.R.s comprise 128 books, averaging over 1,000 pages each. Dr. Douglas Southall Freeman, whose master of these records is clearly evident in his classic volumes on Lee and his army, called them "the greatest of all the publications on the struggle. 'Dr. James I. Robertson, Jr., stated that the' Official Records have dominated Civil War research for three quarters of a century' and that ' any military study treating of the conflict of the 1860's must of necessity have the Official Records as its base." Civil War Books: A Critical Bibliography, characterizes it as 'the Major source of Civil War research material and absolutely indispensable to the serious student.'
WHY SHOULD YOU CONSIDER BUYING OFFICIAL RECORDS? Civil War buffs and students read the books for knowledge as well as for pleasure. The writings in the Official Records are by men who were there. The Civil War was strangely conscious of the history it made, and its participants possessed an uncanny awareness that they were fighting what was to be the most-studied conflict in the history of warfare. Their reports, orders, letters, requests, and pleas gathered in these books clearly define the width and breadth of the war, clearly reveal the men themselves, their heroics, mistakes, foibles, and follies, exposed by their writings. The Official Records are a bridge across the centuries that put the reader in immediate and personal touch with those crucial times and with the men who lived them.
For researchers and writers, the Official Records are the fountainhead of Civil War history. The set is so important to study of the war that no history, biography, or monograph can be written on any phase of the conflict without consulting it.
DESCRIPTION OF THE WORK
The Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies consist of four series,
an Atlas and a General Index, namely:
Series I
Embraces the formal reports, both Union and Confederate,
of the first seizures of United States property in the Southern States, and of all military
operations in the field, with the correspondence, orders, and returns relating specially
thereto, accompanied by an Atlas. It consists of Volumes 1 to 53, comprising one hundred
and eleven books, and the Atlas.Serials number 112 and 113 have never been printed. These numbers are
reserved for volumes to contain additional matter as it may be decided to publish in the
future.
Series II
Contains the correspondence, orders, reports, and returns, Union and
Confederate, relating to prisoners of war and (so far as the military
authorities were concerned) to state and political prisoners. It consists of eight books,
designated as Volumes 1 to 8 (or Serial Nos. 114 to 121).
Series III
-Contains the correspondence, orders, reports, and returns of the Union authorities
(embracing their correspondence with the Confederate officials) not
relating specially to the subjects of the first and second series. It sets forth the
annual and special reports of the Secretary of War, of the General in Chief, and of the
chiefs of the several staff corps and departments; the calls for troops and the
correspondence between the National and several state authorities. This series consists of
five books, numbered as Volumes 1 to 5 (or Serial Nos. 122 to 126).
Series IV
-Exhibits the correspondence, orders, reports, and returns of the Confederate
authorities with regard to the same subjects as those embraced in the
third series. It consists of three books, designated as Volumes 1 to 3 (or Serial Nos. 127
to 129).
General Index
-A general index to the entire work, together with an appendix containing
additions and corrections of errors discovered in the several volumes
after publication. It consists of one book, bearing only the serial number 130.
The Atlas
-Contains 178 plates, consisting of several hundred maps of battlefields of the
war, routes of march of the armies, plans of forts, etc., and a number
of photographic views of prominent scenes, plans, and objects.
Specifications
127 books plus index (138,579 pages).
SIZE: 5½" x 8½" as originally issued.
PAPER: 45 lb. neutral acid-free Glatfelter.
BINDING: Reinforced buckram with headbands.
STAMPING: Spines are gold-stamped in both Roman and Arabic numerals in large format for
easy readability.
COST: $2500 (plus $150.00 shipping ). This is less than $20 per volume which is probably
the best bargain in today's market, considering the books average over 1,000 pages each.
To order click the add to cart button at the top right corner.
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