Research Catalog

Title

Irish American Civil War songs : identity, loyalty, and nationhood / Catherine V. Bateson.

Author

Bateson, Catherine V.

Publication

• Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2022]
• ©2022

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xiii, 301 pages : illustrations; 23 cm.

Summary

"During the American Civil War, approximately 200,000 Irish-born soldiers and sailors fought for both the Union and, to a much lesser extent, the Confederacy. They were involved in every major engagement. In "Irish American Civil War Songs," Catherine V. Bateson examines songs written by Irish Americans about their experiences in that conflict. Bateson offers an in-depth exploration of the different lyrical articulations, themes, and sentiments of wartime ballads produced in America and across the Atlantic in Ireland and Britain. By analyzing the lyrics-a heavily under-used and under-appreciated source of contemporary feelings and opinions-Bateson's work highlights how wartime song lyrics present historians of ethnic migration, culture, the Irish in America, and the Civil War, and those interested in these topics more broadly, with a new way of understanding Irish migrant and Irish America diaspora views about the conflict. More importantly, her assessment of the ballads demonstrates what that diasporic culture thought about the American Union home that the Irish identified with, fought to defend, and saw as an important marker of their national identities. While historians have written extensively about the Irish American Civil War experience, they have not in any comprehensive way explored how participants used balladry to sing about wartime views, battlefield encounters, political opinions, and virtually every aspect of the war as encountered by the Irish on the frontline and homefront. After placing traditional Irish music and songs more broadly in American culture, Bateson discusses the role of song publication, dissemination and how Irish-born and -descended soldiers shared songs and the practice of singing, to and from the front line through songsters, songbooks, fragments written in letters, newspaper publications, and traditional wartime diaries and accounts. She then explores the core themes and subjects that appeared regularly in those lyrical publications, including battlefield service, Irish military heritage, Irish nationalist sympathies, wartime views, politics-including emancipation, abolition, and the infamous New York City draft riots-and finally, how the dominant theme of America, American loyalty, and American identity came to the fore. Bateson's close reading of these lyrics and consideration of their context, meaning, and place within broader wartime experiences and understandings, helps restore cultural articulations and viewpoints that add to a greater understanding of the Irish contribution to the American Civil War"--

Series Statement

Conflicting worlds : new dimensions of the American Civil War

Uniform Title

Conflicting worlds.

Subject

• 1800-1899
• Irish Americans > Music > 19th century > History and criticism
• Irish American soldiers > History > 19th century
• Irish American soldiers
• Irish Americans > Music
• Military participation > Irish American
• Music and war
• Irish Americans
• United States > History > Music and the War. > Civil War, 1861-1865
• United States > History > Participation, Irish American. > Civil War, 1861-1865
• United States
• United States > Confederate States of America

Genre/Form

• Criticism, interpretation, etc.
• History.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references (pages 269-289) and index.

Contents

Irish music and songs in mid-nineteenth-century America -- The production of Irish American Civil War songs -- Battlefield balladry -- Lyrical cultural identity -- Fenian sentiments and Irish nationalism sympathies -- Lyrical expressions of wartime politics -- Irish American loyalty and identity in Civil War songs.

Call Number

JFE 22-5013

ISBN

• 9780807177938
• 0807177938

LCCN

2022014266

OCLC

1305502551

Author

Bateson, Catherine V., author.

Title

Irish American Civil War songs : identity, loyalty, and nationhood / Catherine V. Bateson.

Publisher

Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2022]

Copyright Date

©2022

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Series

Conflicting worlds : new dimensions of the American Civil War

Conflicting worlds.

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references (pages 269-289) and index.

Chronological Term

1800-1899

Other Form:

Online version: Bateson, Catherine V. Irish American Civil War songs Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, 2022 9780807178393 (DLC) 2022014267

Research Call Number

JFE 22-5013