Gate of Hell is a decent study of the Union's Campaign for Charleston, SC in 1863. Stephen R. Wise's history adequately describes the many attacks the Union attempted that summer to capture the cradle of the Confederacy. It is a broad overview of the campaign, focusing on the relationships between the army and the navy of the United States as they try to cooperate in reducing one of the most important ports of the Confederacy. Wise does a good job describing the attacks on Morris Island, with special emphasis on the 54th Massachusetts assault on the works of Battery Wagner. However, he seems to spend too much time telling us what type of artillery was used on both sides in all of these assaults, instead of focusing on the soldiers who attacked and who defended. While this book is a good outline for what happened on the sun drenched beaches of South Carolina in the summer of 1863...for the Civil War student, as I am, you are left wanting more. I'm still waiting for a definitive study on the attack led by the 54th, and although Wise's book attempts to describe the action, unfortunately he falls short. Overall a good book if you are only interested in an overview of the campaign.

I have visited the Higgins Classical Institute and find the description outstanding. I am enjoying reading about the history of the school as well as learning more about Charleston, Maine. My great grandfather was a farmer in Charleston, Me. He attended the Institute as did his five daughters. (my grandmother and aunts.) I was a bit disappointed however that the day students are not mentioned very much. The kids in the town (many of them farmer's children and not well to do) went free as I understand it. They too contributed to the historical value of the Institute. I would like to contact the author to see if she ran across the name Benjamin Dyer, or Roxanna Dyer in her research. I am not finished reading this book but am enjoying it.

This book is a fun children's adventure through the streets of Charleston, SC. If you are familiar with or from that area, it will help you teach even your youngest children a little about the area. If you are not from there, it will still help give a young, school aged child a piece of history in a fun and stimulating way. The illustrations are lovely, and my two-year-olds love them, as well as the story.

I purchased this book at the William Longfellow home and museum in Cambridge, MA several years ago. It is more of a dissertation in tone than a novel, but the anecdotes and illustrative examples make it an interesting read, assuming that you're interested in the subject matter to begin with. The first few pages are a bit dry, but once I got going I really wanted to finish it. The juxtaposition of women in Charleston and Boston in Jacksonian America is quite enlightening. Though the South has a reputation for male dominance, the women in Puritanical Boston were often much more constrained in their ability to influence social and political movements than their southern counterparts. Moreover, southern women could hold land and, if wealthy enough, could *choose* whether or not to marry (sometimes opting for the role of "spinster aunt") more freely than their New England sisters. A very interesting read that makes you examine how remarkably similar many of our modern-day social conventions and the roles of women are to those of the Antebellum US.

Part history, part travel guide, and part photo essay, this lovely book would be wonderful for anyone traveling to Charleston or for an armchair traveler like myself. I loved it, especially the gorgeous photos of the interiors and exteriors of the historic buildings (mansions, churches, small homes, museums,etc.) that a visitor would see on a walking tour of the city.

Beney managed to capture all of the legendary charm of this beautiful city with his camera while giving the reader quite a bit of historic information.

My only complaint is that the author put the map of Charleston in the back of the book and I did not realize it was there ---a map would have been helpful while I was talking my "tour"!

This is an excellent little book for taking a peek at life in Charlestowne before and during the Revolution. This little work contains a number of interesting and little known details of life in the area. A very nice history for the moderately interested reader or those new to the subject.

Abner Doubleday presents a unique account from the Union side of the events leading up to and including the bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, which ignited the American Civil War. His first-person details from inside the garrison are hard to find elsewhere. He was such a staunch Unionist that he recalls being the only officer of the garrison in favor of the election of Lincoln. He continually protests against what he saw as the inaction of his own commanders and higher echelons. He felt that the Rebellion could have been nipped in the bud, had proper action been taken. From the foregoing, it should be apparent that sympathizers of the Confederacy will disagree with Doubleday on many points. I should point out that there is only limited evidence that Abner Doubleday had anything to do with the invention of baseball. He did, however, earn a Congressional Medal of Honor at Gettysburg.