Historical Fiction: Civil War

Suggestions from Mt. Lebanon Public Library, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

www.mtlebanonlibrary.org

 

Unless otherwise noted, all books are shelved alphabetically by the author's last name in the fiction section

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The Tin Heart / Ackerman, Karen
When their fathers choose opposing sides during the Civil War, two girls find a way to preserve their own friendship.  (gr. 3-4)

 

The Ghost Cadet / Alphin, Elaine Marie
A 12-year-old boy forges a friendship with the ghost of a Virginia Military Institute cadet who was killed at the Battle of New Market in 1864. (gr. 5+)

 

Iron Thunder: the battle between the Monitor & the Merrimac  / Avi
Tom's job as an assistant to Captain John Ericsson, the inventor of the Monitor, makes him a target of Confederate spies.  (gr. 2-4)

 

Abraham’s Battle: A Novel of Gettysburg / Banks, Sara H.
A freed slave named Abraham decides to join the Union ambulance corps when the battle of the Civil War approaches his hometown of Gettysburg. (gr. 3-4)

 

Charley Skedaddle / Beatty, Patricia
When a 12-year-old drummer boy in the Union Army comes face to face with the horrors of war, he runs away to the mountains where he meets an old southern woman named Granny Bent. (gr. 5+)

 

Jayhawker / Beatty, Patricia
A teenage Kansas boy becomes a Jayhawker like his father—an abolitionist raider freeing slaves from the neighboring state of Missouri—then becomes an undercover Union spy.  (gr. 5+)

 

Turn Homeward, Hannalee / Beatty, Patricia
During the Civil War, 12-year-old Hannalee is one of 2,000 Georgia mill hands sent north by Union soldiers to work in the Yankee textile mills.  Hannalee remains determined to return home to Georgia and her family. (gr. 5+)
Sequel: Be Ever Hopeful, Hannalee

 

Who Comes with Cannons? / Beatty, Patricia
A young girl discovers that her North Carolina Quaker relatives are involved in the Underground Railroad during the Civil War. (gr. 5+)

 

Diary of a Drummer Boy / Brill, Marlene Targ
A 12-year-old boy joins the Union Army as a drummer and ends up fighting in the Civil War. (gr. 4+)

 

Black Angels / Brown, Linda Beatrice
Three Southern children, two black and one white, escape from their homes during the horrors of the Civil War and, after meeting in the woods, gradually come to rely on each other as they make their way slowly north, enduring hunger, fear, sickness, and constant danger, before arriving in Harper's Ferry, West Virginia.  (gr. 5+)

 

Will at the Battle of Gettysburg / Calkhoven, Laurie
In 1863, twelve-year-old Will, who longs to be a drummer in the Union army, is stuck in his sleepy hometown of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, but when the Union and Confederate armies meet right there in his town, he and his family are caught up in the fight.  (gr. 4+)

 

With Every Drop of Blood / Collier, James Lincoln and Christopher
In the last days of the war, a 14-year-old Virginia boy is captured by Cush, a black Union soldier and runaway slave. (gr. 5+)

 

The Red Badge of Courage / Crane, Stephen
Henry Fleming wants to be a Civil War hero, but when he flees from a battle he must face his own cowardice and find the inner bravery and courage he needs to support his comrades and face battle again. (gr. 6+)

 

Moon Over Tennessee: A Boy’s Civil War Journal / Crist-Evans, Craig
A 13-year-old boy and his father leave Tennessee to join the Confederate forces on their way to Gettysburg. (gr. 4+)

 

Thee, Hannah! / de Angeli, Marguerite
Hannah dislikes her plain and heavy Quaker clothing until a chance encounter teaches her that being a Friend is something of which to be proud.  Set in the days just prior to the Civil War. (gr. 3-5)

 

When Will This Cruel War Be Over?: The Civil War Diary of Emma Simson / Denenberg, Barry
A 14-year-old Virginia girl describes the hardships that she and her family endure during one year of the Civil War. (gr. 4-6)

 

All their names were Courage : a novel of the Civil War  / Denslow, Sharon Phillips
In 1862, as William Burd fights in the Civil War, he exchanges letters with his sister, Sallie, who is also writing to Confederate and Union generals asking about their horses in order to write a book. (gr. 4-6)

 

An Island Far From Home / Donahue, John
A 12-year-old boy, son of a Union doctor killed during the war, begins a correspondence with a Confederate prisoner of war and thus begins to understand the fine line that exists between friends and enemies. (gr. 5+)

 

Imperfections / Durrant, Lynda
In 1862 Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, fourteen-year-old Rosemary Elizabeth strives to fit in with the Shaker sisters of this "Heaven on Earth." But what Rosemary Elizabeth really yearns for is to be reunited with her mother and siblings from whom she was separated when they sought refuge from her abusive father.  (gr. 5+)

 

My Last Skirt: the story of Jennie Hodgers, Union soldier  / Durrant, Lynda
Enjoying the freedom afforded her while dressing as a boy in order to earn higher pay after emigrating from Ireland, Jennie Hodgers serves in the 95th Illinois Infantry as Private Albert Cashier, a Union soldier in the American Civil War.  (gr. 5+)

 

Amelina Carrett, Bayou Grand Coeur, Louisiana, 1863 / Duey, Kathleen (j pb D)
A girl endangers herself and her uncle when she saves the life of a wounded Yankee spy found near her Louisiana home. (gr. 4-6)

 

The Bravest Girl in Sharpsburg / Ernst, Kathleen (j pb E)
The friendship of two girls, one a Unionist and one a Secessionist, is tested by the Civil War at the Battle of Antietam Creek. (gr. 6+)

 

Hearts of Stone / Ernst, Kathleen
Orphaned when her father dies fighting for the Union and her mother expires from exhaustion, and also estranged from their Confederate neighbors, fifteen-year-old Hannah struggles to find a way for her family to survive during the Civil War in Tennessee. (gr. 6+)

 

Private Joel and the Sewell Mountain Seder / Fireside, Bryna J.
A group of Jewish soldiers, and three freed slaves, have a Passover seder in 1862 on the battlefields of the Civil War.  (gr. 2-4)

 

Bull Run / Fleischman, Paul
A wide variety of participants and observers describe the glory and the horror of the first battle of the Civil War. (gr. 5+)

 

Dadblamed Union Army Cow / Fletcher, Susan (j Ea FLETCHER)
During the Civil War, a devoted cow follows her owner when he joins the Union Army and, despite all his efforts to send her home, stays with him and his regiment until the end of the war. Based on a true story. (gr. K+)

 

Brady / Fritz, Jean
When Brady discovers his father’s role in the Underground Railroad, he learns the importance of secrecy and he realizes that he, too, must make a decision on the question of slavery. (gr. 5+)

 

Thunder at Gettysburg / Gauch, Patricia Lee
Fourteen-year-old Tillie becomes involved in the tragic battle of July     1-3, 1863.  (gr. 3-5)

 

Abner & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure / Gutman, Dan
With his ability to travel through time using baseball cards and photographs, thirteen-year-old Joe and his mother go back to 1863 to ask Abner Doubleday whether he invented baseball, but instead find themselves in the middle of the Battle of Gettysburg.

 

Hear the Wind Blow / Hahn, Mary Downing
With their mother dead and their home burned, a thirteen-year-old boy and his little sister set out across Virginia in search of relatives during the final days of the Civil War. (gr. 5+)

 

I Thought My Soul Would Rise and Fly: The Diary of Patsy, a Freed Girl / Hansen, Joyce
Patsy’s diary describes the confusing time at the end of the Civil War when freedom was granted to former slaves. (gr. 4-6)

 

Ghosts of the Civil War / Harness, Cheryl
The ghost of Willie, President Abraham Lincoln's older son, transports Lindsey back to his own time, where she sees and hears many things from both sides of the Civil War. (gr. 2-4)

 

Gabriel’s Horses / Hart, Alison
In Kentucky, during the Civil War, twelve-year-old slave Gabriel contends with a cruel new horse trainer and skirmishes with Confederate soldiers as he pursues his dream of becoming a jockey.  (gr.  4+)
Sequel: Gabriel’s Triumph

 

A Light in the Storm: The Civil War Diary of Amelia Martin / Hesse, Karen
The fictional Civil War diary of a girl who works in her father’s lighthouse off the Delaware coast. (gr. 4-6)

 

A Voice from the Border / Hill, Pamela Smith
Fifteen-year-old Reeves’ life changes forever when the Civil War divides her family and her neighbors in the border state of Missouri as some support the Union and some support the Secessionists. (gr. 6+)

 

The Journal of Rufus Rowe: A Witness to the Battle of Fredericksburg / Hite, Sid
In 1862, sixteen-year-old Rufus Rowe runs away from home and settles in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he documents in his journal the battle he watches unfold there.  (gr. 4+)

 

From Slave to Soldier: Based on a True Civil War Story / Hopkinson, Deborah
A boy who hates being a slave joins the Union Army to fight for freedom, and proves himself brave and capable of handling a mule team when the need arises. (gr. 1-3)

 

Seeing the Elephant / Hughes, Pat
Ten-year-old Izzie wants to join the war like his older brothers and go into battle against the Confederate Army, but when he meets a Rebel soldier in a hospital, he begins to see things differently.  (gr. 2-4)

 

Across Five Aprils / Hunt, Irene
With one brother in the Union Army and the other in the Confederacy, Jethro Creighton and his family face the cruel reality of war. (gr. 5+)

 

Anna Sunday / Keehn, Sally M.
In 1863 twelve-year-old Anna, disguised as a boy and accompanied by her younger brother Jed, leaves their Pennsylvania home and makes the difficult journey to join their wounded father in Winchester, Virginia, where they find themselves in danger from Confederate troops.  (gr. 3+)

 

Rifles for Watie / Keith, Harold
Because of his excellent record as a Union soldier, Jeff Bussey is chosen to be a spy in General Stand Watie’s Confederate Cherokee Cavalry Unit.  This exciting novel about the Civil War’s western campaign is a Newbery winner. (gr. 6+)

 

Freedom Stone / Kluger, Jeffrey
With the help of a magical stone from Africa, a thirteen-year-old slave travels to the battle of Vicksburg to clear her father’s name and free her family from bondage.  (gr. 4+)

 

True North: A Novel of the Underground Railroad / Lasky, Kathryn
A fourteen-year-old Boston girl aids a fugitive slave girl on the Underground Railroad in 1858. (gr. 4+)

 

The Root Cellar / Lunn, Janet
Her Aunt’s root cellar turns out to be the link between present and past in which twelve-year-old Rose befriends two people living in the 1860s—more than a century ago! (gr. 5+)

 

A Pitch in Time / Lytle, Robert A.
A modern-day boy tumbles from his bike and wakes up to find he has traveled back in time to the spring of 1864 in rural Michigan during the Civil War.  (gr. 5+)

 

How I Found the Strong / McMullen, Margaret
Frank Russell, known as Shanks, wishes he could have gone with his father and brother to fight for Mississippi and the Confederacy, but his experiences with the war and his changing relationship with the family slave, Buck, change his thinking.  (gr. 5+)

 

The Muddy Road to Glory / Meader, Stephen W.
Anxious to fight for the Union cause, sixteen-year-old Ben Everett enlists in the Twentieth Maine regiment.  Sent to Virginia to fight General Lee, Ben perseveres through all the harshness of war, even capture by the Confederate forces and imprisonment at Belle Isle. (gr. 5+)

 

The Totally Made-Up Civil War Diary of Amanda MacLeish / Mills, Claudia
While dealing with her parents' separation and her best friend's distance, Amanda is able to work out some of her anxiety through her fifth-grade project—writing a diary from the point of view of a ten-year-old girl whose brothers fight on opposite sides in the Civil War. (gr. 3+)

 

The Drinking Gourd / Monjo, F.N.
Tommy’s father is a deacon of the church by day and a conductor on the Underground Railroad by night.  In this story, Tommy becomes a conductor too when he helps a slave family escape to Canada. (gr. 2-3)
(j Er MONJO)

 

Gettysburg: Tad Lincoln’s Story / Monjo, F.N.
When young Tad Lincoln accompanies his famous father to the war department’s telegraph office, he sees the Battle of Gettysburg unfold before his eyes on the map with the colored pins.  (gr. 3+)

 

Escape by Night: A Civil War Adventure / Myers, Laurie
Tommy, the son of a Presbyterian minister in Augusta, Georgia, during the Civil War, much search his conscience to decide whether he should help a Yankee soldier escape and return home.  Inspired by the early life of Woodrow Wilson.  (gr. 3+)

 

A Dangerous Promise / Nixon, Joan Lowery
One of the “Orphan Train Adventures” series in which a young Union drummer boy is wounded and left for dead behind enemy lines.  (gr. 4-6)

 

My Brother’s Keeper: Virginia’s Civil War Diary / Osborne, Mary Pope
A young girls records the horrible things she witnesses before, during, and after the Battle of Gettysburg. Part of the My America series.  (gr. 3-4)
Sequels: A Time To Dance (Book 2) and After the Rain (Book 3)

 

Soldier’s Heart: A Novel of the Civil War / Paulsen, Gary
Charley Goddard lies about his age in order to join the First Minnesota Volunteers, and after four years of fighting amidst the horrors of the war, returns home older and “deadened.” (gr. 6+)

 

The River Between Us / Peck, Richard
During the early days of the Civil War, the Pruitt family takes in two mysterious young ladies who have fled New Orleans to come north to Illinois. (gr. 3+)

 

The Slopes of War / Perez, N.A.
A young Union soldier realizes that he may be fighting his cousins who are serving in the Army of Northern Virginia at the Battle of Gettysburg. (gr. 5+)

 

The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg / Philbrick, W.R.
Twelve-year-old Homer, a poor but clever orphan, has extraordinary adventures after running away from his evil uncle to rescue his brother, who has been sold into service in the Civil War.  (gr. 4+)
A 2010 Newbery Honor Book

 

Silent Thunder: A Civil War Story / Pinkney, Andrea Davis
A girl and her brother take turns describing how life on the Virginia plantation where they are slaves is affected by the Civil War. (gr. 5+)

 

Pink and Say / Polacco, Patricia
A black Union soldier and the white Union deserter he saves share a special friendship before they are captured and separated by Confederate marauders. (gr. 4+)

 

Across the Lines / Reeder, Carolyn
A story of the Battle of Petersburg Crater, Virginia, told alternately by twelve-year-old Edward and his friend and former servant Simon.
(gr. 5+)

 

Juliet’s Moon / Rinaldi, Ann
In Missouri in 1863, twelve-year-old Juliet Bradshaw learns to rely on herself and her brother, a captain with Quantrill's Raiders, as she sees her family home burned, is imprisoned by Yankees, and then kidnapped by a blood-crazed Confederate soldier.  (gr. 5+)

 

The Last Full Measure / Rinaldi, Ann
In 1863 Pennsylvania, fourteen-year-old Tacy faces the horrors of the Battle of Gettysburg while trying to stay out of the way of her brother David, who is in charge while their father serves as a doctor in the Union army, and to keep her friend Marvelous, a free black, safe from rebel soldiers. (gr. 6+)

 

The Last Silk Dress / Rinaldi, Ann
When fourteen-year-old Susan and her friend collect silk dresses to make a balloon to spy on the Yankees, she learns some unsettling truths about her family and her southern heritage. (6+)

 

Numbering All the Bones / Rinaldi, Ann
It is 1864, the Civil War is moving toward an end. President Lincoln has proclaimed his 'great measure,' and Southern slaves are slowly gaining their freedom. But for thirteen-year-old Eulinda, a house slave on a Georgia plantation, it is the most difficult time of her life.   (gr. 5+)

 

Sarah’s Ground / Rinaldi, Ann
In 1861, eighteen-year-old Sarah Tracy, from New York state, comes to work at Mount Vernon, the historic Virginia home of George Washington, where she tries to protect the safety and neutrality of the site during the Civil War, and where she encounters her future husband, Upton Herbert.  (gr. 5+)

 

Grace’s Letter to Lincoln / Roop, Peter
On the eve of the 1860 presidential election, 11-year-old Grace writes to Abraham Lincoln and advises him to grow a beard. (gr. 2-4)

 

Letters from Vinnie / Sappey, Maureen Stack
The sculptress Vinnie Ream’s account of her Civil War years in Washington, D.C., when she was a young teenager. (gr. 5+)

 

The Storm Before Atlanta / Schwabach, Karen
In 1863 northwestern Georgia, an unlikely alliance forms between ten-year-old New York drummer boy Jeremy, fourteen-year-old Confederate Charlie, and runaway slave Dulcie as they learn truths about the Civil War, slavery, and freedom. (gr. 3-5)

 

The Deep Cut / Spain, Susan Rosson
Considered “slow” by his father, Lonzo tries his best to help out his family in Culpeper, Virginia, during the Civil War, and, in the process, comes to some decisions about how to live his life. (gr. 5+)

 

The Perilous Road / Steele, William O.
Chris Brabson can’t understand why his brother joins the Yankee side—Chris himself wants to help the Confederacy. After reporting a northern troop movement that may imperil his brother, Chris is caught in the midst of a terrible battle that proves his father’s words that “decent men don’t deserve to be killed.” (gr. 4+)

 

Drummer Boy: Marching to the Civil War / Turner, Ann
A thirteen-year-old soldier beats his drum to raise the tunes and spirits and to muffle the sounds of the dying. (gr. 3-5)

 

Nettie’s Trip South / Turner, Ann
In a letter to her friend, Nettie writes about her trip to Virginia and her encounter with the injustices of slavery.  (gr. 3-4)

 

Red Moon at Sharpsburg: A Novel / Wells, Rosemary
As the Civil War breaks out, India, a young Southern girl, summons her sharp intelligence and the courage she didn't know she had to survive the war that threatens to destroy her family, her Virginia home and the only life she has ever known. (gr. 6+)

 

Battle Scars / Wilson, John
This novel by John Wilson, the sequel to The Flags of War, continues the adventures of two cousins, Walt and Nate McGregor, and of Sunday, the former slave on Nate's father's plantation. They have survived the carnage at Shiloh. But the war rages on. Can the three battle-scarred soldiers hope for anything more than survival? (gr. 5+)

 

The Drummer Boy of Vicksburg / Wisler, G. Clifton
A fact-based story of Orion Howe, a drummer boy who displayed great bravery during the Battle of Vicksburg. (gr. 4-6)

 

Mr. Lincoln’s Drummer / Wisler, G. Clifton
Based on the true story of Willie Johnston, an eleven-year-old drummer boy who became the youngest recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor. (gr. 4+)

 

Red Cap / Wisler, G. Clifton
A Yankee drummer boy is captured and sent to Andersonsville Prison. (gr. 4-6)

 

Thunder on the Tennessee / Wisler, G. Clifton
Willie Delamer and his father proudly left Texas in order to fight for the Confederacy.  But they never really faced the horrors of war until the Battle of Shiloh, in which there were nearly 24,000 casualties.
(gr. 5+)

 

The Mark Twain Murders / Yep, Laurence
Mark Twain, a young reporter in San Francisco, uncovers a Confederate plot when he helps a friend investigate the death of his scoundrel father. (gr. 5+)