Literary Figures in the American Civil War

Gary North - March 04, 2015

The three literary figures who fought in the Civil War were Ambrose Bierce (North), Lew Wallace (North), and Sydney Lanier (South).

Bierce is remembered for The Devil's Dictionary and the most famous short story of the war, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge." Bierce did write a personal memoir of the war. It is not famous.

Lew Wallace, author of Ben Hur.

Lanier was a poet. He is remembered mainly because there is a large man-made lake in Georgia named after him. It supplies Atlanta with its water.

I don't count Mark Twain, who served in the Confederacy as a militia man for two weeks and deserted. He headed for Nevada, where he served the Union as the Assistant Secretary of State. He quit that job, too. He sat out the rest of the war as a civilian in California.