Yankee Spy In Richmond
Skilled editing by Ryan (Cornbread and Maggots, Dietz, 1994) reveals the paranoid world of secret agent Elizabeth Van Lew, who spied for the Union while living in the capital of the Confederacy. Most of her correspondence with generals Butler, Sharpe, Meade, and Grant was destroyed, and her "occasional journal"?written "only to be burnt"?was stealthily buried and lamentably damaged. But in the pages that remain, her character and courage come shining through. The CIA could learn from her. Rebel Richmond held her in such contempt that relatives of former Union prisoners whom she helped had to pay to have a granite stone laid on her gravesite some years after her death in 1900. This is a fascinating account of the times and players in an unparalleled drama. Recommended for general readers and Civil Waroholics.?Lynn Thompson, Iron Cty. Historical Soc., Ironton, Mo.Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.