This is CBSI in the world. I'm John Batser visiting with Professor Richard Carwoodine.

The new book is Righteous Strife. The Battle of the Pultants in the Civil War, the makeup of the war is changing as the battles go on.

There is, in the spring of 64, a resolution by Grant to turn south, not to back off chasing Lee. That leads to enormous casualties,

all through the battles called the wilderness, to the siege of Vicksburg and Richmond.

The battles dominate the story of the Civil War, but the professor has identified what was

happening in between the battles, the comments, and the resolution of both the north and

the south. Exhausted would be the word, but there had to be an end to this,

and they stayed with it even though there was talk of making peace or talking peace.

At one point, Lincoln, who did not believe the Confederacy was going to relent,

did send Horace Greeley to Niagara Falls to talk to Confederate commissioners for peace.

It came to nothing. It was not going to come to anything. Jefferson Davis and the Southern

Command were not looking to back off in any fashion whatsoever. And Lee was very effective in the field, even through retreat to

Richmond. At the same time, all of this is being watched by Lincoln and his cabinet and the

voters of the North, they're going to go through the election in November of 64. And in August of

64, Abraham Lincoln writes a very famous note to himself.

He was convinced that he would not win.

Professor, at this point, what we have is a low point for the Union and the South is

hanging on.

Were the abolitionists at this point, the radicals, were they getting ready

for defeated the polls? Did they believe it was going to happen as well as Lincoln? They certainly did.

The editor of the New York Independent, Theodore Tilton, a radical, was quite sure that the way things were looking in August of 1864, Lincoln was going to lose.

Henry Raymond, the manager, the Republican manager of the campaign came to Lincoln and said,

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