Children for the Union: The War Spirit on the Northern Home Front.

Children for the Union: The War Spirit on the Northern Home Front. By James Marten. American Childhoods. (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2004. Pp. [xii], 209. $26.00, ISBN 1-56663-563-2.)

In Children for the Union: The War Spirit on the Northern Home Front, James Marten elaborates the arguments he first put forth in The Children's Civil War (Chapel Hill, 1998) and that are illustrated in his Lessons of War: The Civil War in Children's Magazines (Wilmington, Del., 1999). Chief among those arguments are that children not only are influenced by the cultural milieu but are important participants in shaping culture. At the time of the Civil War, children made up one-third of the nation's population. They were everywhere--at political rallies and public entertainments, in churches and family gatherings, in schools with new literary texts, and certainly in the army. Marten makes excellent use of primary materials to capture the voices and actions of real children, including children's diaries, amateur newspapers published by children (using toy printing sets), memoirs, letters, journals, and autobiographies.

What differentiates Children for the Union from Marten's earlier book is its narrower focus and fuller discussion of the antebellum childhood culture in which a militarized culture developed. By devoting the first chapter to prewar northern family, school, and community life, the changes brought by the war become more acutely visible. Other chapters illustrate the myriad ways the war permeated children's everyday lives. Infant rhymes like "Paddy-cake, paddy-cake, baker man" came to include the lines: "Catch 'em and whip 'em, and mark 'em with a T; And hang all the leaders, as soon you shall see" (p. 40). Children's magazines and school texts carried war-themed stories; games, toys, and everyday play reflected a militarization of children's culture.

Marten convincingly argues that children did not just passively absorb the war-influenced culture around them; they also became historical actors. Children's home lives were radically altered as they dropped out of school to replace fighting brothers and fathers in the workplace. They raised funds for the Union effort at the popular Sanitary Fairs by selling dolls and homemade handicrafts. They also gave musical performances and orations to support the war effort. More than ten thousand boys under the age of eighteen enlisted and served in the military in addition to the scores of even younger drummer boys who accompanied troops into battle. Also included are discussions of the thousands of war orphans whom the government had to support and who played active roles in Decoration Day ceremonies. Using the memories of such notable Americans as Theodore Roosevelt and Henry Cabot Lodge, Marten reflects on the lasting meaning of the war for the children who lived through it.

Marten richly demonstrates the vitality of the history of childhood as a research field. If there is any fault to Children of the Union, it is that in design and content it closely follows his broader work on Civil War--era children. This book seems designed just to fit the parameters of the American Childhoods series that details children's lives in specific times and locales. However, those who missed the earlier book or who want additional contextualization of the war years will certainly appreciate this volume.

No war can seem distant--in time or space--when we see how profoundly children's lives are forever changed when militarism pervades their culture. Marten approaches his subject as one genuinely concerned that we inquire into the experiences of children, not out of antiquarian fascination, but with a genuine commitment to learn how their stories enhance the larger historical narrative.

Rhodes College

GAIL S. MURRAY