n the place of
those ardent South Carolinians and understand their point of view.

For the history of the Civil War, newspapers are not so important. The
other material is superabundant, and in choosing from the mass of it,
the newspapers, so-far as affairs at the North are concerned, need only
be used in special cases, and rarely for matters of fact. The accounts
of campaigns and battles, which filled so much of their space, may be
ignored, as the best possible authorities for these are the one hundred
and twenty-eight volumes of the United States government publication,
the "Official Records of the Union and Confederate armies." The faithful
study of the correspondence and the reports in these unique volumes is
absolutely essential to a comprehension of the war; and it is a labor of
love. When one thinks of the mass of manuscripts students of certain
periods of European history have been obliged to read, the American
historian is profoundly grateful to his government, that at a cost to
itself of nearly three million dollars,[45] it has furnished him this
priceless material in neatly printed volumes with excellent indexes. The
serious student can generally procure these volumes gratis through the
favor of his congressman; or, failing in this, may purchase the set at a
moderate price, so that he is not obliged to go to a public library to
consult them.

Next to manuscript material, the physical and mental labor of turning
over and reading bound volumes of newspapers is the most severe, and I
remember my feeling of relief at being able to divert my attention from
what Edward L. Pierce called this back-breaking and eye-destroying
labor, much of it in public libraries, to these convenient books in my
own private library. A mass of other materials, notably Nicolay and
Hay's contributions, military narratives, biographies, private
correspondence, to say nothing of the Congressional publications, render
the student fairly independent of the newspapers. But I did myself make,
for certain periods, special researches among them to ascertain their
influence on public sentiment; and I also found them very useful in my
account of the New York draft riots of 1863. It is true the press did
not accurately reflect the gloom and sickness of heart at the North
after the battle of Chancellorsville, for the reason that many editors
wrote for the purpose of keeping up the hopes of their readers. In sum,
the student may congratulate himself