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The Harp and the Eagle: Irish-American Volunteers and the Union Army, 1861-1865. By Susannah Ural Bruce. (New York: New York University Press, 2006. Pp. 320. Cloth $70.00; paper $22.00.)
Incredible as it may seem, there are still aspects of Civil War history that scholars have written very little about. One of these is the experiences of prominent ethnic communities in the war, particularly those of the Irish and German Americans, who together contributed hundreds of thousands of soldiers to the Union cause. Susannah Ural Bruce attempts to fill in at least part of this gap with her work on Irish soldiers in the Union army. Hers is not the usual account of the military heroics of Irish soldiers in battle. Rather, she focuses on the way Irish Americans, both in the army and at home, viewed the war "through Irish lenses" (41). It "is a broad examination of the way Irish Catholic men and their communities understood [their] service in the Union Army" (2).
Bruce's focus is on Irish motivation for the war and on the divided loyalties the Irish felt during it. Bruce argues that they maintained dual loyalties throughout the war,...