{"product_id":"delivered-under-fire-absalom-markland-and-freedoms-mail-9781640124486","title":"Delivered Under Fire: Absalom Markland and Freedom's Mail","description":"2024 IPPY Silver Medal Winner in Biography \u003cbr\u003e 2024 IPPY Silver Medal Winner in U.S. History \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e During the Civil War his movements from battlefield to battlefield were followed in the North and in the South nearly as closely as those of generals, though he was not in the military. After the war, his swift response to Ku Klux Klan violence sparked passage of a landmark civil rights law, though he was not a politician. When he died in 1888 newspapers reported his death from coast to coast, yet he's unknown today. He was the man who delivered the most valuable ingredient in U.S. soldiers' fighting spirit during those terrible war years--letters between the front lines and the home front. He was Absalom Markland, special agent of the United States Post Office, and this is his first biography. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e At the beginning of the Civil War, at the request of his childhood friend Ulysses S. Grant, Markland created the most efficient military mail system ever devised, and Grant gave him the honorary title of colonel. He met regularly with President Abraham Lincoln during the war and carried important messages between Lincoln and Generals Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman at crucial points in our nation's peril. When the Ku Klux Klan waged its reign of terror and intimidation after the Civil War, Markland's decisive action secured the executive powers President Grant needed to combat the Klan. Nearly every biography of Lincoln, Sherman, and Grant includes at least one footnote about Markland, but his important, sometimes daily interaction with them during and after the war has escaped modern notice, until now. Absalom Markland is a forgotten American hero. \u003ci\u003eDelivered Under Fire\u003c\/i\u003e tells his amazing story.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eCandice Shy Hooper\u003c\/b\u003e served on the editorial advisory board of the \u003ci\u003eJournal of Military History\u003c\/i\u003e and on the board of directors of President Lincoln's Cottage at the National Soldiers' Home. She is a member of the Ulysses S. and Julia D. Grant Historical Home Advisory Board and a former president of the Johann Fust Library Foundation. She is the author of \u003ci\u003eLincoln's Generals' Wives: Four Women Who Influenced the Civil War--for Better and for Worse\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Potomac Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50725715837202,"sku":"9781640124486","price":26.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_0d7198bc-c285-4490-a9de-d8a639d7498c.jpg?v=1734840799","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/delivered-under-fire-absalom-markland-and-freedoms-mail-9781640124486","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}