The years from 1815 to 1848 were arguably the richest period in American life. In Waking Giant, award-winning historian David S. Reynolds illuminates the era's exciting political story alongside the fascinating social and cultural movements that influenced it. He casts fresh light on Andrew Jackson, who redefined the presidency, as well as John Quincy Adams and James K. Polk, who expanded the nation's territory and strengthened its position internationally....

In this addition to the esteemed Oxford history series, historian Daniel Walker Howe illuminates the period from the battle of New Orleans to the end of the Mexican–American War, an era of revolutionary improvements in transportation and communications that accelerated the extension of the American empire. He examines the era's politics but contends that John Quincy Adams and other advocates of public education and economic integration, defenders

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"Combining expert historical insight with the eyewitness accounts of soldiers and civilians, A Short History of the Civil War offers a brilliant summary of the key events and wider context of the hostilities between North and South. Profiles of influential military and political leaders, and thought-provoking features on themes and experiences, from the evils of slavery to the treatment of wounded soldiers, bring the story dramatically to life." --...

The Curse of the Somers retells the greatest controversy in the history of the U.S. Navy of the early American Republic, a plotted mutiny by the son of the Secretary of War. Acknowledged as the only mutiny in the Navy's history, the events on the Somers inspired countless headlines and, most famously, Hermann Melville's Billy Budd. This book vividly reconstructs the circumstances of this fascinating story, drawing from a rich historical record and...

"A gripping tale of adventure and survival based on the true story of the ill-fated Donner Party on their 2,200-mile trek on the Oregon-California Trail from 1846 to '47. Nineteen-year-old Ada Weeks confronts danger and calamity along the hazard-filled journey to California. After a fateful decision that delays the overlanders more than a month, she--along with eighty-one other members of the Donner Party--finds herself stranded at Truckee Lake on...

A sweeping history of the 1840s that captures America's enormous sense of possibility and shows how the extraordinary expansion of territories forced the nation to come to grips with the deep rift that would bring war just a decade later.

"Andrew Jackson was volatile and prone to violence, and well into his forties his sole claim on the public's affections derived from his victory in a thirty-minute battle at New Orleans in early 1815. Yet those in his immediate circle believed he was a great man who should be president of the United States. Jackson's election in 1828 is usually viewed as a result of the expansion of democracy. Historians David and Jeanne Heidler argue that he actually...

The early decades of the nineteenth century saw the expansion of slavery, Native dispossession, and wars with Canada and Mexico. Mass immigration and powerful religious movements sent tremors through American society. Even as the powerful defended the status quo, others defied voices from the margins moved the center; eccentric visions altered the accepted wisdom, and acts of empathy questioned self-interest. Ayers examines the visions that moved...