Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War

A New York Times Notable Book for 2011
A Library Journal Top Ten Best Books of 2011
A Boston Globe Best Nonfiction Book of 2011

Late on the night of October 16, 1859, John Brown launched a surprise raid on the slaveholding South. Leading a biracial band of militant idealists, he seized the massive armory at Harpers Ferry, freed and armed slaves, and vowed to liberate every bondsman in America.

Brown's daring strike sparked a savage street fight and a counterattack by U.S. Marines under Robert E. Lee. The bloodshed and court drama that followed also shocked a divided nation and propelled it toward civil war. Tony Horwitz's Midnight Rising brings Brown and his uprising vividly to life and charts America's descent into explosive conflict. The result is a taut and indispensable history of a man and a time that still resonate in our own.

Author: Tony Horwitz
Publisher: Picador USA
Published: 08/07/2012
Pages: 384
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.75lbs
Size: 8.24h x 5.55w x 1.00d
ISBN13: 9780312429263
ISBN10: 0312429266
BISAC Categories:
- History | United States | 19th Century
- History | United States | Civil War Period (1850-1877)
- History | Military | United States

About the Author

Tony Horwitz is the bestselling author of Midnight Rising, A Voyage Long and Strange, Blue Latitudes, Confederates in the Attic, and Baghdad Without a Map. He is also a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has worked for The Wall Street Journal and The New Yorker. He lives in Martha's Vineyard with his wife, Geraldine Brooks, and their two sons.