Abraham Lincoln Deals with Foreign Affairs: A Diplomat in Carpet Slippers

"Monaghan has told this whole complex story of Lincoln's conduct of foreign affairs with vigor and wit."-H. S. Commager, New York Times. "Brilliant in style, brilliant in narrative sparkle, and above all brilliant in its easy mastery of an immense body of factual data."-Allan Nevins. "A fine work of narrative history, which combines in rare fashion humor, imagination and scholarly research."-Richard Hofstadter, New Republic. "A fascinating story, and Monaghan gets the most out of it. Good photographs and contemporary cartoons."-New Yorker. "Monaghan, able scholar and skilled writer, has done full justice to this mural-sized canvas. No student of Lincoln will want to miss it."-Boston Globe. On the eve of the American Civil War, the old predatory powers of Europe were waiting to capitalize on the split in the Union. President Lincoln had to prevent foreign governments from giving official recognition to the Confederacy. Jay Monaghan shows how the underestimated, "rustic" president dealt with diplomats both in this country and abroad-and also with contentious politicians and cabinet members. Jay Monaghan's other books include Civil War on the Western Border, 1854-1865 and Custer: The Life of General George Armstrong Custer, both available as Bison Books. Howard Jones is University Research Professor in history at the University of Alabama and author of Union in Peril: The Crisis over British Intervention in the Civil War (Nebraska 1997).