Today this volume was sitting on the “free books” cart at the library and I couldn’t help but take a peek.
Otto Eisenschiml was an Austrian-American chemist and hobbyist Civil War historian most famous (or infamous) for his book promulgating the wild and false conspiracy theory that Lincoln’s assassination was ordered by his Secretary of War. Yet his 1958 follow-up Why the Civil War? (one of his many other books) was apparently deemed worthy of a review in the New York Times by David Herbert Donald.
Eisenschiml, Donald warned readers, was not “bothered by his failure to produce evidence to support his assertions.” Moreover, “The fact that these opinions may contradict those of every Lincoln expert in the country does not at all disturb Mr. Eisenschiml.” On the contrary, that seemed a selling-point for the publisher and the author. On the back of the book, above a blurb by Earl Schenck Miers, is this prescient pitch: “Why the Civil War? Will Make Blood Boil, Says Historian.”
Despite the subtitle on the front, there’s not much in the way of “a new view,” just warmed over “needless war” revisionism long refuted decisively by scholars of the period. Indeed, it might help me illustrate the problems with that discredited school to my students, with whom I am slated to discuss the subject next week in my course. But I did learn something new while falling down this rabbit hole: Eisenschiml co-wrote another book with Ralph G. Newman, legendary bookseller and founder of the charter Civil War Roundtable in Chicago. And according to Wikipedia, Newman’s step-son was none other than … Scott Simon of NPR Weekend Edition fame.
Thanks for that, free library cart. I knew I needed another book.
