Book reviews

Allen C. Guelzo, Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1999). Pp.xii + 516. $29.00 (hardback). ISBN 0 8028 3872 3.

David L. Dykstra, The Shifting Balance of Power: American‐British Diplomacy in North America, 1842–1848 (Lanham, Md: University Press of America, 1999). Pp.xxxiv + 247. $39.00 (hardback). ISBN 0 7618 1316 2.

Kathryn Teresa Long, The Revival of 1857–58: Interpreting an American Religious Awakening (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). Pp.x + 256. $45.00 (hardback). ISBN 0 1951 1293 8.

David Williams, Rich Man's War: Class, Caste, and Confederate Defeat in the Lower Chattahoochee Valley (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1998). Pp.xiv + 288. $34.95 (hardback). ISBN 0 8203 2033.

Eugene D. Genovese, A Consuming Fire: The Fall of the Confederacy in the Mind of the White Christian South (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1998). Pp.xvi 4–180. $24.95 (hardback). ISBN 0 8203 2046 3.

Randall M. Miller, Harry S. Stout, and Charles Reagan Wilson, eds., Religion and the American Civil War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). Pp.xiii + 422. $55.00 (hardback); $24.95 (paperback). ISBNs 0 1951 2128 7 and 0 1951 2129 5.

Daniel E. Sutherland, ed., Guerrillas, Unionists, and Violence on the Confederate Home Front (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1999). Pp.250. $32.00 (hardback); $20 (paperback). ISBN 1 5572 8549 7; ISBN 1 5572 8550 0.     

Reviews of Atlases and maps

EUROPE

An Atlas of Edinburgh. Prepared and published by the Geographical Association (Edinburgh Branch). 15 × 10. Pp. 39+5. 10s.

National Atlas of Disease Mortality in the United Kingdom. Prepared by G. M. Howe. 11 ¼ × 6 ¾. Pp. 111. 56 maps and associated commentaries, statistical appendix and administrative overtraces. London and Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1963. 35s.

Oxford Plastic Relief Maps; series 4: maps 8 (Devon), 9 (Cornwall), and 10 (Hampshire).

AFRICA

Nigeria Junior Atlas. Edited by E. E. Soladoye. Ghana Junior Atlas. Edited by E. A. Boateng. Both 11 × 8 ½. Pp. 33. London and Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd., 1965. Nigeria 5s.     

Local Democracy and Local Government Efficiency: The Case of Elected Executives in Australian Local Government

In the international context it has been argued that institutional reform to leadership in local government can improve the sector in terms of both its democratic legitimacy and its operational efficiency. In Australia, despite two decades of far-reaching reform processes across state government jurisdictions, focused heavily on structural change, local government still faces daunting problems, yet the potential of reform to political leadership as a method of alleviating these problems has not been fully explored. This paper thus examines the applicability of alternative leadership models to Australian local government, in particular the elected executive model which characterises some American and European local government systems. We argue that the introduction of elected executives could prove problematic in terms of accountability and representation in Australian local government.     

Dendrochronology reveals the construction history of an early 19th century farm settlement,southwestern Virginia,USA

The McDonald Farm (also called the Anderson-Doosing Farm) in Catawba Valley, Virginia dates to 1789 and is registered with the National Register of Historic Places maintained by the National Park Service. According to written accounts, oral histories, and architectural analyses, the construction of four structures (a collapsed cabin, a standing cabin, a barn, and a smokehouse) at the farm likely occurred in the early to mid-19th century. To verify and refine the construction dates of the four structures, we absolutely dated the tree rings in logs used in their construction by comparing their ring patterns with a composite reference tree-ring chronology created from four regional locations. We used established graphical and statistical techniques used in dendrochronology to ensure that all tree rings were dated absolutely with 99.99% certainty. We found cutting dates for the collapsed cabin ranged from 1809 to 1810, making the likely builder Samuel Myers and not Joseph Anderson, who is currently given credit for its construction. The logs in the barn had cutting dates ranging from 1830 to 1831, confirming the 1830 construction date estimated by the historical documents and confirming the builder was Joseph Anderson. The logs from the standing cabin and smokehouse had cutting dates ranging from 1838 to 1840, refining the “mid-19th century construction” listed in the register nomination. Furthermore, the nomination gave credit of the construction of these latter two structures also to Joseph Anderson, but the builder was actually John Gish who owned the farm from 1837 to 1845. Our study demonstrates the benefit and reliability of using dendrochronology to verify and refine construction dates and ownership histories of historic structures in the Southeastern U.S.     

Raising the dead: war,memory and American national identity*

Abstract. The dead, particularly the war dead, play a central role in the development of nationalism, nowhere more so than in America. America's mid‐nineteenth century Civil War produced a recognisable and influential ‘cult of the dead’, comparable in its construction with similar developments in Europe following World War I. Focused on the figure of the fallen soldier, especially the volunteer soldier, this cult found physical expression in the development of national cemeteries devoted not just to the burial of those who fell in the war but to the idea of America as a nation, in the development of monuments to the dead that, again, reinforced the new national symbolism of the war era, and in the beginnings of Memorial Day, an American sacred ceremony with clear parallels with the later Armistice Day ceremonies in Europe. In all these developments, America preceded the European nations by several decades, making America a valuable case study for the role that the cult of the fallen soldier plays in national development more generally.