MIRROR OF WAR

The Washington Star reports the Civil War- so runs the sub-head of this collection of contemporary news reporting, dispatches and headlines from the only Washington newspaper of Civil War vintage still in existence. Several things emerge from examination of the day by day reporting: the brevity, the acceptance of rumor as fact, the intermixture of social events, gossip notes, news of cultural flavor, a prize fight, draft riots, labor unrest, disasters such as the explosion of a magazine -- with the daily news of the front. Over sixty of the important events and battles of the Civil War are reported:- Chancellors- ville, Missionary Ridge, the Wilderness and Spotsylvania, the crater battle, the March to the Sea, the surrender at Appomattox, the activities of the pirate ship these are highlights, the bad chronicled with the victories. But one gets little by way of detail of the slugging monotony, the mounting fears, the human bits, the of things that today's reporting makes capital of. A worthwhile piece of historical research, but of interest primarily to modern journalists- and to dyed in the wool Civil War enthusiasts.