Edward Alfred Pollard, The lost cause; a new Southern history of the War of the Confederates ... Drawn from official sources and approved by the most distinguished Confederate leaders.

[4] necessary to discard from the narrative many small incidents, either episodal in their nature, or of no importance in the logical chain of events. With this view, the author has paid but little attention to small occurrences of the war which in no way affected its general fortunes, and has measured his accounts of battles and of other events by the actual extent of their influence on the grand issues of the contest. Instead of a confused chronological collection of events, he has sought to prepare for the reader a compact and logical narrative that will keep his attention close to the main movement of the story, and put instruction as to causes hand in hand with the information of events.