A Fool's Errand: A Novel of the South During Reconstruction

by Albion W. Tourgée

Now available from Waveland Press, this thinly veiled account of Judge Albion W. Tourgee's own career as a forceful advocate of civil rights was a bestseller in the 1880s and continues to occupy a place in the history of American literature. Judge Tourgee's reflections on the fundamental post- abolition problem of how to build a bridge from black emancipation to black equality provide readers with a clear picture of the South during the Reconstruction era. Presented as a work of fiction, this engaging and provocative work discusses Reconstruction and the many problems surrounding it. An introduction by George Fredrickson provides historical context for both the author and the novel.

Genres: History, Civil War, Classics, Nonfiction, American, Read For School, School

404 pages, Paperback

First published November 30, 1878

About the author

Albion Winegar Tourgée was an American soldier, lawyer, writer, politician, and diplomat. Wounded in the Civil War, he relocated to North Carolina afterward, where he became involved in Reconstruction activities. He served in the constitutional convention and later in the state legislature. A pioneer civil rights activist, he founded the National Citizens' Rights Association, and founded Bennett College as a normal school for freedmen in North Carolina (it has been a women's college since 1926).

Reviews

[M.K. Hobson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really fascinating book, and I recommend it highly to any student of history. Written in 1879, it is an informative contemporary glimpse into the life of a yankee "carpetbagger" in America's Reconstruction-era South. It is not only interesting from an historical standpoint, but it's also a pretty decent piece of fiction in its own right. I found Lily's story, in the second half of the book, was particularly well-done.

Highly recommended.

[Neill Goltz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well, I'm on fire today over at my Talking Points Memo account: http://forums.talkingpointsmemo.com/t...

A discussion on the (growing) Confederate flag controversy spawned by the Charleston, SC terrorist act of June 2015 prompted me to write and submit the following to a membership discussion board. Having written about Tourgee' many times in the past elsewhere, I finally saved the most recent composition this time and will post it here, permanently, in lieu of a formal reveiw.

Albion Tourgee's "A Fool's Errand - written by a fool" is a hugely important social novel - written at the time by a participant in Reconstruction.

Although the name of the state in which the tale is told is never mentioned, I understand that Tourgee did historically serve as an infantry colonel with an Ohio regiment which was posted to North Carolina late in the war, and afterward he returned there with his family, thus experiencing the culture and events, that he eventually turned into this "autobiographical historical novel".

Presumably his return was with the best of intentions, but due to the rise of the KKK and the destruction of the antebellum economic system things didn't work out.

Tourgee' is a particularly fascinating and transcendant (if unknown) historical figure because, long after he had been driven out of North Carolina, he served as Homer Plessy's plaintiff's attorney in 1896 in New Orleans, litigating the Plessy v. Ferguson case, in which the SCOTUS established "separate but equal" for the next 60 years.

For more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albion_...

This really is a hugely important book, unknown for the most part by modern readers. It was brought to my attention by the chairman of the English Department at Grinnell College in Iowa in a deep conversation we were having about the failure of Reconstruction.

For an unanswerable question on this, please also read Candace Millard's book on the tragedy of America's loss of James Garfield:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Bridget · Rating 4 out of 5]

sort of cheating. but not really since I read it all.

[Mike Stone, · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A Fool Lies Here - - -."

The era of "Reconstruction" in the aftermath of the Civil War remains one of the most controversial periods of American history, furiously argued over to this day, and "A Fools Errand" is one of the most valuable windows into it that we moderns, and especially the general reader, have access to, giving us an account of those times "straight from the horse's mouth".

Tourgeé was right in the middle of the events he describes, as one of the bitterly (and often unfairly) derided "carpetbaggers" in North Carolina, where he held various public offices, principally as a judge. A Union soldier, he settled there in 1865 with all kinds of high hopes for the rebuilding of the defeated South. Fourteen years later he returned North, utterly defeated and disillusioned.

All his and his fellows' work had been thwarted by a ruthless and efficient terrorist campaign, enjoying the near-total support of the local (white) community, and which the authorities in Washington were quite unable, and, as things dragged on, increasingly unwilling, to combat in any effective way.

In some ways this book has an oddly "modern" sound, perhaps reflecting the fact that much of the story remains so relevant today. Tourgeé's observations on his hero's (and by implication his own) resolution to enlist in 1861 display a dry cynicism worthy of the 21st Century, while this hero's letter to a northern Senator complains of the mishandling of the reconstruction programme in terms which anticipate later criticisms of another "reconstruction" following the fall of Baghdad.

It is interesting to note Tourgeé's complaints about the persistent tendency, even in the North, to romanticise the southern cause. He grumbles that before long, at this rate, men will be ashamed to admit that they ever fought for the Union. And this was written in 1879, over 60 years before "Gone With The Wind" and even 35 years before "Birth of a Nation". Clearly the will to sympathise with the fallen foe (once he was safely defeated) began far earlier than most people realise.

Yet he himself can show, if not sympathy, then at least understanding of the feelings of those who so brutally destroyed his work. One of the best things about the book is its ability, much rarer now in an age which takes colour-blind democracy for granted, to get inside the heads of those who rejected it - who saw themselves (and were seen by many others) as serving an honourable cause, though by the most dishonourable methods.

Tourgeé gives a vivid illustration of the levels of resistance which even a totally defeated society can bring to bear against the efforts of well meaning outsiders, even when the latter are backed by seemingly overwhelming force. At one point (Ch XXI) with an eerie topicality, he equates the depth of Southern commitment to white supremacy with "the zeal of Islam", and when (Ch XLV) he speaks of north and south as "convenient names for two distinct, hostile and irreconcilable ideas.- two civilisations" he again anticipates the language of the "war on terror". One recalls those lines of Kipling's

"And the end of the fight is a tombstone white
with the name of the late deceased
And the epitaph drear 'A fool lies here,
who tried to hustle the east'".

Substitute "south" for "east" and that pretty well sums it up. But perhaps there is another (middle) eastern example in our own day for those with eyes to see it.

This book is Tourgeé's "retrospect" on that part of his life. Sadder but infinitely wiser, he calls himself a "Fool" for his youthful aspirations, yet one somehow feels that that he retains a sympathy for that youthful idealist, and deep down still thinks the young Tourgeé (alias "Comfort Servosse") a better man than his world-weary older self. I am reminded of the survivor from World War One, who dedicated his memoirs "With deep emotion, to the man I used to be".

[Neal Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Albion Tourgee was a lawyer who fought in the Civil War on the side of the union and is probably best known for his (losing) role in the Supreme Court case Plessy versus Ferguson that upheld the Jim Crow laws of segregation. His novel, A Fool's Errand, provides a fascinating and often disturbing look at the racial animus in the South during Reconstruction. Written in 1879 and loosely autobiographical, it relays the story of a union officer, Comfort Servose, who moves to the South shortly after the Civil War. In his effort to aid the freed slaves, he encounters the racism of his neighbors and eventually has to deal with the Klu Klux Klan. But Albion Tourgee doesn't let the North off so easily either. Fool's Errand is also a stinging indictment of the apathy of the North. Many Northerners didn't want to interfere in the South and really just wanted to move on from the Civil War. Nominated as a delegate to his state's convention to rewrite the constitution to be readmitted to the Union, Servose is advised by a prominent (but unnamed) senator to just revise the old constitution with the words 'slavery is wrong' somewhere. As to the lynchings and other forms of intimidation, the freed slaves should learn to fend for themselves.

I usually don't read fiction but ran across Albion Tourgee in Ida B Wells 'Crusade for Justice' that I read earlier this year. Apparently the two of them were friends, and it was through Tourgee that Ida met her husband. I gave it 4 stars only because sometimes the language can be a bit flowery, which is also indicative of the time period. But the racial sentiments expressed by Servose seem very modern. The condemnation of explicit racism from voter suppression and intimidation to the hatred of alt-right groups like the KKK could have been written today. Albion Tourgee also has a unique writing style. It reminded me a little bit of the Greek or Roman dialogues where different sides to an issue are debated by various characters. Tourgee primarily achieves this through letters sent back and forth. But there are also action scenes throughout which make certain portions of the work a 'page turner.' All in all I highly enjoyed A Fool's Errand and would highly recommend.

[Frank Stein · Rating 3 out of 5]

Today, Albion Tourgee is best known as the lawyer for Homer Plessy in the suit of Plessy vs. Ferguson (1896), which, despite Tourgee's best efforts, instituted the "separate but equal" standard in American law. Before that, Tourgee was a union soldier and "carpetbagger" who went to Greensboro, North Carolina to improve his health and help protect the new Republican government. He became disillusioned with the enterprise, however, and his cri de coeur is this thinly-veiled novel, "A Fool's Errand," originally just signed "By one of the fools."

Unlike some historians to come, Tourgee was not disillusioned about Reconstruction because of the horror of corrupt "carpetbagging" governments, run by supposed "ignorant" freedman, but because he thought the North never understood how hard it would be to fight the racial bigotry of the South and truly reconstruct it in a new modern form.

Although the book can become preachy and political, it often exhibits a keen eye for the peculiar mores of the South, both in their good and bad variations. The book recounts a wonderful encounter between Colonel Servosse (the Northern hero), his wife, and Judge Squire Hyman, who absent-mindedly peruses some "abolition" books the Northerners had on their shelf, and tells them he is curious to read them, since such books were banned before the war. The Northerners are shocked that he could have consented to have books banned, but Hyman sees it all as logical self-defense of what they regarded then as a sacred institution. Hyman later notes that he is featured in one of those books, for helping beat two Methodist ministers preaching against slavery. He's as friendly as can be with the "abolitionist" Servosses but sees no contradiction in this, since such beatings were just necessary "protection" of the community, and were in no way personal. Again and again, such as when the Ku Klux Klan decides to kill Servosse and fails, and then many of those same members later rush to his side during his illness, the author notes the peculiar violent and impersonal ideas of the South, combined with its strangely touching and personal relations.

Likewise, Tourgee has a good eye for the condition of the freedmen, who often strive to establish a firm economic independence, but know they must rely on the might and wealth of the local whites. When one blacksmith caters to other blacks and learns to read and assist them in voting, the Ku Klux Klan whips him, and he is so used to such abuse that he hardly seems horrified by it. The author knows that the combination of centuries of abuse of the blacks and centuries of command by the whites meant that such relations could not be easily severed.

Much of the book shows how the desire to reestablish white supremacy corrupted the institutions of the South, from the judiciary to the press, since the old institutions could only be recreated through pervasive falsehoods and lies. When the local Klan kill the "radical John Walters" and stuff his body in a box in the courthouse, the local press claims that he must have been killed by angered black allies, or at worst by intruders from another county, when they know as well as anyone it was locals. When the black reverend Jerry Hunt overhears two whites describe the murder, though, he also hears them almost come to blows because one of them has continuing qualms about such extra-legal murder, and the other knows that no qualms can be allowed if the Klan is going to triumph. Bit by bit, the white South lied, cheated and killed to force a false victory, one which even the victors knew corrupted their country.

At the end, the book descends into a poor melodrama involving the local son of gentry and former "Kluxer," Melville Gurney, and his efforts after Lily Servosse's hand, along with bald pontificating from Servosse about the South's upcoming problems. But, overall, it offers much to ponder about the nature of the Civil War and the failure of its aftermath, and offers a peculiar image of the South in some of its darkest moments.

[Erik · Rating 4 out of 5]

A surprising novel about the era of post-Civil War Reconstruction. Based on his own experience as an idealistic young man who joined thousands of Union Army veterans to move South after the war, Tourgee tells a story that runs counter to the usual narrative of Reconstruction as a time of brutal military occupation and misrule by greedy Yankee transplants (carpetbaggers) in league with uneducated and unprepared freemen and poor whites (scalawags).

Like much of the history of the Civil War and its aftermath, when it came to telling the story of Reconstruction, the victor outsourced writing the history to the vanquished.

Rather than exercising its privilege -- and its responsibility -- to document the war and Reconstruction as heroic fights by abolitionists and their allies to free slaves and establish racial equality, the North let the losers write the history their way. And that's how we got the story of the Civil War as the heroic "Lost Cause" and the story of Reconstruction as a big corrupt failure.

Tourgee helps correct these myths with his tale of a wounded Union colonel from the Midwest, Comfort Servosse, who fell in love with the South during the war and returns there after the war to recover his health and help the devastated region rebuild. Starting full of goodwill for his neighbors black and white, Servosse soon learns that most of the leading whites in the community are just unreconstructed Confederates whose charming manners hides a brutality in pursuit of returning their social order and economy as close to slavery as possible.

Once he buys a run-down plantation, fixes it up, and then subdivides part of it into small farms for freed slaves, relations with the local whites start to get ugly. The Klan shows up and blood starts to run, making it clear that old Confederates may have lost the war, but they will fight to the death the win the peace. Servosse and his fellow Reconstructors in the state appeal to the Wise Men of the North in Congress for help, those who advocated abolition before the war. But the only answer they receive after the war is advice to stop making so much trouble and try to get along with their white southern neighbors. Once Union troops are withdrawn, and "Redeemers" take control over the state government, the last barrier is removed to the planters' counter-revolution.

A tragic story that nonetheless conveys much of the charm of the South, "A Fool's Errand" provides an inside view of what this underrated but key time in American history was really like. And it shows why America still has so much trouble, 155 years after the end of the Civil War, in making our country truly fair and free for Black citizens.

Tourgee, who was born in Ohio and moved to North Carolina after the Civil War, has come down in American history as the leading white advocate of racial equality and economic empowerment in Reconstruction. A judge and legislator under North Carolina's multi-racial Reconstruction government, Tourgee earned a reputation as an active supporter of Black rights.

Decades later, when the Black citizens of New Orleans wanted to fight Louisiana's law allowing segregated railcars, they called on Tourgee to help them mount a challenge in court. The case made it all the way to the Supreme Court, but unfortunately, in 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson was decided against the plaintiffs, legalizing more than a half century of "separate but equal" segregation in public facilities.

[soap · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actual rating 3.5 stars.

I think this book started off pretty strong and carried onward pretty strong until about halfway through the novel. I found myself really enjoying Metta's character and the debates that Comfort had with the townspeople. However, I continually found myself confused because of the constant introduction and interactions of new characters that I wasn't sure were entirely relevant to the story at hand, so I had some difficulty weeding through those.

I also think that some of the potential that this book could have had was not completely reached because the book continually talks about the patterns of escalating violence and the threats that have been made against Comfort and his family, and yet, all of that seems to dissipate. Yes, other people do suffer at the hands of the KKK for speaking out against injustice, but I think in terms of character development, Comfort really got the short end of the stick. It seems as though he regressed rather than advanced and grew to accept his fate rather than continue to try to change it. This affected not just his opinions on race but also on gender, as he makes a rather insulting comment about his wife being contradictory and "all women are the same" at the end of one of the last chapters.

Granted, I think using these ironic situations were a way that Tourgee could point out to his audience some of the inconsistencies of thought during this period in time. But it was still a frustrating book to read at times and really highlights just how difficult it was to progress in a time where the country legally *should* have been progressing and was not.

[J M-B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Subtitled 'a novel of the South during Reconstruction' this book deserves to be read more widely. While a work of fiction, it is clearly in the 'novel of ideas' tradition and offers an early critique of the policies of the victorious Unionists, in particular the policy of emancipating enslaved people while also offering sovereign power to the Southern states of the confederacy which, inevitably, meant toleration of the 'Black Codes', the violence of the KKK and the immiseration of Black southerners by other means. While it is intensely critical of both the Confederacy and the Unionist handling of Reconstruction it is, by no means, a condemnation of slavery that modern readers might wish it to be. In a lengthy narrative exposition that cannot easily be dismissed as the views of the central character, Servosse, Tourgee offers a jarring defence of the right of Southern Unionists to continue to own slaves as reward for having opposed secession (pp. 144-6 in this edition). It is a fascinating period novel that is all the more valuable because it remains so evidently 'of its time'.

[Sean Tandy · Rating 3 out of 5]

An important book if not a very good one. Tourgée was an early advocate of equal rights, famous as the lawyer arguing against segregation before the Supreme Court in Plessy v. Ferguson. He published this lightly dramatized account of his experiences in the South during reconstruction in 1879. It suffers from many of the faults of 19th-century American literature in general (hopelessly sentimental; outmoded ideals) but also from those of a first-time novelist (mediocre plotting, terrible dialogue). But the novel does succeed in making real the apprehension and political chaos that was Reconstruction. The section on the rise of the KuKlux Klan is particularly effective. It also presents an attempt to see more than the northern side of the issues and deals with deeper problems of the human condition, such as how good people get wrapped up in movements of evil. In a lot of ways, like most literature on Reconstruction, it resonates perhaps too strongly with America’s present condition.

[Henry Percy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Originally pub. 1879. A WSJ reviewer listed this reeking pile in one of the weekend, 5-best columns. Not so much a novel as a compilation of carpetbagger sermons, pamphlets and editorials from the time. For those who wish to wallow in smarmy, self-righteous sanctimony, read on. I got only 30% through it.

[Robert Belknap · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had never heard of this novel before. It sends shivers -- about the failures of the past but also its resonances in our modern-day circumstances. The “willful circumventions” used by secessionists after the Civil War in their “lost cause” to hold onto the ideals and leaders of the traitor confederacy are akin to the GOP’s conjoint machinations today to give cover to Trump and his lies about the results of the 2020 election. Read it and see for yourself.

[Tom Bain · Rating 2 out of 5]

An interesting record of contemporary attitudes in the Reconstruction era, and prescient in its analysis of how deeply entrenched racism would continue to be, but there isn't much in the way of plot, character or interesting prose in this novel. I will however say that it's very funny to end your autobiographical novel with the death of your authorial stand-in character.

[k chu · Rating 5 out of 5]

A contemporary telling of southern life 'post bellum'.

Closest portrayals of the dynamics of 'Reconstruction' and the reasons for its failure in a work of fiction. Published 1879.

[Pam Ackerman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still Relevant

To urge has provided us with a thorough look into the hearts of the people who struggled with all the fall out of the civil war.

[Makayla Carr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Definitely an interesting read. It doesn’t have any true resolution which was frustrating, but it is a novel about Reconstruction to be fair.

[Feargal McGovern · Rating 5 out of 5]

forget about the pro slavery cry fest 'Gone with the wind', this is the only civil war novel you ever need to read

[Mark Schlatter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was introduced to Tourgee in the book We as Freemen: Plessy v. Ferguson, which described Tourgee's advocacy of Plessy before the Supreme Court. That book also described Tourgee's fiction of the Reconstruction in enough interesting detail that I decided to try his first major work. By the way, I read the electronic version of the work available at http://docsouth.unc.edu/church/tourge....

The novel is based upon Tourgee's time in the South as a "carpet-bagger". Our protagonist is Comfort Servosse, a Union soldier who moves his family south (in the area where he fought) after the Civil War. His aim is to carry out the changes in Southern politics and society that he believes he fought for in the war. However, the title is apt --- Servosse acts as a fool in the early going (as he fails to understand how his words and actions impact supporters of the former Confederacy) and then realizes how foolish the entire endeavor is in the latter part of the novel.

It is this realization that is the strongest part of the novel. Tourgee outlines not only what the North and South believe, but what they believe about each others' beliefs. The result is a dramatization of the immense gulf between the intentions of the North and the unyielding nature of the South. In a reversal of the usual saying, Tourgee argues that the South lost the war, but won almost every subsequent political and moral battle. The efforts of "radical" Northerners and newly freed slaves, even with the help of Reconstruction, are ultimately cast aside. (Note that Tourgee argues that Reconstruction did not go far enough, and his protagonist is not surprised when the compromise eventually fails.)

In many ways, this is a novel of polemic. Tourgee, for much of the book, focuses not on action, but communication: letters to and from the Servosse family (including one from a Senator urging the quick work of Reconstruction for political reasons) as well as oral descriptions of various events. For most of the book, I was fascinated with the documentation (assumably slightly fictionalized) that Tourgee provides. The section on the development and power of the Ku Klux Klan is particularly chilling.

However, in the last third or so of the book, Tourgee turns to plot. Servosse's daughter, barely present throughout the beginning of the book, becomes a central figure. We have a thrilling escape from the KKK and thwarted romance. It's nicely written (if somewhat florid), but not of a piece with the first part of the book. Indeed, with this turn, the rest of the novel is mostly concerned with rich white Southerners and how they will live with each other, not the freed slaves.

A solid read to help with understanding Reconstruction, but a flawed ending.

[Marcus · Rating 4 out of 5]

A window on the South during Reconstruction following the Civil War.

The author, Albion Tourgee, was a combat veteran of two Union regiments, having fought and been wounded at Bull Run, and Perryville. He was exchanged out of the infamous Libby Prison in 1863 and resumed serving with his Ohio regiment. He resigned from ill health in December of that year. After the war he wrote a history of his regiment, "The Story Of A Thousand", a history of the 105th Ohio Volunteer Infantry.

In 1866, returning to North Carolina after the war, wanting to remain there for health reasons, he was eventually appraised as a "Carpetbagger", and abolitionist, by those so recently occupied with insurrection. His equanimity towards negroes put him at a distinct disadvantage in social circles of North Carolina. Aiding former slaves by selling them part of his land upon which they could farm, was frowned upon by the insurgent KKK. Elected as a Superior Court judge in 1868, his life was threatened by the Klan for confrontations with them in court. One of three commissioners in charge of updating the State's laws, the commissioners codified previously contradictory North Carolina laws. He was a delegate to the 1875 North Carolina constitutional convention.

His championing of black rights in print and in person made him infamous to whites and brought admiration from blacks. He was Plessy's attorney for the 1896 Supreme Court case, Plessy v Ferguson, that settled black's rights as "Separate but equal." Convicted earlier in Louisiana, and affirmed by that state's Supreme Court, they lost the case in the SCOTUS.

The protagonist in the story, Comfort Servosse, a Union Civil War veteran, like Tourgee, purchases a farm in North Carolina, and proceeds to become a good neighbor, and citizen by his own standards, not those of the deep South after the Civil War. Social elevation of blacks to equality with whites was, to put it mildly, not accepted by the locals who outnumbered the former slaves. This was what Tourgee ignored, or did not consider enough, until a realization dawned on him some time later that white society was deeply recalcitrant to grant equality to blacks, so he gave himself the title of "The Fool," in consequence.

It was a best seller in 1879, and it greatly illuminates that time of American history that lingers in the deep shade constructed by the Confederates who lost the war, but won the Reconstruction.

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a literary text it is a little unbalanced in its structure and story, however it is immensely interesting in its portrayal of the conditions of the South from an honest and respectable 'carpetbagger'. It's amazing the parallels that exist between the Southern cause and the right of today, even the aptitude to defame through cleverly invented names. There is also the partisanship and political scheming which debilitated Reconstruction which to this day plagues all noble causes brought to Congress to questions of the role of the Federal government in directing state affairs. I'm honestly surprised that many lists which try to share the best texts to aid scholars in their attempts to unveil the tragedy of this era and would recommend it to anyone with an interest in the era as it is much more interesting with its Twain-esque humor of the Wise men who drove the honest man to folly and contemporaneous perspective.

[Humphrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

The subtitle of A Fool's Errand might be pluralized to "Novels of the South during Reconstruction," for it is a dappled text. On one hand there are the sections, largely early in the book, of Twain-like irreverent humor. This humor becomes increasingly bitter as the novel progresses. On the other hand, there are substantial sections in the middle of the text of political monologue in the form of letters or narrative address. Finally, the novel turns to a romance, both in the plot sense (an arc about the rising threat posed to the hero by the KKK) and the courtship sense. It's a fascinating text, at some times fun, others enraging, others simply saddening. Definitely worth attention for those interested in either the historical experience of Reconstruction or the aesthetic project of representing it.

[Jean Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a scathing indictment of the role of the US government after the Civil War in allowing the freedoms won by the slaves to be eroded by the State's Rights people in the interest of peace between North and South. The author tells the story of his main character frequently labelling him the 'fool' referred to in the title. The main character is a well meaning former Union soldier who heads South to gain his health back and begin a new life. He has no understanding of the Southern outrage following the war and the whole Reconstruction period in our history. Every side comes in for scorn in a book that it is hard sometimes to realize was written in the 1870s.

[Samantha · Rating 5 out of 5]

an unltimately sad account of the south's refusal to change after the civil war and the north's refusal to give a damn about the south. comfort servosse finds himself the fool, the starry-eyed carpet-bagger who moves south after the close of the war. servosse's dreams are gradually stripped of any worth when the intricate workings of white society pove too strong for any radical reordering of social and economic echelons.

[Bruce Greene · Rating 3 out of 5]

Essential for any understanding of Reconstruction history. This novel is based on the author's experiences s a "Carpetbagger" but goes far beyond the textbook understanding. The doubts he raises are still with us today. The language is flowery, the vocabulary challenging at times (uses words no longer in use! ((a good thing))) but the melodramatic plot keeps the history moving along.

[Jessica Lynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. I think it was an interesting book. I had never heard the term "carpetbagger" before and so I found out some history facts while I read it. Though I enjoyed the story, I found it a bit flowery and repetitive at parts, which made it hard to get through. But overall, it was pretty well done.

[+Chaz · Rating 3 out of 5]

For us fools who sometimes jump to enlighten others when the others think your not enlighten. A good read about what happens after the American Civil War ended and the Northern judge that thought he could right the wrongs of the South

[Sarah Padgett · Rating 5 out of 5]

This has been referred to as "The Reconstruction Era" Confederacy of Dunces. I agree to a point but our main character in Errand posses more endearing qualities. I recommend this book to Northerners interested in the real commoners narrative during and after the Civil War.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A novel of Reconstruction based on Tourgee's own life during that period; wrestles with the many problems of that time.

[Donna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this one a while ago. Came across it while cleaning out my bookshelf.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

A historically important book that gives the reader great and memorable insight into the reconstruction-era south.