Manassas: A Novel of the War

Classics of Civil War Fiction

by Upton Sinclair, Dr. Kent Gramm (Editor)

Centers on the moral dimension of the conflict as it traces a young Mississippi boy’s conversion from pro-slavery Southerner to abolitionist Union soldier

Allan Montague, born on a Mississippi plantation about twenty years before the Civil War, has grown up with slavery and considers it natural. When his father moves to Boston for business and takes the boy with him, young Allan carries a knife given to him by his cousin to use in killing abolitionists.
 
The first abolitionist young Allan meets in Boston is Levi Coffin, the reputed founder of the Underground Railroad. In this first of many meetings with historical figures, Allan forms a friendship with Coffin, who eventually takes him to hear a speech by former slave Frederick Douglass. Douglass's powerful words cement Allan's transformation into an abolitionist—a transformation that will lead him back to his Deep South home with the hope of freeing slaves and eventually back to the North and the fateful Battle of Manassas.
 
Kent Gramm, author of the introduction for this new edition of Manassas, calls the novel “a modern version of the morality play,” with the United States as the central character. “The real story, he writes, is the moral phenomenon of the Civil War.” It is a powerful book that deserves to be revived, read, and studied.
 

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction

439 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1904

About the author

Upton Beall Sinclair, Jr. was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle (1906). To gather information for the novel, Sinclair spent seven weeks undercover working in the meat packing plants of Chicago. These direct experiences exposed the horrific conditions in the U.S. meat packing industry, causing a public uproar that contributed in part to the passage a few months later of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act. The Jungle has remained continuously in print since its initial publication. In 1919, he published The Brass Check, a muckraking exposé of American journalism that publicized the issue of yellow journalism and the limitations of the “free press” in the United States. Four years after the initial publication of The Brass Check, the first code of ethics for journalists was created. Time magazine called him "a man with every gift except humor and silence." In 1943, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Sinclair also ran unsuccessfully for Congress as a Socialist, and was the Democratic Party nominee for Governor of California in 1934, though his highly progressive campaign was defeated.

Reviews

[Anastasia · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fascinating early work by Sinclair, Manassas stands out more for its flaws than its virtues. A must-read for those studying Sinclair or the writing craft, Manassas shows the raw potential of emerging writer and thinker.

Intended to be the first part of a series of unfinished/unpublished works focusing on the Civil War, Manassas chronicles the story of a young man, Allan Montague, coming of age in a time of political unrest. Unbalanced at best, the work is part bildungsroman and part historical fiction. It does neither justice. The narrative can feel contrived, as Sinclair forces Montague into many historical entanglements. His interactions with Jefferson Davis, Frederick Douglas, John Brown, and Abraham Lincoln (to name a few) satisfy in humanizing these iconic figures and make the absurdity of the coincidences almost forgivable. And the fun facts he provides, such as the Lincoln love triangle, are worth the read alone.

Unfortunately, these delights come at the expense of his main character. At times, Montague is forgotten completely or just flatten into one dimension. A stark contrast made all the more so by the beautiful psychological study in the last pages of the text. Just as Sinclair seems to find his footing once more, the book ends abruptly. For some readers, this will be an unforgivable disappointment. Others, like me, will want to read more of his lesser known works, in hopes of demystifying his process and intentions.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Clever, beautifully written, over-written account of slave-owning life in the South, followed by the young protagonist's move to the North, and conversion to Abolitionism. A lively, passionate introduction to American politics at the time, to Abraham Lincolm, and to their wonderful command of the language in those days.

Warmly recommended by one my sons!

[David Arthur · Rating 5 out of 5]

With echoes of Stephan Crane, the author of "The Jungle," his opus on working class struggle and misery in fin de siècle industrial Chicago, I chanced upon Upton Sinclair's lesser known gem on the Civil War. "Manassas", an earlier version was written in 1903 by the twenty-four old Princeton, New Jersey resident, and published in 1904. this at a time when many Civil War veterans were busy leading the racist imperial slaughter of Filipinos on the other side of the Pacific. The planned Civil War trilogy stopped there. But, it still had a ways to go and grow. ["Theirs be the Guilt" , revised edition of "Manassas," copyright 1959 by Upton Sinclair. "Manassas," copyright 1904 by Macmillan Company and Copyright, 1923 by Upton Sinclair...A Manor Book, 1973]
The author's Preface relates:
"Charlotte Perkins Gilman, author of many feminist books,told me of having loaned the novel to a Civil War veteran who had expressed skepticism, saying that no mere youngster could tell 'him' anything about the subject."
Upton, dug into the Civil War collection at Princeton University, and accumulated 200 volumes, borrowed or bought to write the novel that I finish today.
"Also, I had another source from which to draw. Having been born in Baltimore, of a Virginia family, I had spent my early life amongst a proud people who still smarted from defeat. On my father's side, my grandfather and seven of my uncles and cousins had been Confederate naval officers; my great-grandfather, Captain Arthur Sinclair, U.S.N., served as a model for 'Grandfather Montague' of this novel...
I have taken this opportunity to give "Manassas" a thorough revision, moderating some of the exuberance of the earlier version..."

"War to the hilt!
Theirs be the guilt,
Who fetter the freeman
To ransom the slave!"

Thus rang the three conquerors of Manassas, Allan's own kin from the plantation he had left to go North and become converted by relatives, and the abolition sentiment of the North. These lines end the novel, as the loss to the Union at Manassas seeps into Allen's mind as he lay injured and battle shocked drinking from a water stream.

"Ten years ago one of the Montagues had given his life for Texas according to Valley Hall way of thinking, the wretched mongrel inhabitants of Mexico-- degenerate illustrations of the consequences of the doctrine of 'equality' and of white men's mixing with lower races...
Here, on the lawn also, were Negro children grown up into men and women, and recognitions and perplexities without end. These Negroes had been most of Allen's boyhood world....
Allen saw the truth now as he never seen it before. No longer was he to be bound by other duties-- his love of home, or his love for the South. Indeed, it was the South herself who cried out to him for deliverance, from the haglike spectre of Slavery which rode upon her back,...
'Thee must stay to dinner with us,' replied the Quaker. 'I will introduce thee to a young man whom I expect to see shortly--an extraordinary person. Since thee is turned Abolitionist, there will be no harm in thee knowing about him'...
The temper of the times was shown upon the assembling of the new Congress, three days after the hanging of Brown. Previously to this it is recorded that those who opposed each other in public life had been wont to meet socially upon friendly terms; but now feeling ran so high that social functions in Washington were difficult to arrange...
Inquiring for whose benefit the South suffered such things as these, he showed that out of a total white population of six million there were but three hundred and fifty thousand who owned more than five Negroes each...
The voice of Allan's grandfather Montague spoke to him again--those lessons which as a child he had only partially understood-- how terribly he understood them now: that America was humanity, it was for the brotherhood of mam. its hope was the hope of man, and its purpose the purpose of God...
The name of Lane was familiar to Allan [Allan was among volunteer soldiers guarding the White House] as one of the more violent of the free-state leaders in the old Kansas quarrel-- a companion of John Brown. Cassius Clay was a Kentuckian, an Abolitionist who had had various adventures as editor of an anti-slavery paper, fighting duels about it in his native State...
And then suddenly from somewhere opposite there burst out a cloud of smoke and flame, and Allan heard at his side a crushing, spatting sound, and felt his cousin, whom he still grasped with one arm, half torn out of it. Things smote Allan's face, cutting him, tearing him, blinding him; and over his hands there rushed a flood of something hot and terrible. In a spasm of fright he shook his head free and wiped clear his eyes--staring. Jack-- great God, where was Jack! Here was his body, and above it a neck-bone sticking up, and a jaw dangling in front of it; and out of the middle gushing up as from a fountain-- pumping, pumping-- a jet of crimson blood!..."

[Katherine · Rating 2 out of 5]

Upton Sinclair was only 26 when he wrote this book! There are some great elements to it and you can see the early seeds of his writing talents. But Manassas is pretty terrible. The first 40 pages are almost unreadable. It's a story of a young man who had a happy childhood living on a plantation in antebellum South. He was blissfully ignorant of the evils of slavery and never questioned it. So the description of the happy years, talking about "darkies" and picaninnies, is painful to read. Then the Young man goes to Harvard and has his eyes opened. He meets Quakers and goes to see Frederick Douglass speak. The middle part of the novel which deals with his enlightenment and the events of the prewar years is really great. He eventually enters the Union Army and fights in the battle of Manassas. The last few chapters about the battle are overblown, breathlessly dramatic and not very good. Still if you are an Upton Sinclair fan you'll enjoy seeing how he developed his writing style.

[Jim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sinclair wrote this book two years before The Jungle, and I like it. There is a little of The Red Badge of Courage to the last thirty pages, the battle of Manassas itself, but the first 230 pages are political, the story of how slavery tore North and South apart. At points Sinclair’s understanding is clearly wrong, as his portrayal of the North as teeming with abolitionists, but I learned as well, about the negotiations over California’s admission to the union or the preparations for the shelling of Ft. Sumter. With only one main character who is unrealistically present for a Forrest Gumpian series of historical events, the book is not believable as history, but it’s chronological storytelling offers a smooth read with some emotional resonance.

[Joe Stack · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have enjoyed other stories by Upton Sinclair, so I was disappointed in this one because how the nonfiction parts disrupt the flow of the fictional story. The story is like a sine curve. You go through low parts, then high, back to low, then high, and so on. Some parts, like the slave trying to run away is thrilling, and then it gets bogged down by a history lesson. Was I reading nonfiction or fiction? Both. The author's extensive research is clearly evident in the parts covering the historical events which Sinclair uses to describe what transpires in the story's timeline and to introduce the reader to what the main character, Allen Montague, is going to experience. The historical events described by Sinclair would make a good textbook about the events that lead to the Civil War. Sinclair's historical narrative is often filled with the passion and intensity that was likely felt by citizens of the South and North, giving these historical events an emotional context that the reader may not frequently feel in regular history books. I rate the final chapter, "The Battle," 4 stars because it is a n outstanding blending of nonfiction and fiction. Sinclair not only describes the horrors of combat, but he also describes the confusion, diversity, and unpreparedness that the government and soldiers of both sides experienced. However, as mentioned early on, the history lessons disrupt the story. Perhaps too, the story is uneven because of the weight carried by the main character. Allen is Sinclair's symbol of the nation. Allen/the nation is coming of age, has to endure internal upheaval, and see beyond his upbringing/sectionalism.

[Gregg Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book in many ways but it claims that slavery was the cause of the Civil War. But it leaves out all the other issues that caused the Civil War. It leaves out the Crash of 1857. That alone brought the whole USA into a financial crisis that I believe was worse than the Depression of the 1930's. It leaves out how the Congress was trying to lay an import tax that would impact the South more than the North. It was put in after the Civil War and this tax did lay the South bare for about 100 years. This was just not to found in this book.

It is a good moral examination of the moral dilemma of slaver before the Civil War and for that I would say it is worth reading.

Loat, Upton Sinclair did hail from a Southern family who were ruined by the Civil War and it did move Upton to finding a living that was not found in the traditional South.

[Dr.J.G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

A comparatively fresh look at the civil war in US. Fresh, from the perspective rather than time of course. It is a bit comparable in freshness of outlook to Orwell's Homage to Catalonia.