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The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West
A dramatic, riveting, and deeply researched narrative account of the epic struggle for the West during the Civil War, revealing a little-known, vastly important episode in American history.
In The Three-Cornered War Megan Kate Nelson reveals the fascinating history of the Civil War in the American West. Exploring the connections among the Civil War, the Indian wars, and western expansion, Nelson reframes the era as one of national conflict—involving not just the North and South, but also the West.
Against the backdrop of this larger series of battles, Nelson introduces nine individuals: John R. Baylor, a Texas legislator who established the Confederate Territory of Arizona; Louisa Hawkins Canby, a Union Army wife who nursed Confederate soldiers back to health in Santa Fe; James Carleton, a professional soldier who engineered campaigns against Navajos and Apaches; Kit Carson, a famous frontiersman who led a regiment of volunteers against the Texans, Navajos, Kiowas, and Comanches; Juanita, a Navajo weaver who resisted Union campaigns against her people; Bill Davidson, a soldier who fought in all of the Confederacy’s major battles in New Mexico; Alonzo Ickis, an Iowa-born gold miner who fought on the side of the Union; John Clark, a friend of Abraham Lincoln’s who embraced the Republican vision for the West as New Mexico’s surveyor-general; and Mangas Coloradas, a revered Chiricahua Apache chief who worked to expand Apache territory in Arizona.
As we learn how these nine charismatic individuals fought for self-determination and control of the region, we also see the importance of individual actions in the midst of a larger military conflict. The Three-Cornered War is a captivating history—based on letters and diaries, military records and oral histories, and photographs and maps from the time—that sheds light on a forgotten chapter of American history.
In The Three-Cornered War Megan Kate Nelson reveals the fascinating history of the Civil War in the American West. Exploring the connections among the Civil War, the Indian wars, and western expansion, Nelson reframes the era as one of national conflict—involving not just the North and South, but also the West.
Against the backdrop of this larger series of battles, Nelson introduces nine individuals: John R. Baylor, a Texas legislator who established the Confederate Territory of Arizona; Louisa Hawkins Canby, a Union Army wife who nursed Confederate soldiers back to health in Santa Fe; James Carleton, a professional soldier who engineered campaigns against Navajos and Apaches; Kit Carson, a famous frontiersman who led a regiment of volunteers against the Texans, Navajos, Kiowas, and Comanches; Juanita, a Navajo weaver who resisted Union campaigns against her people; Bill Davidson, a soldier who fought in all of the Confederacy’s major battles in New Mexico; Alonzo Ickis, an Iowa-born gold miner who fought on the side of the Union; John Clark, a friend of Abraham Lincoln’s who embraced the Republican vision for the West as New Mexico’s surveyor-general; and Mangas Coloradas, a revered Chiricahua Apache chief who worked to expand Apache territory in Arizona.
As we learn how these nine charismatic individuals fought for self-determination and control of the region, we also see the importance of individual actions in the midst of a larger military conflict. The Three-Cornered War is a captivating history—based on letters and diaries, military records and oral histories, and photographs and maps from the time—that sheds light on a forgotten chapter of American history.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published February 11, 2020
207 people are currently reading
2708 people want to read
About the author
Megan Kate Nelson
12 books93 followersMEGAN KATE NELSON is a writer and historian living in Lincoln, Massachusetts. I have written about the Civil War, U.S. western history, and American culture for the New York Times, Washington Post, Smithsonian Magazine, The Atlantic, and TIME.
I have just published "Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America" (Scribner, 2022) to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Yellowstone National Park. My previous book, "The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West" (Scribner, 2020) won a 2017 NEH Public Scholar Award and was a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize in History.
I earned my BA in History and Literature from Harvard University and my PhD in American Studies from the University of Iowa.
I have just published "Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America" (Scribner, 2022) to coincide with the 150th anniversary of Yellowstone National Park. My previous book, "The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West" (Scribner, 2020) won a 2017 NEH Public Scholar Award and was a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize in History.
I earned my BA in History and Literature from Harvard University and my PhD in American Studies from the University of Iowa.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 176 reviews
July 1, 2022
The Three-Cornered War is a vital account of the struggles in the far-flung West during the years of the U.S. Civil War, where Union soldiers fought to retain territory, Confederate soldiers fought to expand theirs, and Native Americans fought for their very existence. Using nine individuals who experienced the conflict as her book's anchors (a la
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
), Megan Kate Nelson streamlines these tumultuous, violent years into a brisk, coherent narrative that proves richly rewarding for readers looking to learn more about this neglected part of civil war history. Although the book is far more sympathetic towards the various Navajo and Apache people caught up in an expansionist maelstrom (and how couldn't it be?), Nelson offers a fair portrait of the Union and Confederate soldiers involved, successfully getting at the motives and psychology that drove them, as well as their individual acts of bravery and heroism. That being said, there's probably something wrong with you if you don't finish the book with a feeling of contempt for John Baylor, who never got his just desserts. All told, this is a great book about the more obscure events and consequences of the U.S. Civil War.
March 20, 2025
The epilogue of this book points out the juxtaposition that’s at the heart of its story, about the Union government’s efforts to gain control of the far-off Southwest during the Civil War. Union troops found themselves fighting both Confederate forces and Native Americans, for different reasons, using different methods. In doing so, they saw no incongruity in how they sought to win the West and unite the nation - securing “an American empire of liberty” required a simultaneous embrace of both “slave emancipation and Native extermination.”
If anything at all is said in most Civil War histories about events in the New Mexico Territory, attention generally wanes after the Battle of Glorieta Pass, which took place early in the war and is generally treated as a sideshow to the main events further east. In this book, the battle occurs at roughly the halfway point, because there remains much more story to be told.
First, though, Nelson writes of the territory’s importance to each side in the war, and to the inception of the war itself. Control of the southwest would provide access to California’s ports and its gold, which would give the victor a financial edge in the war. And the very question of whether slavery would be allowed to expand into the territories is largely what led to the war in the first place. So the Union was determined to keep the territory free, while the Confederacy saw the expansion of slavery - and of the Confederacy itself - as crucial to its survival.
At this point in the “three-cornered war” among Union troops, Confederates and the local Native American and Hispanic people, the Union-versus-Confederacy conflict is of primary importance, and relations with the natives mostly involve relatively minor skirmishes, fragile truces, and playing them off against each other in a “the enemy of your enemy is your friend” kind of way.
This begins to change after the Confederate withdrawal following the Battle of Glorieta Pass. With dwindling hopes of successfully conquering the southwest, “the dream of creating a continental Confederacy built on the labor of slaves in the fields and the mines, and the possibility of extending that empire of slavery into Mexico, had evaporated like a desert mirage,” Nelson writes.
And then her narrative takes a turn. Union forces have successfully vanquished the Confederates. Now they need to do the same with the natives.
By late 1862, after Confederate troops had retreated to Texas, Union forces in New Mexico remained on war footing and their patience was wearing thin. So the federal government’s long-running strategy of negotiating and making peace with natives as it expanded westward went out the window. “The army would make no treaties,” Nelson writes. “War first. Then relocation. And then, ultimately, civilization.” The Native Americans did not give up easily, as defeats made them even more determined, leaving federal forces to conclude that annihilation or removal were the only options. Peaceful coexistence was not - at least not until the book’s end, long after the war.
This is a unique book in that it’s not strictly about the Civil War, nor is it about the Indian Wars as a whole, though it provides a sense of both. There are frequent check-ins to what’s happening back east, via newspaper accounts read by the book’s protagonists, which helps to place events in the context of the broader Civil War. And there are nods to other conflicts with natives in other areas, before, concurrently with, and after the book’s events.
The story is told largely through the eyes of a handful of main characters, which works much better than I had imagined - sometimes this type of storytelling structure can get bogged down in biography and backstory and personalities, though here it helps to make a complex story more understandable, signposting what’s happening where, and to whom, and giving you a rooting interest in how it all turns out. And the writing is very good, providing a great sense of everything from the landscape to the various individuals’ perspectives.
It’s easy to picture the Civil War being waged on rolling green hills and farmlands along the eastern coast, with the lesser-known Western theater extending no further west than the Mississippi River. This book extends the story even further west, telling a little-known story about efforts to unite and expand the country, and how they coincided and conflicted in a complicated but fascinating way.
If anything at all is said in most Civil War histories about events in the New Mexico Territory, attention generally wanes after the Battle of Glorieta Pass, which took place early in the war and is generally treated as a sideshow to the main events further east. In this book, the battle occurs at roughly the halfway point, because there remains much more story to be told.
First, though, Nelson writes of the territory’s importance to each side in the war, and to the inception of the war itself. Control of the southwest would provide access to California’s ports and its gold, which would give the victor a financial edge in the war. And the very question of whether slavery would be allowed to expand into the territories is largely what led to the war in the first place. So the Union was determined to keep the territory free, while the Confederacy saw the expansion of slavery - and of the Confederacy itself - as crucial to its survival.
At this point in the “three-cornered war” among Union troops, Confederates and the local Native American and Hispanic people, the Union-versus-Confederacy conflict is of primary importance, and relations with the natives mostly involve relatively minor skirmishes, fragile truces, and playing them off against each other in a “the enemy of your enemy is your friend” kind of way.
This begins to change after the Confederate withdrawal following the Battle of Glorieta Pass. With dwindling hopes of successfully conquering the southwest, “the dream of creating a continental Confederacy built on the labor of slaves in the fields and the mines, and the possibility of extending that empire of slavery into Mexico, had evaporated like a desert mirage,” Nelson writes.
And then her narrative takes a turn. Union forces have successfully vanquished the Confederates. Now they need to do the same with the natives.
By late 1862, after Confederate troops had retreated to Texas, Union forces in New Mexico remained on war footing and their patience was wearing thin. So the federal government’s long-running strategy of negotiating and making peace with natives as it expanded westward went out the window. “The army would make no treaties,” Nelson writes. “War first. Then relocation. And then, ultimately, civilization.” The Native Americans did not give up easily, as defeats made them even more determined, leaving federal forces to conclude that annihilation or removal were the only options. Peaceful coexistence was not - at least not until the book’s end, long after the war.
This is a unique book in that it’s not strictly about the Civil War, nor is it about the Indian Wars as a whole, though it provides a sense of both. There are frequent check-ins to what’s happening back east, via newspaper accounts read by the book’s protagonists, which helps to place events in the context of the broader Civil War. And there are nods to other conflicts with natives in other areas, before, concurrently with, and after the book’s events.
The story is told largely through the eyes of a handful of main characters, which works much better than I had imagined - sometimes this type of storytelling structure can get bogged down in biography and backstory and personalities, though here it helps to make a complex story more understandable, signposting what’s happening where, and to whom, and giving you a rooting interest in how it all turns out. And the writing is very good, providing a great sense of everything from the landscape to the various individuals’ perspectives.
It’s easy to picture the Civil War being waged on rolling green hills and farmlands along the eastern coast, with the lesser-known Western theater extending no further west than the Mississippi River. This book extends the story even further west, telling a little-known story about efforts to unite and expand the country, and how they coincided and conflicted in a complicated but fascinating way.
November 1, 2021
The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West was a Pulitzer prize winning book for History in 2021, and so well deserved as Megan Kate Nelson provides an entire new dimension of the Civil War being not only that of the North and the South, but the war was indeed being waged in the West as well with the indiginous people at risk. I don't think that I can summarize it better than the book jacket that describes the nine individuals the author Nelson introduces to us in these words:
This was a well-researched book based on the letters, diaries, military records, oral histories, photographs and maps that adds a captivating dimension to the Civil War that few of us think about. And that is what was going on in the West as Union and Confederate forces struggled to take control and in that struggle the indiginous people of the West were ruthlessly forced to leave their native lands and homes. However, one Navajo Indian was featured throughout. We came to know Juanita, a Navajo weaver. Her husband, Manuelito Segundo, vowed to fight the Americans to the death, if he had to:
William Tecumseh Sherman facilitated the signing of the treaty on June 1, 1868, with the Navajos essentially trading one reservation for another, a bittersweet moment, but now finally they were able to once again have some control over their lives.
"John Baylor, a Texas legislator who established the Confederate Territory of Arizona; Louisa Canby, a Union Army wife who nursed Confederate soldiers back to health in Santa Fe; James Carleton, a soldier who engineered campaigns against Navajos and Apaches; Kit Carson, a famous frontiersman who led a regiment of volunteers against Texans, Navajos, Kiowas, and Comanches; Juanita, a Navajo weaver who resisted Union campaigns against her people; Bill Davidson, a soldier who fought in the Confederacy's major battles in New Mexico; Alonzo Ickis, an Iowa-born gold miner who fought on the side of the Union; John Clark, a friend of Abraham Lincoln's who embraced the Republican vision for the West as New Mexico's surveyor general; and Mangas Coloradas, a revered Chiricahua Apache chief who worked to expand Apache territory in Arizona."
This was a well-researched book based on the letters, diaries, military records, oral histories, photographs and maps that adds a captivating dimension to the Civil War that few of us think about. And that is what was going on in the West as Union and Confederate forces struggled to take control and in that struggle the indiginous people of the West were ruthlessly forced to leave their native lands and homes. However, one Navajo Indian was featured throughout. We came to know Juanita, a Navajo weaver. Her husband, Manuelito Segundo, vowed to fight the Americans to the death, if he had to:
"I will shed my blood on my own land," he told her, "and my people will have the land even if I die." The Great Spirit had give Dine Bikeyah to the Navajos, he had insisted, the valleys and the high mesas and the four sacred mountains. The people were supposed to be there, and they would not leave.
William Tecumseh Sherman facilitated the signing of the treaty on June 1, 1868, with the Navajos essentially trading one reservation for another, a bittersweet moment, but now finally they were able to once again have some control over their lives.
"When he was done, William Tecumseh Sherman left Fort Sumner for Santa Fe. In one of his trunks was a large blanket with thin red and cream stripes interspersed with undulating lines of red and brown, some shot through with thin blue lines. The stripes were a traditional Navajo design, but the waving lines were a new pattern. If considered from above, they evoked the serpentine banks of the Pecos River. But if turned to the side, they suggested the peaks and valleys of Dine Bikeyah."
"As Juanita and her family crossed back into Dine Bikeyah, the summer monsoons came. The desert exploded with life; yellow and pink flowers opened on the tips of the cholla's spiny fingers; purple wildflowers sprang up in the meadows; and sunflowers lifted their heads."
June 12, 2024
This book covers a part of the war that is not often covered. When it refers to the war in the west, it means the west as we think of it rather than places like Kentucky. Initially it focuses on the war between Union soldiers and Texans. The Texans won at Valverde and again at Glorieta Pass but Union soldiers were able to burn and destroy all of their supply wagons which effectually ended the Confederacy's plans to take over the west- outside of Texas.
Most of the action was the Union's drives to force Native Americans off their lands and/or exterminate them. In exploring this aspect, one is given a play by play of the genocide perpetrated against the Apaches, the Navajoe, and any other natives who stood in their way.
The great irony of it all is that the same people who were fighting to free the enslaved people were the ones exterminating and driving natives off their land. I highly recommend this book if you, like me, are not well versed in the war in the West.
Most of the action was the Union's drives to force Native Americans off their lands and/or exterminate them. In exploring this aspect, one is given a play by play of the genocide perpetrated against the Apaches, the Navajoe, and any other natives who stood in their way.
The great irony of it all is that the same people who were fighting to free the enslaved people were the ones exterminating and driving natives off their land. I highly recommend this book if you, like me, are not well versed in the war in the West.
February 20, 2020
Appreciated impressively informative first half of book, the part dealing mostly with warfare between Union and Confederate forces. Did not like second half which clearly showed how US soldiers killed and subdued Native tribes. Too much 'Wounded Knee' type information.
***
The copied and pasted Kirkus review that follows contains 'spoilers.'
"KIRKUS REVIEW
The fight between North and South comes West.
Nelson’s (Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War, 2012, etc.) cast of characters reads like a John Ford film cast, featuring Mangas Coloradas, Kit Carson, and, in a cameo appearance, Geronimo. Added to it are lesser known figures such as John Baylor, a Texas rancher who became a Confederate, and James Henry Carleton, an agile foe on the Union side. The setting is New Mexico Territory, with a breakaway Arizona in favor of slavery and a nearby California founded as a free state. At the beginning of the Civil War, Baylor, writes the author, “became the first Confederate to lead a successful invasion of Union territory in the Civil War.” He captured a Union fort and threatened others before being relieved of command, in part because he had issued a no-quarter call against “renegade” Apaches. The Union Army eventually gained supremacy in the field with the arrival of columns from California and Colorado and victories in fights with Confederate forces, but federal forces then continued the war against the Apaches and Navajos to make the “three-cornered war” of which Nelson writes. That war took savage turns with the murder of Apache leader Mangas Coloradas, whose head was removed by a Union surgeon and boiled in a large kettle until “nothing but the skull was left.” It was a gruesome souvenir but not the only atrocity of the campaign. The war in New Mexico did not last long, with a “multiracial army of Union soldiers” composed of Hispanic New Mexicans and newcomer Anglos placing the territory firmly under Northern control by 1862. Nelson is a touch florid at times (“their stories reveal how the imagined future of the West shaped the Civil War, and how the Civil War became a defining moment in the West”), and most elements of her story are well known to students of the history of the American West. She does a good job of setting them in a coherent, if never particularly rousing narrative.
A useful survey for readers interested in the Civil War in its short-lived southwestern theater."
***
The copied and pasted Kirkus review that follows contains 'spoilers.'
"KIRKUS REVIEW
The fight between North and South comes West.
Nelson’s (Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War, 2012, etc.) cast of characters reads like a John Ford film cast, featuring Mangas Coloradas, Kit Carson, and, in a cameo appearance, Geronimo. Added to it are lesser known figures such as John Baylor, a Texas rancher who became a Confederate, and James Henry Carleton, an agile foe on the Union side. The setting is New Mexico Territory, with a breakaway Arizona in favor of slavery and a nearby California founded as a free state. At the beginning of the Civil War, Baylor, writes the author, “became the first Confederate to lead a successful invasion of Union territory in the Civil War.” He captured a Union fort and threatened others before being relieved of command, in part because he had issued a no-quarter call against “renegade” Apaches. The Union Army eventually gained supremacy in the field with the arrival of columns from California and Colorado and victories in fights with Confederate forces, but federal forces then continued the war against the Apaches and Navajos to make the “three-cornered war” of which Nelson writes. That war took savage turns with the murder of Apache leader Mangas Coloradas, whose head was removed by a Union surgeon and boiled in a large kettle until “nothing but the skull was left.” It was a gruesome souvenir but not the only atrocity of the campaign. The war in New Mexico did not last long, with a “multiracial army of Union soldiers” composed of Hispanic New Mexicans and newcomer Anglos placing the territory firmly under Northern control by 1862. Nelson is a touch florid at times (“their stories reveal how the imagined future of the West shaped the Civil War, and how the Civil War became a defining moment in the West”), and most elements of her story are well known to students of the history of the American West. She does a good job of setting them in a coherent, if never particularly rousing narrative.
A useful survey for readers interested in the Civil War in its short-lived southwestern theater."
March 8, 2021
The author takes a detail-oriented look at the Civil War in the far West. I found this book to be captivating. The narrative was brisk and flowed very smoothly without seeming forced or pedantic. I learned several things from this book-always a plus in any endeavor, but especially in summer reading when the TBR stacks start looking ominous and foreboding. Overall, a very meritorious effort and one of the better books I've read so far this year.
July 25, 2021
(Copied from a post made in the Civil War Group---entered via phone)
This book is an easy read. I've read some Pulitzer winners that are hard to read. while this was a finalist, the content and style are very digestible.
That being said, this is going to be a book that is more enjoyable than challenging.
So the highlights:
1---I lived in Colorado for over a decade. I didn't know that Breckenridge was named after the former VP/Presidential candidate
2---Really enjoyed the story about John Baylor. I've lived in Texas for 14 years, didn't know who Baylor was. Enjoyed the story about how he acted and attacked a union outpost before he got orders not to. How he saved Union troops from dying due to dehydration.
3) Chapter about military wife's really hit home. I'm a military brat. My dad was career Air Force. I liked the fact that the book dedicated a chapter to the experience of the wives.
4. This book brings forth the fact that loyalties were divided in the west. We usually don't think about what happened in "Indian" territory. The US army was attempting to establish order and civilization in the west... and to subdued the natives.
But what happens to military order when word arrives that a Civil War had errupted. Suddenly that unit/fort that had been united is now divided. Half the enlisted/officers are on divided loyalties. Men who would have given their lives for one another a week ago are not enemies.
Indians, who a week ago, were a common enemy can be viewed as potential allies? And what about that renegade group in Utah know as the Mormons?
simple book, but a lot to it!
This book is an easy read. I've read some Pulitzer winners that are hard to read. while this was a finalist, the content and style are very digestible.
That being said, this is going to be a book that is more enjoyable than challenging.
So the highlights:
1---I lived in Colorado for over a decade. I didn't know that Breckenridge was named after the former VP/Presidential candidate
2---Really enjoyed the story about John Baylor. I've lived in Texas for 14 years, didn't know who Baylor was. Enjoyed the story about how he acted and attacked a union outpost before he got orders not to. How he saved Union troops from dying due to dehydration.
3) Chapter about military wife's really hit home. I'm a military brat. My dad was career Air Force. I liked the fact that the book dedicated a chapter to the experience of the wives.
4. This book brings forth the fact that loyalties were divided in the west. We usually don't think about what happened in "Indian" territory. The US army was attempting to establish order and civilization in the west... and to subdued the natives.
But what happens to military order when word arrives that a Civil War had errupted. Suddenly that unit/fort that had been united is now divided. Half the enlisted/officers are on divided loyalties. Men who would have given their lives for one another a week ago are not enemies.
Indians, who a week ago, were a common enemy can be viewed as potential allies? And what about that renegade group in Utah know as the Mormons?
simple book, but a lot to it!
August 15, 2024
4.5 stars
As the Civil War was just starting in the East, things on the Western front were heating up, too. On July 24, 1861, while the Battle of Manassas had yet to be fought, John Baylor occupied the important crossroads town of Mesilla in the New Mexico Territory. In doing so, he became the first Confederate in the Civil War to successfully occupy Union territory.
The battle of Mesilla and others that followed at Valverde, Apache Canyon, and Glorieta Pass were fought to gain control of the West. New Mexico Territory was especially critical to both the Union and the Confederacy for the access it provided to California’s gold and ports. But the indigenous people living off of their ancient land had a huge stake in controlling it as well. Navajos and Chiricahua Apaches formed the third corner in the “three-cornered war” that Megan Kate Nelson describes in this fascinating history. After the Union troops successfully pushed the Confederates back into Texas, they began forcefully and systematically to remove the Natives from the territory.
Nelson has written a well-researched and dramatic narrative history about a lesser known Civil War theater. What makes this account all the more interesting is that she tells the larger story of the war through the lives of nine individuals who were swept up in the events that unfolded. In addition to Baylor, these included among others: Kit Carson, the famed frontiersman; James Carleton, organizer of the “Indian wars” and champion of the failed Bosque Redondo Reservation; Apache chief and resister, Mangas Coloradas; and my favorite, Alonzo Ickis, a young Iowan farmer turned gold miner who joined the Union Army and kept a colorful journal of his experiences.
As always, I could have used more maps.
As the Civil War was just starting in the East, things on the Western front were heating up, too. On July 24, 1861, while the Battle of Manassas had yet to be fought, John Baylor occupied the important crossroads town of Mesilla in the New Mexico Territory. In doing so, he became the first Confederate in the Civil War to successfully occupy Union territory.
The battle of Mesilla and others that followed at Valverde, Apache Canyon, and Glorieta Pass were fought to gain control of the West. New Mexico Territory was especially critical to both the Union and the Confederacy for the access it provided to California’s gold and ports. But the indigenous people living off of their ancient land had a huge stake in controlling it as well. Navajos and Chiricahua Apaches formed the third corner in the “three-cornered war” that Megan Kate Nelson describes in this fascinating history. After the Union troops successfully pushed the Confederates back into Texas, they began forcefully and systematically to remove the Natives from the territory.
Nelson has written a well-researched and dramatic narrative history about a lesser known Civil War theater. What makes this account all the more interesting is that she tells the larger story of the war through the lives of nine individuals who were swept up in the events that unfolded. In addition to Baylor, these included among others: Kit Carson, the famed frontiersman; James Carleton, organizer of the “Indian wars” and champion of the failed Bosque Redondo Reservation; Apache chief and resister, Mangas Coloradas; and my favorite, Alonzo Ickis, a young Iowan farmer turned gold miner who joined the Union Army and kept a colorful journal of his experiences.
As always, I could have used more maps.
March 7, 2025
Well researched and plenty to keep the reader interested. I learned several things about the war in the west.
February 14, 2020
“The Three-Cornered War” by Megan Kate Nelson, published by Scribner.
Category – Civil War Publication Date – February 11, 2020.
This is a story that most people, even history professors, probably know very little about. It is the story of the Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West.
The story revolves around nine people that most of us have never heard of, I heard of one. They are John R. Baylor, Louisa Hawkins Canby, James Carleton, Kit Carson, Juanita, Bill Davidson, Alonzo Ickis, John Clark, and Mangas Coloradas. These people were very influential in how the West evolved.
Most of the history was put together by the author using letters, military records, and diaries.
The West proved to be a pivotal factor in dividing the people living there into free or slave states. This became a hotly contested battle between the military and the homesteaders.
It also tells the plight of the American Indian and how they were unfairly treated. They trusted the government officials and their treaties, most of which were never kept. They were driven off their land and given inferior land to live on.
This is a eye opening story that very few people know about or even care to know about, especially our treatment of the American Indian. A great read for those who love history and those who just want a better knowledge of our past.
Category – Civil War Publication Date – February 11, 2020.
This is a story that most people, even history professors, probably know very little about. It is the story of the Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West.
The story revolves around nine people that most of us have never heard of, I heard of one. They are John R. Baylor, Louisa Hawkins Canby, James Carleton, Kit Carson, Juanita, Bill Davidson, Alonzo Ickis, John Clark, and Mangas Coloradas. These people were very influential in how the West evolved.
Most of the history was put together by the author using letters, military records, and diaries.
The West proved to be a pivotal factor in dividing the people living there into free or slave states. This became a hotly contested battle between the military and the homesteaders.
It also tells the plight of the American Indian and how they were unfairly treated. They trusted the government officials and their treaties, most of which were never kept. They were driven off their land and given inferior land to live on.
This is a eye opening story that very few people know about or even care to know about, especially our treatment of the American Indian. A great read for those who love history and those who just want a better knowledge of our past.
April 19, 2020
This is a highly readable account of the Civil War in the West. Wait, you say. You didn’t know there was a Civil War in the West? I didn’t either, until I read this book. Nelson does a great job of bringing the story of a rarely told, yet important chapter of US History to light, by focusing on nine main characters, in a narrative style. The approach, which means the reads like a novel, yet still possessing academic rigor, works splendidly.
August 11, 2021
Nelson follows individuals through the tumultuous1860s in New Mexico territory, giving both a more personal and diverse perspective on historical events than is usual. She gives voice to all sides of a complicated time and brings the period to life.
March 5, 2020
A well -researched history for the struggle to control the West, specifically the American Southwest (New Mexico and Arizona territories) around the period of the American Civil War. The slave states had hoped to expand slavery into the American Southwest (and, with the Civil War, to California), the Union was determined to prevent this, and both were encroaching on the territories of the Apache and Navajo peoples. As the South was losing the Civil War and withdrew from the American Southwest, the North was determined to control the region by pacifying or destroying the native peoples. Hence, the "three-cornered war" - the Union, the Confederacy, and the native peoples of Apacheria and Dine Bikeyah.
November 28, 2023
This book is highly acclaimed (Pulitzer Prize finalist) and I get it, the book is irresistible- The time of the Civil War in the Western US- and three forces- The United States, the Confederacy and Native Americans
In some ways, the ambition of the books title is misleading. It is sort of a regional history of New Mexico and Arizona during the Civil War. Additionally, the book focuses on nine main characters and each chapter is assigned to one. While these characters are diverse and interesting, I think the book would have flowed better if it wasn’t boxed into that format.
While the book itself is very dry and dense inside, the overall theme is fantastic. This is history that generally doesn’t get covered and is very interesting. The book is a fairly short read in terms of page count. Also I recently binged Yellowstone and 1883 and I would definitely recommend it in conjunction for anyone looking to related reading because it’s perfect for that.
The first part of the book is interesting in that it covers some of the Confederacy’s ambitions in the early years of the Civil War, while the second focuses on the displacement and relocation of the Navjoes. Both topics are illuminating. The latter with post War cameos from William Sherman and Ulysses Grant. Additionally, Kit Carson features toward the beginning.
September 20, 2021
A recounting of the efforts of both the Union and Confederacy to take control of and settle the Southwest during (and shortly after) the Civil War. I had never realized that there was a southwest front during the Civil War, but it makes perfect sense that the Confederacy would have had its own Manifest Destiny vision.
The author focuses on 9 main characters - an Army wife, a Union colonel, a gold miner, a frontiersman, a Navajo woman, an Apache war chief, a surveyor, a rancher, and a lawyer - and follows them through the war.
The book moves along at a brisk pace. However, the frequent casual racism and nonchalant genocidal attitudes had me putting the book down for days at a time.
The author focuses on 9 main characters - an Army wife, a Union colonel, a gold miner, a frontiersman, a Navajo woman, an Apache war chief, a surveyor, a rancher, and a lawyer - and follows them through the war.
The book moves along at a brisk pace. However, the frequent casual racism and nonchalant genocidal attitudes had me putting the book down for days at a time.
April 10, 2020
A beautifully written and compelling story featuring the southwestern theater of the Civil War. Both history buffs and non-history people will enjoy and learn something. Hopefully this will change how we think about and study the Civil War.
April 23, 2020
Beautiful cover and factual account of the Civil War in New Mexico and Arizona and a bit of Texas and California. Lots about how the troops fought with Native Americans. The book lacked humanity and human interest stories. Well written from a factual account, but could have used more emotion.
January 17, 2023
This book was very difficult to get started on. To the point where I had to force myself to read 10-15 pages a day. In all, it’s 256 pages (paperback). For me, it was difficult to get through until the 130s. The set up to the point is vital to understanding the issues and big picture: How the New Mexico territory was so important for the Union, Confederacy, and various Indian tribes in the area.
Additionally, this book helped me piece together some consistencies in the US government’s approach to handling Native Americans in the 1850s-1890s. For one, the US insisted that during treaties the Indians appoint ONE negotiator. This was an attempted to “Americanize” their political ways, as Indians were known to prefer council based leadership over a single leader. This is consistent with the Lakota tribes of the plains in the 1870s leading by council before finally settling on Sitting Bull. Another similarity I noticed was the insistence to use “signatures of 3/4 of all adults males of the tribe” to break a treaty. At times, the government would stick to this - meaning that if a treaty was to be broken 3/4 of all tribal adult males would have to agree. Other times the government would not follow this, even though they had agreed to do so.
I enjoyed this book. The last 130 pages certainly made up for the first 130. It’s left me wanting to learn more about so many things: the Civil War, Apache, Navajo, and Utes Indians, and more about how President Lincoln and other political leaders viewed the west during the Civil War.
Additionally, this book helped me piece together some consistencies in the US government’s approach to handling Native Americans in the 1850s-1890s. For one, the US insisted that during treaties the Indians appoint ONE negotiator. This was an attempted to “Americanize” their political ways, as Indians were known to prefer council based leadership over a single leader. This is consistent with the Lakota tribes of the plains in the 1870s leading by council before finally settling on Sitting Bull. Another similarity I noticed was the insistence to use “signatures of 3/4 of all adults males of the tribe” to break a treaty. At times, the government would stick to this - meaning that if a treaty was to be broken 3/4 of all tribal adult males would have to agree. Other times the government would not follow this, even though they had agreed to do so.
I enjoyed this book. The last 130 pages certainly made up for the first 130. It’s left me wanting to learn more about so many things: the Civil War, Apache, Navajo, and Utes Indians, and more about how President Lincoln and other political leaders viewed the west during the Civil War.
January 23, 2021
A good and illuminating read on a little-known feature of the Civil War period. Obviously, it covers how both the Union and the Confederate forces arose and contending in the region. But it also brings in the role of the enslavement of Native peoples by the 'Hispanos,' the conflicts between Native peoples among themselves, and between all of them, and 'whites,' siding alternately with the Yankees or the Rebels, as it helped or hindered them. The most important is the struggle of the Navajo, and their desire to keep their homeland, and the role of William Tecumseh Sherman in bringing about a 'compromise,' where the Najaho got their land back, but have to submit their children to 'civilizing' schools as a price. Beneath all of it, is the organizing force of the railroads and gold mines. We need this in our ongoing quest to discover 'who we are' as US Americans, warts and all.
January 31, 2025
3.5 ⭐️ An interesting exploration of a lesser known theater of the Civil War. Enjoyed learning about the competitions ambitions of the Union, Confederacy, and Natives in New Mexico. The battle scenes were also exciting, well-written, and not overly technical.
December 8, 2020
This is really a history of the American Civil War specifically within the New Mexico Territory, so don't expect a discussion of crucial events in the Utah Territory or Colorado, such as the Massacres of Bear River and Sand Creek.
Nelson is a captivating writer, and skillfully weaves the lives of nine different figures into a mostly coherent narrative. As is routinely the case in American history, the most unfortunate losers are the Native Americans. Nelson provides riveting accounts of the murder of Mangas Coloradas, an Apache chief, as well as the human displacement of the Navajo Nation. I personally would have liked to see Nelson use more of these Native peoples' own oral histories, rather than a reliance on secondary materials.
Overall, a good introduction to an often-ignored and important theater of the Civil War. Unlike many history books, it is clearly targeted toward a popular audience, and will therefore be accessible to most readers.
Nelson is a captivating writer, and skillfully weaves the lives of nine different figures into a mostly coherent narrative. As is routinely the case in American history, the most unfortunate losers are the Native Americans. Nelson provides riveting accounts of the murder of Mangas Coloradas, an Apache chief, as well as the human displacement of the Navajo Nation. I personally would have liked to see Nelson use more of these Native peoples' own oral histories, rather than a reliance on secondary materials.
Overall, a good introduction to an often-ignored and important theater of the Civil War. Unlike many history books, it is clearly targeted toward a popular audience, and will therefore be accessible to most readers.
February 22, 2020
The best history book I've read in a couple of years. Fascinating story well told by a gifted writer and researcher. Enjoyed every second of it!
March 9, 2020
A great book about a piece of history that seems to be forgotten. I appreciate the chapter format and the details about The People that are not included in other books.
April 1, 2022
I'd heard of Glorieta Pass, but otherwise never been clear on what was going on in the Southwest during the Civil War period. The Three-Cornered War fills in the details admirably. Although this history includes a few grisly scenes, they weren't frequent enough to be overwhelming. We learn not only of interactions between Union and Confederate troops in New Mexico and Arizona territories, but what was happening with native people in that same time and place. The author focuses on a few actual people, both men and women among the different groups, which was an effective technique to cover the big picture.
On the last page of the book, the author gives this powerful summary statement: "These struggles for power in the West exposed a hard and complicated truth about the Union government's war aims: that they simultaneously embraced slave emancipation and Native extermination in order to secure an American empire of liberty."
On the last page of the book, the author gives this powerful summary statement: "These struggles for power in the West exposed a hard and complicated truth about the Union government's war aims: that they simultaneously embraced slave emancipation and Native extermination in order to secure an American empire of liberty."
March 20, 2024
Nelson presents a well written account of the American Civil War in the Western theater. She portrays it as a conflict between three different antagonists: the Union, the Confederacy, and the Native American tribes of the Southwest(primarily Apache and Navajo, but Comanche, Ute, Pima, and several other tribes are included peripherally). Nelson also tries to tell the history through the lens of different individuals, rather than an overarching narrative.
I do really appreciate the work. Nelson has clearly conducted the research and knows the topic well. She also has a very readable style. However, the format to me is only partially successful. The first nine chapters adhere pretty closely to the stated goal in following the individual storylines. After that, though, the broader historical context largely takes center stage, despite Nelson continuing to label the chapters after individuals. Again, she attempts to keep the narrative focused on the individual stories, but for some(particularly the Native Americans, and specifically the Navajo woman Juanita, wife of Navajo leader Manuelito) there is a lack of primary source material, so their stories must be related directly in context to material from the United States perspective.
Overall, I do recommend this work. It is a little known theater of the Civil War, and Nelson does a fantastic job of resurrecting it from the shadows and giving life to the individuals, locations, and events of the Southwest(Arizona, California, Mexico, New Mexico, and Texas) during the Civil War.
I do really appreciate the work. Nelson has clearly conducted the research and knows the topic well. She also has a very readable style. However, the format to me is only partially successful. The first nine chapters adhere pretty closely to the stated goal in following the individual storylines. After that, though, the broader historical context largely takes center stage, despite Nelson continuing to label the chapters after individuals. Again, she attempts to keep the narrative focused on the individual stories, but for some(particularly the Native Americans, and specifically the Navajo woman Juanita, wife of Navajo leader Manuelito) there is a lack of primary source material, so their stories must be related directly in context to material from the United States perspective.
Overall, I do recommend this work. It is a little known theater of the Civil War, and Nelson does a fantastic job of resurrecting it from the shadows and giving life to the individuals, locations, and events of the Southwest(Arizona, California, Mexico, New Mexico, and Texas) during the Civil War.
March 13, 2025
An insightful, well written history, which filled a void in my historical knowledge that I hadn’t even been aware of. Nelson does a good job juggling an ensemble of characters, on all three sides of the conflict. The characters are shaded with some complexity, which might have made them a touch more difficult to tell apart, but also made it a considerably more interesting book. She also did well connecting the events of this arena with the War back east, that most of us are already so familiar with.
I would definitely recommend this.
I would definitely recommend this.
February 5, 2025
An incredibly well researched narrative which follows a cast of individuals with crossing paths in the American West during the Civil War years and shortly after.
This shed light on the often overlooked most western portions of the Civil War. It was incredibly interesting to hear individuals own words and experiences during turbulent times. I appreciated the three acts, each focusing on different corners. It was interesting to learn about the historic value of the area in Westward Expansion in the pre- transcontinental rail road.
I recommend as interesting, enlightening and authentic read.
This shed light on the often overlooked most western portions of the Civil War. It was incredibly interesting to hear individuals own words and experiences during turbulent times. I appreciated the three acts, each focusing on different corners. It was interesting to learn about the historic value of the area in Westward Expansion in the pre- transcontinental rail road.
I recommend as interesting, enlightening and authentic read.
November 2, 2021
My Civil War knowledge is pretty limited and my knowledge of the West is also pretty low. This book was very informative while also being written in an engaging manner. I really liked how it focused on a few key people and their experiences.
January 21, 2024
Never realized how much went on in New Mexico during the Civil War
March 19, 2021
4 stars. Well written book that seeks to address the conflict in Arizona and new Mexico through multiple personal narratives.
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