Civil War Stories

Newspaperman, short-story writer, poet, and satirist, Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914) is one of the most striking and unusual literary figures America has produced. Dubbed “Bitter Bierce” for his vitriolic wit and biting satire, his fame rests largely on a celebrated compilation of barbed epigrams, The Devil’s Dictionary, and a book of short stories (Tales of Soldiers and Civilians, 1891). Most of the 16 selections in this volume have been taken from the latter collection.The stories in this edition include: “What I Saw at Shiloh,” “A Son of the Gods,” “Four Days in Dixie,” “One of the Missing,” “A Horseman in the Sky,” “The Coup de Grace,” “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” “The Story of Conscience,” “One Kind of Officer,” “Chickamauga,” and five more.Bierce’s stories employ a buildup of suggestive realistic detail to produce grim and vivid tales often disturbing in their mood of fatalism and impending calamity. Hauntingly suggestive, they offer excellent examples of the author’s dark pessimism and storytelling power.
–back cover

Contents:
1 What I Saw of Shiloh
2 Four Days in Dixie
3 A Horseman in the Sky
4 An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
5 Chickamauga
6 A Son of the Gods
7 One of the Missing
8 Killed at Resaca
9 The Affair at Coulter’s Notch
10 The Coup de Grâce
11 Parker Adderson, Philosopher
12 An Affair of Outposts
13 The Story of a Conscience
14 One Kind of Officer
15 George Thurston
16 The Mocking-bird