Was the Civil War really about slavery? Or was it a war fought over money? Civil War historian Samuel W. Mitcham Jr. (Vicksburg, Bust Hell Wide Open) opens his fascinating new book, It Wasn’t About Slavery, with Dr. Grady McWhiney’s claim that “what passes as standard American history is really Yankee history written by New Englanders or their puppets to glorify Yankee heroes and ideals.” Relying on nineteenth-century sources, Mitcham lays out his case that slavery was not the primary cause of the Civil War and that the Civil War narrative taught in schools today is wildly misleading.