The Shenandoah Valley, 1861-1865

Conventional wisdom has it that the Shenandoah Valley, called the granary of the Confederacy, was of vital strategic importance during the Civil War. New evidence, however, shows that since most of its resources were depleted by late 1862, the significance of the Valley has been overestimated. The author uses an extensive array of primary sources to back up this revolutionary thesis: diaries of Valley residents; records and correspondence of the Confederacys Subsistence, Quartermaster, and War Departments; dispatches between Robert E. Lee and his subordinates; as well as recently discovered tax-in-kind records.