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The Jean and Alexander Heard Libraries will host historian and bestselling author Scott Ellsworth on Tuesday, Nov. 11, for a discussion of his latest book, Midnight on the Potomac: The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America.
The talk, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 4:30 p.m. in the Central Library Community Room. A reception and book signing with the author will follow. Copies of Ellsworth’s book will be available for purchase on site from the Vanderbilt Bookstore.
Focusing on the final months of the American Civil War, when the outcome was far from certain, Midnight on the Potomac takes readers behind the scenes in the White House, along the battlefronts in Virginia, and into the conspiracies of spies and secret agents. It details the Confederacy’s attempt to burn down New York City, how Lincoln almost lost the presidency, and how thousands of enslaved African Americans freed themselves—and helped secure their nation’s survival.
The book also examines how the plot to assassinate Lincoln was not the sole invention of a disgruntled, pro-South actor but the result of a nearly yearlong collaboration among John Wilkes Booth and agents of the Confederate Secret Service. Lincoln inhabits the book, as do generals Grant and Sherman, but common soldiers, runaway slaves, and an unknown but intrepid female war correspondent named Lois Adams are also featured.
“Midnight on the Potomac is a powerful achievement by Scott Ellsworth, blending meticulous research with vivid storytelling,” said Pulitzer Prize-winning author Gilbert King. “Capturing both the urgency and humanity of the Civil War’s final year, Ellsworth offers a riveting account of courage, sacrifice and rebirth—the story of how America nearly lost itself and how it fought to become whole again.”
Ellsworth is the New York Times bestselling author of The Secret Game: A Wartime Story of Courage, Change and Basketball’s Lost Triumph, winner of the 2016 PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing. Formerly a historian at the Smithsonian Institution, he has written about American history for The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times.
His other books include Death in a Promised Land: The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921; The World Beneath Their Feet: Mountaineering, Madness and the Deadly Race to Summit the Himalayas; and The Ground Breaking: The Tulsa Race Massacre and an American City’s Search for Justice, which was longlisted for the 2021 National Book Award for Nonfiction. Ellsworth is a teaching professor in the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan.
The Nov. 11 event is part of the Heard Libraries’ celebration of America250, a nationwide non-partisan initiative to engage every American in the 250th anniversary of the United States.