On October 27, the Department of History and Foreign Languages will welcome Lesley Gordon, PH.D., to Jax State to discuss her latest book, Dread Danger: Cowardice and Combat in the American Civil War. The event will take place in the Houston Cole Library 1103 AB from 5:00–6:30 pm.

Lesley J. Gordon earned her BA with High Honors from the College of William and Mary, and her MA and PhD in American History from the University of Georgia. Since 2016, she has been the Charles G. Summersell Chair of Southern History at the University of Alabama. She is the author of three monographs: General George E. Pickett in Life and Legend (University of North Carolina Press, 1998); A Broken Regiment: The 16th Connecticut’s Civil War (Louisiana State University Press, 2014); and most recently, Dread Danger: Combat and Courage in the American Civil War (Cambridge University Press, 2025), which was a finalist for the 2025 Gilder-Lehrman Lincoln Prize. She has also co-edited four volumes of essays and authored multiple book chapters, articles, and book reviews. Professor Gordon served as editor of the academic journal Civil War History (2010-2015), and President of the Society of Civil War History (2022-2024); as well as the chair of the Editorial Board for the University of Alabama Press (2022-present).  During the 2024-2025 academic year, she was the Charles Boal Ewing Chair in Military History at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York.

Summary of the Book: When confronted with the abject fear of going into battle, Civil War soldiers were expected to overcome the dread of the oncoming danger with feats of courage and victory on the battlefield. The Fire Zouaves and the 2nd Texas Infantry went to war with high expectations that they would perform bravely; they had famed commanders and enthusiastic community support. How could they possibly fail? Yet falter they did, facing humiliating charges of cowardice thereafter that cast a lingering shadow on the two regiments, despite their best efforts at redemption. By the end of the war, however, these charges were largely forgotten, replaced with the jingoistic rhetoric of martial heroism, a legacy that led many, including historians, to insist that all Civil War soldiers were heroes. Dread Danger creates a fuller understanding of the soldier experience and the overall costs and sufferings of war.