This book covers each year from 1861 to 1865 in the twelve counties on the Tennessee/North Carolina border from what is now the Great Smoky Mountains National Park north to the Virginia line followed by a chapter on the post-war period. Although the title emphasizes the role of George W. Kirk, a Greene County, Tennessee, native who lead important raids against Confederate bastions, this book does not really center on his fascinating and controversial life, with practically no mention of him until the chapters on 1864 and 1865 when he became quite active. On the last page the book does mention Kirk’s role as a North Carolina militia officer sent in the summer of 1870 to Alamance and Caswell Counties to quell Ku lux Klan violence and his departure late in life first to Tennessee where he again led state militia against the Ku Klux Klan and finally to California where he died and is buried. Michael C. Hardy has written twenty-two previous books about Western North Carolina where he moved in 1995 so his wife could attend graduate school at Appalachian State University.
Charleston, South Carolina: The History Press, 2018. 192 pages with an Index, Notes, photos, and an Appendix, “The Role of African-Americans in the Border War.” Trade paperback