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Author Quotes: ''I have never been in a battle, of course,'' Crane said after the book was published in 1895, 30 years after the Civil War ended. ''I believe I got my sense of the rage of conflict on the football field.''

Stephen Crane’s Red Badge of Courage is considered the first modern war book and many Civil War scholars believe it is based on the battle of Chancellorsville from April 30 to May 6, 1863, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia. Stephen Crane (1871-1900), a minister's son born several years after Appomattox, was too young to fight in the Civil War. Written in 1895, this short novel depicts a young Henry Fleming’s conflicted reactions from cowardice to terror in his first experiences of the horrors of war as he prepares for his first battle. He has visions of glory and longs to prove his manhood on the battlefield. After witnessing his friend’s death he struggles with his conscience as he comes to terms with the realities of war.  This well crafted novel brings a richly textured atmosphere that transports the reader into the heart and mind of a young Union soldier at war in a way the best journalism and history books cannot.

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