Originally published in 1892, Loss of the Sultana and Reminiscences of Survivorsis a collection of first-hand accounts by those who lived to tell the story of perhapsthe worst maritime disaster in U.S. history.On the Mississippi River just above Memphis at two o'clock on the morning of April27, 1865, the steamboat Sultana, carrying over 2,400 passengers (it was licensed to carry only 356), exploded and sank. Over 1,700 people perished.Most of the passengers were Union soldiers recently released from Confederateprisons. Many were from East Tennessee. They had boarded at Vicksburg, where thelongest siege of the war had finally ended in Confederate surrender, ending theVicksburg campaign.The soldiers, homeward bound from Andersonville and Cahaba Confederate prisons, had survived the terrors of battle, the loss of close comrades, physical and psychological wounds, the risky confinement of hospital, the humiliation of capture andsurrender, escape and recapture, homesickness, boredom, the daily threat of death bystarvation, disease, suicide, robbery, injury, or death by raiders.Chester D. Berry'one of the survivors'compiled facts, records, and personalaccounts of other survivors, resulting in this compelling and profound testimony to thehuman spirit in the face of tragedy.

Excerpt from Loss of the Sultana and Reminiscences of Survivors: History of a Disaster Where Over One Thousand Five Hundred Human Beings Were Lost, Most of Them Being Exchanged Prisoners of War on Their Way Home After Privation and Suffering From One to Twenty-Three Months in Cahaba and Andersonville Prisons Among the passengers on board were twelve ladies, most of them belonging to the Christian commission, an association akin to that of the sanitary commission of the Army of the Potomac. One of these ladies, with more than ordinary courage, when the flames at last drove all the men from the boat, seeing them fighting like demons in the water in the mad endeavor to save their lives, actually destroying each other and themselves by their wild actions, talked to them, urg ing them to be men, and finally succeeded in getting them quieted down, clinging to the ropes and chains that hung over the bow of the boat. The flames now began to lap around her with their fiery tongues. The men pleaded and urged her to jump into the water and thus save herself, but she refused, saying I might lose my presence of mind and be the means of the death of some of you. And so, rather than run the risk of becoming the cause of the death of a single person, she folded her arms quietly over her bosom and burned, a voluntary martyr to the men she had so lately quieted. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

“One of the most riveting war stories I have ever read….Huffman’s smooth, intimate prose ushers you through this nightmare as if you were living it yourself.” —Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm The dramatic true story of the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history, Alan Huffman’s Sultana brings to breathtaking life a tragic, long forgotten event in America’s Civil War—the sinking of the steamship Sultana and the loss of 1,700 lives, mostly Union soldiers returning home from Confederate prison camps. A gripping account that reads like a nonfiction Cold Mountain, Sultana is powerful, moving, rich in irony and fascinating historical detail—a story no history aficionado or Civil War buff will want to miss.

Reprint. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, A1996.