From the battlefields of Gettysburg and Antietam to the generals who plotted strategy, Blood, Tears & Glory: How Ohioans Won the Civil War, by historian James Bissland, chronicles the extraordinary circumstances created by heroic men, which helped bring victory to the North, as well as the sacrifices of the families who kept the home fires burning.. (Orange Frazer Press)

President William McKinley was the last of the Civil War veterans to reach the White House, and the only one who served in the ranks: He enlisted as a private in the 23rd Ohio Volunteer Infantry (later commanded by another Ohioan and future president Rutherford B. Hayes). Major McKinley: William McKinley and The Civil War, by retired United Church of Christ Minister William H. Armstrong, gives perspective on the Niles native’s experiences in battle and how they shaped his days in the Oval Office. (The Kent State University Press)

More than 4,400 Ohio soldiers participated in the battle of Gettysburg, 30 percent of whom were killed, wounded or captured. In Buckeye Blood: Ohio at Gettysburg, author Richard A. Baumgartner uses diaries and letters to paint a poignant portrait of the citizens who gave their all to the cause. (Blue Acorn Press)

During the Civil War, the women back home spent countless hours writing letters to lonely soldiers on the battlefield. The task clearly boosted troop morale. So much so that it often led to romantic relationships. And when Edwin Lewis Lybarger, a 21-year-old member of Company K of the 43rd Ohio from Knox County, placed a lonely-hearts ad, he was besieged with a deluge of responses. Wanted — Correspondence: Women’s Letters to a Union Soldier, edited by Lybarger’s granddaughter, Nancy L. Rhoades, and Oklahoma State University professor Lucy Bailey, offers insightful glimpses of women’s lives as they waited, worked, worried and wrote from the home front. (Ohio University Press)

Akron native Simon Perkins Jr. and his fellow quartermasters helped make Union victory possible by ensuring that the Federal army had the equipment it needed. During his service with the Army of the Ohio, the Army of the Cumberland and the Department of the North, Perkins held key assignments in Tennessee and Alabama, directing wagon trains during the Kentucky campaign and managing railroad transportation in Nashville during the Chattanooga campaign. He also settled labor disputes and paid bills. In The Supply for Tomorrow Must Not Fail, Lenette S. Taylor, a member of the Summit County Historical Society, describes Perkins’ never-a-dull-moment days behind the lines. (The Kent State University Press)

When his captain was killed during the Battle of Perryville — the largest Civil War battle fought in Kentucky — John Calvin Hartzell of Portage County was made commander of Company H, 105th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He led his men during the Battle of Chickamauga, the siege of Chattanooga and the Battle of Missionary Ridge. Ohio Volunteer: The Childhood and Civil War Memoirs of Captain John Calvin Hartzell, OVI, edited by Eastern Illinois University English professor Charles I. Switzer, documents his military strategies and the triumph and tragedy of life on the battlefield. (Ohio University Press)