This excellent book, written and also edited by an authority on the Civil War, author of The Man Who Killed Lincoln. The Drums of Morning, and other books, is the story, based on contemporary documents and on records held in Washington until 1953 as "top secret" of "the evolution of underground activities for the entire Civil War," both North and South. Here, with long and carefully documented introductions and comments by the author, are accounts in their own words of such personages as Allen Pinkerton, McClellan's personal spy, the beautiful Mrs. Rose O'Neal Greenhow and Belle Boyd, and the less beautiful S. Emma E. Edmonds, the notorious Lafayette Baker, the first head of the Secret Service, Maffitt, the fabulous blockade-runner, and many others. Perhaps the most interesting account is the little-known tale of the huge Confederate underground, operating largely from Canada, which was behind the New York Draft Riots and engineered a gigantic and unsuccessful conspiracy to involve the entire North in revolution. The true fabric of history is a sound basis for a book with its appeal to all students of the Civil War as well as those who will enjoy an acquaintance with some of its most dramatic figures. (Kirkus Reviews)