Alan Nolan Passes Away

Hat tip to Kevin Levin for bringing this to my attention (please be sure to read the interesting tributes to Alan in the comments to Kevin’s post).

I had an opportunity to meet Alan and spend some time with him over the years. We did several programs together over the years, and he was a regular attendee at Gabor Borit’s annual Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College. A number of years ago, Alan had a devastating stroke that left him largely wheelchair bound. Although his body had failed him, his mind remained active and he retained a keen interest in the Civil War. Even after the stroke, he continued to come to CWI, sitting on the aisle in a special spot reserved just for him. Alan passed away on July 27 at age 85.

I particularly enjoyed talking with him. For one thing, he was an attorney with decades of experience, so we spoke the same professional language. Alan was an NLRB arbitrator, and he thoroughly enjoyed that role. In addition, he was an accomplished and universally respected Civil War historian. His history of the Iron Brigade is considered to be one of the great classics of Civil War literature, and for good reason. It was a great book that helped to pave the way for contemporary unit historians; many still use its approach as a model for the modern unit histories. And, most importantly, Alan was always willing to chat with anyone who came by, and he was unfailingly kind and generous to all. Through it all, he remained humble, friendly, and always approachable, even as his illness sapped his productivity as a Civil War historian.

As for me, his work had a profound impact on me. In 1991, his seminal work, Lee Considered: General Robert E. Lee and Civil War History. This book, which has spurred vast amounts of controversy since the day it was published, broke new ground: it contradicted the Lost Cause mythology and instead argued that Robert E. Lee was a human being filled with ordinary foibles who was not perfect. Writing a brilliant legal brief, Alan argued that Lee was not a god, but just a man, imperfect and eminently human, and prone to mistakes and even to some unpleasant and not altogether likable personality traits. In short, the book was a brilliant and ultimately revolutionary work that had a great impact on the world of Civil War history.

I read the book when it first came out and was blown away by it. And I remembered it.

Years later, when I decided to assess Phil Sheridan’s role in the Civil War, I used Alan’s Lee Considered as the model for my book Little Phil: A Reassessment of the Civil War Leadership of Gen. Philip H. Sheridan. I very much modeled my approach on Alan’s and I was unabashed about saying so in the introduction to the book. In a lot of ways, Little Phil was my personal tribute to Alan and his work, and like Lee Considered, it’s generated a great deal of controversy. Like Alan’s book, readers either love it or they hate it; I frankly don’t care whether they love it or hate it. If readers reassess their opinions about Sheridan, then I will have accomplished what I set out to do. Alan took very much the same approach to his work, and to the same effect.

I owe Alan Nolan a great debt, and I will miss him. Rest in peace, Alan. While your presence will be missed, your legacy will live on.

They say that bad things come in threes. Our little Civil War community has lost Deborah Fitts, Prof. John Y. Simon and now Alan Nolan in a period of just three weeks or so. Let’s hope that there will be no more losses for a while. Our ranks are thin enough.