An Undivided Union

An Undivided Union is one of Oliver Optic’s many novels for boys in his Civil War series, with the title pointing directly to the central Union political and moral concept that the war was being fought to preserve. The undivided union framing positions the war as the defense of the federal political union against the Confederate effort to divide it, with the standard pro Union moral and adventure structure of his Civil War fiction unfolding within this wider political framework.

Oliver Optic produced military and political fiction set in the Civil War across multiple novels and connected series.

For scholars of nineteenth century American children’s literature, of how the Civil War was translated into adventure fiction for the young, or of the wider career of Oliver Optic, the Civil War series is essential. Many of his books are now in the public domain.