Come to the May 8, 2024 meeting for the Civil War Roundtable of the Merrimack at the Hilton Senior Center, 43 Lafayette Rd (Rte1), Salisbury, MA. Doors open at 7pm, the meeting begins at 7:30pm.

A special meeting is in store for members and visitors to the CWRT of the Merrimack this night as we welcome Robert C. Conner, with a discussion of his book: James Montgomery: Abolitionist Warrior.

BOOKS WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE AND SIGNING!

The first full biography of James Montgomery, who through his actions before and during the Civil War, contributed towards the abolition of slavery.

James Montgomery was a leader of the free-state movement in pre-Civil War Kansas and Missouri, associated with its direct-action military wing. He then joined the Union Army and fought through most of the war.

A close associate and ally of other abolitionists including John Brown, Harriet Tubman, Colonels Thomas Wentworth Higginson and Robert G. Shaw, Montgomery led his African-American regiment along with Tubman and other civilians in the 1863 Combahee River raid, which freed almost 800 slaves from South Carolina plantations. He then commanded a brigade in the siege of Fort Wagner, near Charleston.

In 1864, still in brigade command, he fought at the Battle of Olustee in Florida, helping prevent the collapse and disintegration of Union General Truman Seymour’s army. Later that year he returned home and played a significant role in defeating Confederate General Sterling Price’s great raid, especially at the Battle of Westport.

This is the first published biography of Montgomery, who was and remains a controversial figure. It uncovers and deals honestly with his serious flaws, while debunking some wilder charges, and also bringing to light his considerable attributes and achievements. Montgomery’s life, from birth to death, is seen in the necessary perspective and clear delineation of the complex racial, political and military history of the Civil War era.

Robert C. (Bob) Conner, a former journalist, is the author of not only the biography James Montgomery: Abolitionist Warrior, the book for this meeting's subject, published in April 2022 by Casemate, but his 2013 biography, General Gordon Granger: The Savior of Chickamauga and the Man Behind "Juneteenth". He also wrote the historical novel The Last Circle of Ulysses Grant, which was published in 2018 by Square Circle Press. He won two first-place writing awards from the New York Associated Press Association for newspapers with circulation between 50,000 and 200,000, and is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of New York University. Bob Conner and his wife Barbara have three grown children. They live in upstate New York, where he volunteers at Grant Cottage and the Saratoga County History Center at Brookside Museum, and is an active Rotarian.

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