Charles Irons

Assistant Professor of History

Other Souths: The Civil War and Reconstruction in Alamance County, North Carolina

Project Abstract

Inhabitants of Alamance County, North Carolina responded to national events during the Civil War era in ways that confounded regional stereotypes, through persistent unionism before the war and a willingness to experiment with biracial democracy afterwards, for example.  The county therefore makes an excellent site for the study of Southern dissent, or of “Other Souths.”  Both the end product—an ambitious website containing hundreds of primary sources, searchable census records, interactive timelines, and rollover maps—and the open-ended process of creating and maintaining the site will help to educate students and community members about the complexity of Southern History.