Thomas Laqueur writes:

Neely is right that the modern estimate of 620,000 dead is a ‘hand-me-down’ and based on evidence that was collected, collated and analysed more than a century ago. Such numbers – six million for the Holocaust would be a 20th-century example – become enshrined and take on the sort of totemic significance that puts them beyond query. The man who did much of the pioneering work for the Civil War – Thomas Livermore – was himself a veteran of the war who went on to a career in law and business. He was not a professional historian or demographer. And his interest in the historical record was very different from ours: his aim was to show that the soldiers of the North and the South were equally courageous, steadfast and willing to die. Again, he and other military historians were not terribly interested in how many soldiers died from causes other than battle – disease, mishap and friendly fire, for example. The total number of deaths has had to be pieced together from widely scattered sources.

(LRB 18 December 2008)

Harvard | hardback 277 pp. |ISBN: 9780674026582