Free at Last… at Least for the Summer

News and Notes

Teaching at Gettysburg

Dear Substack Friends,

I apologize for my absence the past few days as I was pounding out major projects for two of my Doctor of Strategic Leadership classes. I had gotten behind in my work recovering from a compression fracture to my fourth lumbar vertebrae and a ruptured quadriceps tendon. Those injuries wiped me out to the point that I had a hard time keeping focus or staying awake. That put me behind. I had to take an incomplete in once class that I had to make up as well as complete two projects, and dialogue posts in the class that ended yesterday. In two weeks I wrote over 20,000 words of scholarly work, not counting abstracts, and references. It wore me out.

I did a bit of writing here but now with a break for the summer I will be doing more as I will finally have time to really build the site. Since I won’t be getting my VA housing allowance over the summer I am hoping to build a paid subscriber base here by writing and beginning a podcast.

Subscribing is easy, just $5 a month, $50 a year, and $75 for a Founding Member with which you will receive an inscribed copy of my book Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: Religion and the Politics of Race in the Civil War Era and Beyond. The book is a must if you want to know the dark roots of the current Christian Nationalist movement which is a lot like Confederate Christian Nationalism.

I have some other things going on. Since Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory was published in October I have had little time between the doctoral program and my injuries I had little time to due any promotional activities for it. I am hoping to get some speaking and book signing events scheduled over the summer. If you have any ideas or contacts that might be interested in working with me, please let me know.

I am also going to be completing my second book. Like Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory, it began as an introductory chapter to my Gettysburg Staff Ride Text, a future trilogy. When I was on faculty at the Joint Forces Staff College, part of the National Defense University I taught ethics and led the Gettysburg Staff Ride for senior US Military officers, civilian personnel from other Federal agencies to include the State Department, the Defense Intelligence Agency, Homeland Security, and the Departments of Justice and Interior as well as officers from NATO, EU, and other nations.

I wrote Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory in order that my students would understand the religious and ideological motivations of the men that fought the American Civil War. The second book deals with the changes in strategy, tactics, operational methods, weaponry, volunteer soldiers and the draft, communications, as well as emancipation, and the growing influence of immigrants, the beginning of Women’s Rights, and even what we now call transgender soldiers. The tentative title is A Great War in an Age of Revolutionary Change, and all I need to do with it is editing and a few changes.

Over the next week I plan on writing about the Cult of the AR-15 and assorted other topics.

Here are some of the reviews of Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory:

“With no sugar coating of America’s history of slavery and racism, Steve Dundas adds to the story of the religious ideology used to justify slavery, not as a side note but as the significant factor that it was. A very timely read as we face the growing threat of today’s Christian nationalists and white supremacists.”—Chris Rodda, author of Liars for Jesus, The Religious Right’s Alternate Version of American History, volumes 1 and 2

“American slavery’s ghosts and the Civil War haunt this sweeping interpretation of how a toxic blend of white supremacy and tribal religion still shape American society. In this historical account Steve Dundas analyzes its significance for our current social and political divisions making it an especially timely study.”—Charles Reagan Wilson, author of Baptized in Blood, the Religion of the Lost Cause: 1865–1920

“Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory is a book for our time. Steven L. Dundas has skillfully woven slavery, race, racism, politics, and religion into a single entity in telling this country’s complex story. Every American would profit from reading what he is telling us.”—Charles B. Dew, author of Apostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War

So until tomorrow, have a great night.