This major addition to the history of the Civil War is a “fast-paced, fact-rich account” (The Wall Street Journal) offering a detailed look at President Abraham Lincoln’s use of clandestine services and the secret battles waged by Union spies and agents to save the nation—filled with espionage, sabotage, and intrigue. Veteran CIA correspondent Douglas Waller delivers a riveting account of the heroes and misfits who carried out a shadow war of espionage and covert operations behind the Confederate battlefields. Lincoln’s Spies follows four agents from the North—three men and one woman—who informed Lincoln’s generals on the enemy positions for crucial battles and busted up clandestine Rebel networks. Famed detective Allan Pinkerton mounted a successful covert operation to slip Lincoln through Baltimore before his inauguration after he learns of an assassination attempt from his agents working undercover as Confederate soldiers. But he proved less than competent as General George McClellan’s spymaster, delivering faulty intelligence reports that overestimated Confederate strength. George Sharpe, an erudite New York lawyer, succeeded Pinkerton as spymaster for the Union’s Army of the Potomac. Sharpe deployed secret agents throughout the South, planted misinformation with Robert E. Lee’s army, and outpaced anything the enemy could field. Elizabeth Van Lew, a Virginia heiress who hated slavery and disapproved of secession, was one of Sharpe’s most successful agents. She ran a Union spy ring in Richmond out of her mansion with dozens of agents feeding her military and political secrets that she funneled to General Ulysses S. Grant as his army closed in on the Confederate capital. Van Lew became one of the unsung heroes of history. Lafayette Baker was a handsome Union officer with a controversial past, whose agents clashed with Pinkerton’s operatives. He assembled a retinue of disreputable spies, thieves, and prostitutes to root out traitors in Washington, DC. But he failed at his most important mission: uncovering the threat to Lincoln from John Wilkes Booth and his gang. Behind these operatives was Abraham Lincoln, one of our greatest presidents, who was an avid consumer of intelligence and a ruthless aficionado of clandestine warfare, willing to take whatever chances necessary to win the war. Lincoln’s Spies is a “meticulous chronicle of all facets of Lincoln’s war effort” (Kirkus Reviews) and an excellent choice for those wanting “a cracking good tale” (Publishers Weekly) of espionage in the Civil War.

1861. As the Civil War rages on, one man is determined to prove himself on the front lines of battle. But destiny has far greater plans for him. . . On the battlefield, Captain Fitz Dunaway is a man of action with a keen, intellectual prowess. But when he humiliates his commanding officer, he finds himself facing a court martial for his maverick behavior. Now his only chance to redeem himself is by working as a spy to uncover a plot to assassinate President Lincoln. Searching through gas-lit alleyways for traitors who will embrace him as one of their own, Fitz discovers just how fine the line is between allegiance to your cause--and allegiance to your country. . . In this rousing novel of loyalty and patriotism, betrayal and scandal, honor and valor, Lincoln scholar and expert Steven Wilson blends meticulous detail with captivating characters, taking readers back to one of America's most defining moments in history. "The reader can taste the grit and feel the excitement and expectations of a pivotal time in American history. In President Lincoln's Spy, Wilson has given us a time machine." --John Lutz "Steven Wilson writes a story as vivid and engrossing as the Civil War itself." --Troy Soos "If Robert Ludlum had written a Civil War novel filled with spies, double-crosses, murders, romances, and battlefield mayhem, it would read like President Lincoln's Spy." --Clint Johnson, author of Pursuit: The Chase, Capture, Persecution and Surprising Release of Confederate President Jefferson Davis

On the battlefield, Captain Fitz Dunaway is a man of action with a keen, intellectual prowess. But when he humiliates his commanding officer, he finds himself facing a court martial for his maverick behavior. Now his only chance to redeem himself is by working as a spy to uncover a plot to assassinate President Lincoln. Searching through gas-lit alleyways for traitors who will embrace him as one of their own, Fitz discovers just how fine the line is between allegiance to your cause--and allegiance to your country.

Discusses a corps of balloonists led by Thaddeus Lowe during the Civil War who spied on the Confederate Army.

Pledging her loyalty to the North at the risk of her life when her native Virginia secedes, Quaker-educated aristocrat Elizabeth Van Lew uses her innate skills for gathering military intelligence to help construct the Richmond underground and orchestrate escapes from the infamous Confederate Libby Prison.

A month after Lincoln’s assassination, William Alvin Lloyd arrived in Washington, DC, to press a claim against the federal government for money due him for serving as the president’s spy in the Confederacy. Lloyd claimed that Lincoln personally had issued papers of transit for him to cross into the South, a salary of $200 a month, and a secret commission as Lincoln’s own top-secret spy. The claim convinced Secretary of War Edwin Stanton and Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt—but was it true? Before the war, Lloyd hawked his Southern Steamboat and Railroad Guide wherever he could, including the South, which would have made him a perfect operative for the Union. By 1861, though, he needed cash, so he crossed enemy lines to collect debts owed by advertising clients in Dixie. Officials arrested and jailed him, after just a few days in Memphis, for bigamy. But Lloyd later claimed it was for being a suspected Yankee spy. After bribing his way out, he crisscrossed the Confederacy, trying to collect enough money to stay alive. Between riding the rails he found time to marry plenty of unsuspecting young women only ditch them a few days later. His behavior drew the attention of Confederate detectives, who nabbed him in Savannah and charged him as a suspected spy. But after nine months, they couldn’t find any incriminating evidence or anyone to testify against him, so they let him go. A free but broken man, Lloyd continued roaming the South, making money however he could. In May 1865, he went to Washington with an extraordinary claim and little else: a few coached witnesses, a pass to cross the lines signed “A. Lincoln” (the most forged signature in American history), and his own testimony. So was he really Lincoln’s secret agent or nothing more than a notorious con man? Find out in this completely irresistible, high-spirited historical caper.

It is 1863, the year of Gettysburg and Vicksburg, when a nation savagely tears at its soul. At the center of the carnage stands the calm, enigmatic figure of President Abraham Lincoln. In this extraordinary thriller, Lincoln sends his most trusted agent to turn the course of the War. . . Twelve miles from Wilmington, Delaware, a heavily guarded ammunition dump has exploded--and lit up the night sky for miles around. On a newly christened ironclad in the Potomac, Lincoln meets with Colonel Fitz Dunaway and his beautiful, brilliant wife Asia. Fitz has already been wounded in service to the President. Now, the Union is imperiled as never before . . . and the President needs Fitz's skills more than ever. In the clandestine world where more than espionage is kept secret, a killer makes his first move on Lincoln's man. It is then that Fitz and Asia confront a cabal of traitors and spies, sufferers and sinners who are all guarding the most terrifying threat of all. . . Praise for Steven Wilson and President Lincoln's Spy "A story as vivid and engrossing as the Civil War itself." --Troy Soos "You'll taste the grit and feel the excitement of a pivotal time in American history."--John Lutz "If Robert Ludlum had written a Civil War novel, it would read like President Lincoln's Spy." --Clint Johnson