The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 52, February, 1862: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics

This February 1862 issue of The Atlantic captures a nation at war with itself, publishing some of the most powerful literary voices of the Civil War era. Leading the issue is Julia Ward Howe's 'Battle Hymn of the Republic,' the thunderous anthem of divine justice and fierce patriotism that would become the defining song of the Union cause. The issue also continues Harriet Beecher Stowe's serialized novel 'Agnes of Sorrento,' which transports readers to 15th-century Italy where faith, art, and political turmoil collide through the eyes of Father Antonio and the Cavalier approaching Florence. These pages hold the intellectual and emotional landscape of mid-19th-century America, the poems, essays, and fiction that helped a wounded nation understand itself. For historians of the Civil War, scholars of American periodical culture, or anyone curious about the literary world that shaped a nation's consciousness during its greatest crisis, this issue offers an unfiltered window into 1862.