Being a person who is moderately interested in the Civil War and whose ancestors fought for the cause, I was very pleased with "They Went into the Fight Cheering" because it gave me a sense of what the soldiers, their families and neighbors went through as people. I am interested in the human story surrounding the War and found myself "in their shoes": the inner turmoil of the men as they struggled to balance their desire to maintain their Southern heritage and way of life with the realities of leaving their families and home to go to war, the stress of being left behind as a wife/mother/child. The actual letters reproduced in the book (which to my joy includes the vocabulary and spelling of the era) were particularly touching and added to my human experience as I read.[...]