| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 95.3

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 95.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Citizens More than Soldiers: The Kentucky Militia and Society in the Early Republic. By Harry S. Laver. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2007. xii, 216 pp. $45.00, ISBN 978-0-8032-2970-9.)
At a crucial moment during the battle of Buena Vista, Gen. Zachary Taylor mistakenly believed that his Kentucky volunteers wavered under fire. He turned to his aide and declared, "By God Mr. Crittenden this will not do—this is not the way for Kentuckians to behave themselves when called upon to make a good battle" (Federal Writers' Project, Military History of Kentucky, 1939, pp. 133–34). However, when he soon observed the advancing Mexicans reel before a heavy volley from his Kentuckians, Taylor rose in the saddle and shouted, "Hurrah for old Kentuck!" (ibid.).	1
From the battle of Tippecanoe to the Mexican War, Kentuckians distinguished themselves in battle. However, in Citizens More than Soldiers, Harry S. Laver sheds light on the Kentucky militia as a major civic institution in the antebellum era. Although often portrayed as clownish "corn stalk" militia led by bombastic "carpet knights," these citizen soldiers, Laver contends, played an important role in Kentucky's social, economic, and political growth.	. . .

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