Catton begins by looking at the spring of 1860 and how it was that the Democratic convention of that year, held disastrously in Charleston, ended in disaster because a majority of delegates from the North would accept no other nominee than Stephen Douglas but a blocking minority would not accept him under any circumstances, while the Republicans went for availability and cast aside the favorite Seward for the more unknown and thus less objectionable Lincoln. The nearly 500 pages of text in this book are divided into seven chapters with various subjects.

Far more than the other two books in the series, this one offers a granular look at what happened between the Spring of 1860 and the summer of the year following, when the United States first faced divided political parties struggling over power and then faced the gradual buildup and sudden release of tension that led to brutal and all-out warfare between the North and the South over issues of Union and slavery. Reading this book is akin to reading the first part of a Greek tragedy, where the reader is aware that things do not turn out well and where the people themselves warn others of the disaster that is looming but where the people in charge of events cannot be stopped no matter how many sound omens they receive. And intriguingly, this book would have been a very worthwhile setup for the other two, even if it only covers the area between the Democratic convention of 1860 and the immediate aftermath of Bull Run.

This book is one I read somewhat out of order, it being the third book I read in the series after having read the second and the third ones before. The Coming Fury (The Centennial History Of The Civil War #1), by Bruce Catton

The Coming Fury by Bruce Catton