About: In Deadly Earnest

In Deadly Earnest: The History of the First Missouri Brigade, CSA is a 1991 book written by Phil Gottschalk and published by Missouri River Press. The book follows the story of the brigade from its formation through the end of the war and posits that the men of the unit were fighting for the South, not slavery. It is illustrated with both maps and photographs. Reviewers characterized the book as redundant and criticized its tendency to contain digressions into off-topic material. One reviewer questioned some of the book's conclusions and described it as "ancestor worship posing as history". Other reviewers acknowledged the book's flaws and described it as a positive addition to the bibliography of the American Civil War.