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USC history professor studies Civil War experience through the senses

Experiencing war envelops all the human senses, even taste.

The sensory experience of the Civil War is the subject of a new book written by University of South Carolina Distinguished Professor Mark Smith. It's titled The Smell of Battle, the Taste of Siege.

"My aim here...is to add texture to the experience of war," he said. "What did it mean? How did it feel?"

From the first shots at Fort Sumter, to the Hunley submarine and the burning of Columbia, South Carolina is featured throughout the book. 

"My thinking was to identify a very well-known event during the Civil War and then look at the sources. What do the sources say about the sensory experience of that event?" he said...

Read entire article at WISTV