William Henry Seward

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Seward (1801-1872), Abraham Lincoln's secretary of State and best-known cabinet member, was a state senator and governor of New York before emerging as a leading anti-slavery spokesman in the U.S. Senate. Focussing on Seward's relationship with Lincoln (he became the president's confidant as well as his foreign minister during the Civil War), Taylor describes Seward's adept handling of the Trent affair (when Anglo-American tensions raised the possibility of British intervention on the Confederate side) and provides a dramatic account of the physical assault upon him by a fellow-conspirator of John Wilkes Booth on the night Lincoln was assassinated. Seward retained his cabinet position under Andrew Johnson, supported his Reconstruction policies, helped end French intervention in Mexico and almost single-handedly arranged the purchase of Alaska from the Russians in 1867. By the author of General Maxwell Taylor (a biography of his father), this is a straightforward account of the life of one of the political giants of his generation. (July)