

Almost ready!
In order to save audiobooks to your Wish List you must be signed in to your account.
Log in Create accountGift memberships
Gift audiobooks to anyone in the world from the comfort of your home. You choose the membership (3, 6, or 12 months/credits), your gift recipient picks their own audiobooks, and We Are LIT is supported by your purchase.
Start gifting
Down Along with That Devil's Bones
Bookseller recommendation
“The past won’t go anywhere — especially the racist past endorsed by the contemporary enablers of the Nathan Bedford Forrest mythology. O’Neill’s combination of historical research on the ‘Southern Cause’ and Jim Crow racism, combined with visits to the most contentious monuments to slavery, bring this work to visceral life. Down Along with That Devil’s Bones brings to mind Tony Horwitz’s Confederates in the Attic, but there’s much less to laugh about as O’Neill gives us the endless monumental horror of a country’s refusal to shake free from the roots of a long racist history.”
Brian Lampkin,
Scuppernong Books
Summary
“We can no longer see ourselves as minor spectators or weary watchers of history after finishing this astonishing work of nonfiction.” —Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy
In Down Along with That Devil’s Bones, journalist Connor Towne O’Neill takes a deep dive into American history, exposing the still-raging battles over monuments dedicated to one of the most notorious Confederate generals, Nathan Bedford Forrest. Through the lens of these conflicts, O’Neill examines the legacy of white supremacy in America, in a sobering and fascinating work sure to resonate with readers of Tony Horwitz, Timothy B. Tyson, and Robin DiAngelo.
When O’Neill first moved to Alabama, as a white Northerner, he felt somewhat removed from the racism Confederate monuments represented. Then one day in Selma, he stumbled across a group of citizens protecting a monument to Forrest, the officer who became the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan and whom William Tecumseh Sherman referred to as “that devil.” O’Neill sets off to visit other disputed memorials to Forrest across the South, talking with men and women who believe they are protecting their heritage, and those who have a different view of the man’s poisonous history.
O’Neill’s reporting and thoughtful, deeply personal analysis make it clear that white supremacy is not a regional affliction but is in fact coded into the DNA of the entire country. Down Along with That Devil’s Bones presents an important and eye-opening account of how we got from Appomattox to Charlottesville, and where, if we can truly understand and transcend our past, we could be headed next.