A Civil War History of the New Mexico Volunteers and Militia, by leading Civil War historian Jerry D. Thompson, won the 2016 A. M. Pate, Jr. Award in Civil War History from the Fort Worth Civil War Round Table this month. The award, which includes a $1,000 prize, honors outstanding research done on the Trans-Mississippi sector of the Civil War. Thompson was recognized at a ceremony in Fort Worth last mont.   

Thompson’s study, published by UNM Press in September 2015, tells the history of the New Mexico volunteers and militia in the Civil War. Drawing on service records and numerous other archival sources that few earlier scholars have seen, Thompson reveals how the volunteer companies were raised; who led them; how they were organized, armed, and equipped; what they endured off the battlefield; how they adapted to military life; and their interactions with New Mexico citizens and various hostile Indian groups, including raiding by deserters and outlaws.

In 2016, A Civil War History of the New Mexico Volunteers and Militia also won the Historical Society of New Mexico’s Fray Francisco Atanasio Domínguez Award for an outstanding publication or significant contribution to historic survey and research in New Mexico or Southwest borderlands history.

Thompson is a Regents Professor of History at Texas A&M International University. He is the author or editor of more than a dozen books, including Texas and New Mexico on the Eve of the Civil War: The Mansfield and Johnston Inspections, 1859–1861 (UNM Press).

For more information, visit www.unmpress.com or www.fortworthcwrt.com.