The Georgia Historical Society (GHS)announced today that Dr. Elizabeth R. Varon has been awarded the 2024 Malcolm Bell, Jr. and Muriel Barrow Bell Award for the best book on Georgia history published in 2023 for Longstreet: The Confederate General Who Defied The South, published by Simon and Schuster.

The Bell Award, established in 1992, is the highest publication award given by the Georgia Historical Society. It recognizes the best book on Georgia history published in the previous year. The award is named in honor of Malcolm Bell, Jr., and Muriel Barrow Bell in recognition of their contributions to the recording of Georgia’s history.

The Bell Award selection committee said, “Elizabeth R. Varon has produced an incisive and captivating work that shows not only how a man who once fought to secure a slaveholder’s republic could change, but also how the American South, as a whole, decidedly did not. Her work provides a testament to how historical currents and events are a product of decisions and demonstrates that inequality in the past cannot be diminished or excused as the result of ‘a different time’ with different standards. Varon’s skillful use of sources as well as her integration of Longstreet’s personal and professional lives reveal the striking evolution of a much-maligned Confederate general into a champion of Reconstruction and Republicanism.”

"Elizabeth Varon is one the best Civil War historians at work in the field today.,” said Dr. Stan Deaton, the Dr. Elaine B. Andrews Distinguished Historian and Senior Historian at GHS. “This award-winning book is not only deeply and carefully researched but also graceful and engagingly written."

Elizabeth R. Varon is the Langbourne M. Williams Professor of American History at the University of Virginia’s Corcoran Department of History and the Associate Director of UVA’s John L. Nau III Center for Civil War History.