two persons, but we feel that in our case the disadvantages of
collaboration are reduced to the minimum. Our experiences, our
observations, our material, have been for twenty years not merely
homogeneous--they have been identical. Our plans were made with
thorough concert; our studies of the subject were carried on together;
we were able to work simultaneously without danger of repetition or
conflict. The apportionment of our separate tasks has been dictated
purely by convenience; the division of topics between us has been
sometimes for long periods, sometimes almost for alternate chapters.
Each has written an equal portion of the work; while consultation and
joint revision have been continuous, the text of each remains
substantially unaltered. It is in the fullest sense, and in every
part, a joint work. We each assume responsibility, not only for the
whole, but for all the details, and whatever credit or blame the
public may award our labors is equally due to both.

We commend the result of so many years of research and diligence to
all our countrymen, North and South, in the hope that it may do
something to secure a truthful history of the great struggle which
displayed on both sides the highest qualities of American manhood, and
may contribute in some measure to the growth and maintenance
throughout all our borders of that spirit of freedom and nationality
for which Abraham Lincoln lived and died.

John G. Nicolay
John Hay
[signatures]