"A tour de force. No one before David Montejano has ever traced the Civil War supply chain from southern plantations across Texas to Matamoros where the 'Mexican' cotton could be exported to northern mills and woven into flags, bandages, and uniforms."--Alice Baumgartner, author of South to Freedom: Runaway Slaves to Mexico and the Road to Civil War "A dazzling book. Through prodigious research, inspired analysis, and a host of richly-drawn laborers, schemers, and profiteers, David Montejano reconstructs cotton's transnational sojourn from Confederate bale to Union bandage. One of our great borderlands scholars has given us an engrossing new perspective on the Civil War era."--Brian DeLay, author of War of a Thousand Deserts "The Civil War is an international commercial struggle in David Montejano's capable hands. His account of covert cotton dealings ties southern planters, Mexican agents, and northern industrialists together in an uncommon transatlantic tale."--Conrad Edick Wright, Massachusetts Historical Society " A Red Badge of Cotton reframes the Civil War, detailing how southern cotton crossed into Mexico, then sailed to supply northern industries.

While soldiers died, border merchants kept dueling economies alive--building capital that led to New York's Citibank and Monterrey's rise as Mexico's industrial powerhouse."--John Tutino, Georgetown University.