Stephen B. Oates, Civil War Historian, passed away on August 20, 2021 at the age of 85.

Oates was a Kendall Professor of History Emeritus at the University of Massachusettes-Amherst. In the “Civil War quartet”, one of his best-known works, he wrote on the lives of four prominent men—John Brown, Nat Turner, Abraham Lincoln, and Dr. King—as they navigated the issues of slavery and race in their own time and strove to create a solution that would allow for equality. Dr. Oates was also included in Ken Burns’ 1990 PBS documentary “The Civil War” as an advisor and participant.

He received the Nevins-Freeman Award of the Chicago Civil War Round Table for lifetime achievement in the field of Civil War Studies. Oates was the author of eighteen books, including The Whirlwind of War: Voices of the Storm, 1861–1865 (Nebraska, 2012), The Approaching Fury: Voices of the Storm, 1820-1861 (Nebraska, 2012), and With Malice Toward None: A Biography of Abraham Lincoln. 

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