Early life

Bahr joined the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War and later worked on the railroads for several years. In the early 1970s, when he was in his late 20s, he began attending the University of Mississippi. He earned a bachelor's degree and a master's degree from Ole Miss. For almost 20 years, he worked as the curator of the William Faulkner house, Rowan Oak, in Oxford, Mississippi.

Literary career

During much of his career, he taught American literature at the University of Mississippi. In 1993, he began working as an English instructor at Motlow State College in Tullahoma, Tennessee, and continued there until 2006. Bahr is the author of three novels that focus on the American Civil War, all of which have been widely praised by critics. He currently lives in Jackson, Mississippi, and teaches creative writing courses at Belhaven University.

Bahr started his writing career in the 1970s, publishing both fiction and non-fiction articles in magazines such as Southern Living and Civil War Times Illustrated. He also co-edited a regional magazine called Lagniappe from 1974 to 1975. His first published book was a children’s story titled Home for Christmas, released in 1987. It was reprinted in 1997 with new illustrations after the publication of his first novel, The Black Flower: A Novel of the Civil War. This novel, set during the Battle of Franklin in 1864, was named a New York Times Notable Book.

In 2000, Bahr released his second novel, The Year of Jubilo. The story takes place in a fictional Mississippi town called Cumberland shortly after the Civil War and explores how war and its aftermath affect Southern society. Like The Black Flower, this book was also named a New York Times Notable Book.

Bahr’s third novel, The Judas Field, was published in 2006. This book again focuses on the Battle of Franklin, but it is told from the perspective of a character who visits the battlefield in the 1880s to recover the body of a fallen soldier. Through this journey, the character relives the events of the battle that took place in 1864.

Bahr’s fourth novel, Pelican Road, was published in 2008. The story is set in December 1940 and follows events along a railroad line that stretches 207 miles between Meridian, Mississippi, and New Orleans.

Awards

His book The Black Flower: A Novel of the Civil War won the W.Y. Boyd Literary Award for Excellence in Military Fiction in 1998. His third book, The Judas Field, won the Michael Shaara Award for Excellence in Civil War Fiction.