A Southern Chronicle By Edward L. Ayers The Virginia Quarterly Review and the American South, 1925–2000 You need an active subscription to view this contentYou should really subscribe now!Or login if you already have a subscription. Share — Issue: Spring 2000 / Volume 76/2 Published: December 11, 2003 Edward L. Ayers Edward L. Ayers is an American historian and the ninth president of the University of Richmond. His book In the Presence of Mine Enemies: The Civil War in the Heart of America, 1859-1864 won the Bancroft Prize in 2004.