The Institute sponsors four book prizes annually. Each recognizes the best book of the year in its field.
A jury of leading scholars evaluates the entries and presents the top choices to the prize’s board for final selection. The winner is honored at an award ceremony, providing an opportunity for the public, including teachers and students, to hear the author speak.
Book Prizes
Book Prizes
About
The Institute sponsors four book prizes annually. Each recognizes the best book of the year in its field. A jury of leading scholars evaluates the entries and presents the top choices to the prize’s board for final selection. The winner is honored at an award ceremony, providing an opportunity for the public, including teachers and students, to hear the author speak.
We always welcome submissions of books that bear a copyright date in the current year and that conform to the criteria described below. A book that meets the eligibility criteria of multiple prizes may be submitted to each that it qualifies for.
To inquire about submitting or suggesting books for consideration, please contact bookprizes@gilderlehrman.org.
Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize
The prize is awarded to the finest scholarly work in English on Abraham Lincoln, the American Civil War soldier, or the American Civil War era.
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2025 Laureate: COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War by Edda L. Fields-Black
George Washington Prize
The prize recognizes the year’s best works on the nation’s founding era, especially those that have the potential to advance broad public understanding of American history.
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2025 Winner: Serpent in Eden: Foreign Meddling and Partisan Politics in James Madison’s America by Tyson Reeder
Gilder Lehrman Military History Prize
The award recognizes the best book on American military history in English distinguished by its scholarship, its contribution to the literature, and its appeal to the broadest possible general reading public.
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2024 Winner: Supremacy at Sea: Task Force 58 and the Central Pacific Victory by Evan Mawdsley
Frederick Douglass Book Prize
Awarded to an outstanding non-fiction book in English published on the subject of slavery, resistance, and/or abolition.
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2024 Winners: Awakening the Ashes: An Intellectual History of the Haitian Revolution by Marlene L. Daut and Encyclopédie Noire: The Making of Moreau de Saint-Méry's Intellectual World by Sarah E. Johnson