Gettysburg: The Tide Turns, an Oral History

The Battle of Gettysburg was a dramatic combination of pathos and absurdity, according to this remarkable selection of primary sources from historian Chadwick (The Cannons Roar). In the summer of 1863, Confederate forces under Robert E. Lee invaded Pennsylvania, intent on compelling the Union into peace talks by cutting off the state’s fertile agricultural land. But Union forces led by George Meade—who was only 72 hours into his command—inadvertently collided with Lee’s advanced guard on the outskirts of Gettysburg. This all-too-human factor of war—whereby mistakes, disagreements, and muddled thinking impact the course of events—is Chadwick’s focus throughout his oral history of the battle that followed. For example, he highlights the friction between Lee and his second-in-command James Longstreet, and between Meade and Lincoln, who sent the triumphant commander (feted by everyone else) an unaccountably “scathing” post-battle reprimand for not pursuing the retreating enemy. In between snippets from soldiers’ letters and journalists’ on-the-ground reporting—some of which are just a sentence long, creating rapidly shifting and panoramic views of the battle’s most famous moments—Chadwick provides cheeky commentary (“Pickett was angry at everybody for Pickett’s Charge”; “McClellan... wrote that the people saw him as some kind of a God on a horse”). By turns amusing and bleak, it’s a stellar look at the folly, valor, and happenstance of war. (Feb.)