Making comprehensive and sophisticated use of a broad spectrum of archival and printed sources, NPR executive producer Trudeau (Bloody Roads South) enhances his reputation as a narrative historian of the Civil War with what is to date the best large-scale single-volume treatment of those crucial three days in July 1863, elegantly reconstructing the battle and the campaign from the perspectives of the participants. Trudeau allows them, from generals to enlisted men, to speak in their own words, creating a thoroughly absorbing story of determination on both sides and at all levels. Robert E. Lee began the campaign intending to win a battle of annihilation. July 1 inaugurated some of the hardest, and the most exacting, fighting American soldiers have ever done. The operational narratives are remarkable for their clarity, especially Trudeau's presentation of the confused fight for the Union left flank on July 2. The text is supplemented by sketch maps of unit positions and movements that are also models of clarity—a particular boon to nonspecialist readers. Trudeau defensibly concludes that the wide latitude allowed subordinates at all levels of the Army of Northern Virginia worked against it at Gettysburg. Further, his emphasis on contemporary sources instead of postwar retrospection and academic analysis shows that—despite nearly equal losses totaling almost 50,000 men—Gettysburg failed as Lee's battle of annihilation. (July 1)
Forecast:From Jeffry D. Wert's
Gettysburg, Day 3 and Harry W. Pfanz's day-by-day accounts to Duane P. Schultz's
The Most Glorious Fourth, there have been a slew of recent books on Gettysburg, not to mention renewed attention to Lincoln's Address. Publishing on the 139th anniversary of the battle's beginning, this book should get a boost from July 4 patriotism, and would nicely anchor a holiday display.
