Gettysburg & Assoc. Bios
Previous works on Confederate brigadier general Harry T. Hays's First Louisiana Brigade -- better known as the "Louisiana Tigers" -- have tended to focus on just one day of the Tigers' service -- their role in attacking East Cemetery Hill at Gettysburg on July 2, 1863 -- and have touched only lightly on the brigade's role at the Second Battle of Winchester, an important prelude to Gettysburg. In this commanding study, Scott L. Mingus, Sr., offers the first significant detailed exploration of the Louisiana Tigers during the entirety of the 1863 Gettysburg Campaign.
Mingus begins by providing a sweeping history of the Louisiana Tigers; their predecessors, Wheat's Tigers; the organizational structure and leadership of the brigade in 1863; and the personnel that made up its ranks. Covering the Tigers' movements and battle actions in depth, he then turns to the brigade's march into the Shenandoah Valley and the Tigers' key role in defeating the Federal army at the Second Battle of Winchester.
Combining soldiers' reminiscences with contemporary civilian accounts, Mingus breaks new ground by detailing the Tigers' march into Pennsylvania, their first trip to Gettysburg in the week before the battle, their two-day occupation of York, Pennsylvania -- the largest northern town to fall to the Confederate army -- and their march back to Gettysburg. He offers the first full-scale discussion of the Tigers' interaction with the local population during their invasion of Pennsylvania and includes detailed accounts of the citizens' reactions to the Tigers -- many not published since appearing in local newspapers over a century ago.
Mingus explores the Tigers' actions on the first two days of the Battle of Gettysburg and meticulously recounts their famed assault on East Cemetery Hill, one of the pivotal moments of the battle. He closes with the Tigers' withdrawal from Gettysburg and their retreat into Virginia. Appendices include an order of battle for East Cemetery Hill, a recap of the weather during the entire Gettysburg Campaign, a day-by-day chronology of the Tigers' movements and campsites, and the text of the official reports from General Hays for Second Winchester and Gettysburg.
Comprehensive and engaging, Mingus's exhaustive work constitutes the definitive account of General Hays's remarkable brigade during the critical summer of 1863.
Service manages, none hold more national appeal and recognition than Gettysburg National
Military Park. Welcoming more than one million visitors annually from across the
nation and around the world, the National Park Service at Gettysburg holds the enormous
responsibility of preserving the war's "hallowed ground" and educating the public, not
only on the battle, but also about the Civil War as the nation's defining moment. Although
historians and enthusiasts continually add to the shelves of Gettysburg scholarship, they
have paid only minimal attention to the battlefield itself and the process of preserving,
interpreting, and remembering the bloodiest battle of the Civil War. In On a Great Battlefield,
Jennifer M. Murray provides a critical perspective to Gettysburg historiography by
offering an in-depth exploration of the national military park and how the Gettysburg
battlefield has evolved since the National Park Service acquired the site in August 1933. As Murray reveals, the history of the Gettysburg battlefield underscores the complexity
of preserving and interpreting a historic landscape. After a short overview of early
efforts to preserve the battlefield by the Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association
(1864-1895) and the United States War Department (1895-1933), Murray chronicles the
administration of the National Park Service and the multitude of external factors--including
the Great Depression, the New Deal, World War II, the Civil War Centennial, and
recent sesquicentennial celebrations--that influenced operations and molded Americans'
understanding of the battle and its history. Haphazard landscape practices, promotion of
tourism, encouragement of recreational pursuits, ill-defined policies of preserving cultural
resources, and the inevitable turnover of administrators guided by very different
preservation values regularly influenced the direction of the park and the presentation
of the Civil War's popular memory. By highlighting the complicated nexus between preservation,
tourism, popular culture, interpretation, and memory, On a Great Battlefield
provides a unique perspective on the Mecca of Civil War landscapes. Jennifer M. Murray, assistant professor of history at the University of Virginia's College
at Wise, is the author of The Civil War Begins. Her articles have appeared in Civil War
History, Civil War Times, and Civil War Times Illustrated.
"This is not just 'another Gettysburg book, ' but a different Gettysburg book. Most of the prior Gettysburg books have been accounts of Confederate command failures that led to Confederate defeat. This is the story of the Federal defense leading to Federal victory. The book contains new material and new insights. It rivals Coddington as an essential Gettysburg book, and it maps the battle like Bigelow mapped The Campaign at Chancellorsville." --Alan T. Nolan, author of Lee Considered and The Iron Brigade
This major reinterpretation of the key battle of the American Civil War tells the story of the Gettysburg campaign as it unfolded from early June through mid-July 1863, and its climax with the Federal victory at Gettysburg. The book strives to describe the campaign with utmost clarity. In pursuit of this goal, it restricts itself to the campaign's major events and participants. Yet many components of even a boiled-down account of the campaign are complex. Accordingly, The Stand features more than 160 maps and numerous diagrams that allow the reader to understand what happened at every important stage of the campaign, with special emphasis on the three-day battle of July 1-3. The book also pays tribute to the vast literature on Gettysburg, with careful consideration of the many analyses of the campaign, paying particular attention to recent works. The appearance of new interpretations, including those offered here, suggests that only now, nearly 150 years after the event, are we approaching a complete and accurate view of what happened during those crucial days at Gettysburg.