Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Candice Shy Hooper's avatar

I thought a lot about the vagaries of historical memory, too, when I wrote Delivered Under Fire. Even now, it’s hard for me to understand how Absalom Markland has been essentially wiped from the historical record despite his close relationship with Grant and Sherman. It makes me want to look more closely at those who are on the perimeters of “great man” history.

Expand full comment
Michael Penrod's avatar

Outside of my studies in history the first time I encountered Chamberlain was in company grade office PME in the 1980s. The Army was using story telling, specifically biography, to teach lessons about officer development. As I remember this stuff was professionally done by one of the departments in the school at Ft Leavenworth. Chamberlain was presented as the quintessential citizen soldier leader. Someone not trained in the military art but intelligent and analytic and able to make decisions. In reality there was probably more to the Chamberlain lesson but this was all a long time ago. Much of his story focused of course on Gettysburg. I don’t remember anything being said about his post-war career other than a very superficial overview. The Gettysburg movie and subsequent issues over the Little Round Top fight prompted me to go back many years latter and look more deeply at Chamberlain

Expand full comment
16 more comments...

No posts