Remembering Antietam One Book at a Time
Today is the anniversary of the bloodiest day in American history. On this day in 1862 Union and Confederate armies clashed along the Antietam Creek and in and around Sharpsburg, Maryland.
I visited the Antietam National Battlefield back in 1994 knowing nothing about the Civil War. After spending time on a tour of the battlefield led by park historian Ted Alexander I was hooked. On my next visit I picked up a copy of Stephen Sears’s wonderful book Landscape Turned Red and walked the entire field reading as I went along.
Nothing was the same for me after that experience.
My fascination with the battle and the landscape has never waned. I’ve led a number of tours for students and other groups and I continue to read as much as I can. You can see the books that I possess on the battle and campaign, but I am always on the lookout for additional sources.
With that in mind, go ahead and suggest an additional book or article for me to read.
Thanks.
And if you weren’t able to make it to Sharpsburg this year, you can join Garry Adelman and Dennis Frye for a virtual tour of the battlefield, including the Cornfield, the Dunker Church/West Woods and the Sunken Road.
I will say that among the Antietam guides, The Landscape Turned Red does not have a good reputation. It is certainly well-written but we feel it is unfairly prejudiced against McClellan. And also just plain wrong about when McClellan got the “lost orders,” incorrectly accusing him of an inordinate delay. We recommend Joseph Harsh and, now, Scott Hartwig. McClellan certainly had his faults but he attacked an army in a strong defensive position (that he had been told had the same number of soldiers) and accomplished what he set out to do, driving them from Maryland. But if you want to go down well thought of in American history, not a good career move to run against Abraham Lincoln for president.
I was at Antietam in February just after the last snow of the season had gone off. Not an ideal time but I did have the battlefield mostly to myself. I want to go back when I can actually walk more of the site. It was cold and the ground was still muddy.
I watched the videos. I think they fit well with the broad themes of the Gettysburg discussion we have been having. What really is the purpose of preserving the battlefields. The Trust certainly sees it as returning the battlefield to near battle day appearance. Dr Gannon I think has a different view as does Dr Muarry as do I suspect many of the subscribers to this group. I’d like to see Kevin host a zoom discussion on this topic. I realize it might need to be narrowed some; but what are we trying to do as we memorialize these sites