Writing the Gettysburg Address
Writing the Gettysburg Address

Author: Martin P. Johnson

Publisher: University Press of Kansas

Published: 2015-04-10

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 0700621121

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Four score and seven years ago . . . . Are any six words better known, of greater import, or from a more crucial moment in our nation’s history? And yet after 150 years the dramatic and surprising story of how Lincoln wrote the Gettysburg Address has never been fully told. Until now. Martin Johnson's remarkable work of historical and literary detection illuminates a speech, a man, and a moment in history that we thought we knew. Johnson guides readers on Lincoln’s emotional and intellectual journey to the speaker’s platform, revealing that Lincoln himself experienced writing the Gettysburg Address as an eventful process that was filled with the possibility of failure, but which he knew resulted finally in success beyond expectation. We listen as Lincoln talks with the cemetery designer about the ideals and aspirations behind the unprecedented cemetery project, look over Lincoln's shoulder as he rethinks and rewrites his speech on the very morning of the ceremony, and share his anxiety that he might not live up to the occasion. And then, at last, we stand with Lincoln at Gettysburg, when he created the words and image of an enduring and authentic legend. Writing the Gettysburg Address resolves the puzzles and problems that have shrouded the composition of Lincoln's most admired speech in mystery for fifteen decades. Johnson shows when Lincoln first started his speech, reveals the state of the document Lincoln brought to Gettysburg, traces the origin of the false story that Lincoln wrote his speech on the train, identifies the manuscript Lincoln held while speaking, and presents a new method for deciding what Lincoln’s audience actually heard him say. Ultimately, Johnson shows that the Gettysburg Address was a speech that grew and changed with each step of Lincoln's eventful journey to the podium. His two-minute speech made the battlefield and the cemetery into landmarks of the American imagination, but it was Lincoln’s own journey to Gettysburg that made the Gettysburg Address.

Fight Like the Devil
Fight Like the Devil

Author: Chris Mackowski

Publisher: Casemate Publishers

Published: 2015-04-20

Total Pages: 395

ISBN-13: 1611212286

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“Gives the reader an excellent readable narrative of the first day of battle . . . [and] an incredible driving tour which closes each chapter.” —Matthew Bartlett, Gettysburg Chronicle Do not bring on a general engagement, Confederate General Robert E. Lee warned his commanders. The Army of Northern Virginia, slicing its way through south-central Pennsylvania, was too spread out, too vulnerable, for a full-scale engagement with its old nemesis, the Army of the Potomac. Too much was riding on this latest Confederate invasion of the North. Too much was at stake. As Confederate forces groped their way through the mountain passes, a chance encounter with Federal cavalry on the outskirts of a small Pennsylvania crossroads town triggered a series of events that quickly escalated beyond Lee’s—or anyone’s—control. Waves of soldiers materialized on both sides in a constantly shifting jigsaw of combat. “You will have to fight like the devil . . .” one Union cavalryman predicted. The costliest battle in the history of the North American continent had begun. July 1, 1863 remains the most overlooked phase of the battle of Gettysburg, yet it set the stage for all the fateful events that followed. Bringing decades of familiarity to the discussion, historians Chris Mackowski, Kristopher D. White, and Daniel T. Davis, in their always-engaging style, recount the action of that first day of battle and explore the profound implications in Fight Like the Devil. “The book, written in the series’ accessible style, includes more than 100 illustrations, new maps and analysis.” —Longwood Magazine