The New Gettysburg Campaign Handbook: Facts, Photos, and Artwork for Readers of All Ages, June 9 - July 14, 1863

Revisiting Gettysburg With Petruzzi And Stanley

In 2009, author David Petruzzi and cartographer Steven Stanley published a study of the battle of Gettysburg titled "The Complete Gettysburg Guide". The Guide is a hardbound, large book on glossy paper which offers detailed walking and driving tours of the Gettysburg Battlefield and associated sites, the town of Gettysburg, cemeteries, hospitals and other points of interest to students of this great battle. The book has received awards and critical acclaim. It has become a best-seller.

With this impressive overview of Gettysburg published only two years ago, it might be hard to imagine what the authors could do to justify a second look. But Petruzzi's and Stanley's new work, "The New Gettysburg Campaign Handbook" is not a simple rehash of the earlier book and does not need any excuse for its publication. According to the book's Foreword, the publishing company approached the authors after the success of the 2009 volume to request them to write a follow-up handbook which briefly covered the battle "with its varied stories, facts, statistics, photos, illustrations, original maps, and so much more". There are many handbooks of the battle which offer tours and summaries of the military action. In a crowded field, this new handbook takes a fresh look at Gettysburg.

The book offers a short, moving portrayal of both the highlights and some of the less familiar aspects of the battle. The book is a small paperback much easier to carry while walking the battlefield than the earlier volume. The text and accompaniments are crisp and clear. The book is presented on quality, glossy paper with a yellowed touch to provide a nostalgic, historic feel. It is a gimmicky touch, but effective.

The book bears an appealing and accurate subtitle, "Facts, Photos, and Artwork for Readers of all Ages" which captures its strengths. The text includes outstanding maps, historical and contemporary, together with paintings, and photographs of the battle, its participants, environment, and monuments. Much of this material will be familiar to close students of the battle, but much of it is relatively uncommon. The photographs and artwork, presented in a small book, make a strong cumulative effect and offer a fresh, effective look on this much-studied battle.

For all its brevity, the authors have included information which rarely appears in a small handbook and which enhances its appeal. Most importantly, there were 64 Union soldiers who received the Medal of Honor for their heroism during the Battle of Gettysburg. Before getting to the details of the battle, Petruzzi and Stanley offer a list of these individuals together with a short summary of their heroic actions. This recognition of heroes of the battlefield creatively sets the stage for the book. Other material that sets the stage for the battle itself includes key quotations from Union and Confederate supporters on various aspects of the combat and the Gettysburg campaign. The reader is encouraged to reflect on what these varied quotations mean. The book also includes a summary of the location of the Union and Confederate Corps just prior to the battle (this information usually needs substantial digging through long books to discover), and a short section discussing and evaluating some popularly-held views about the battle.

Following the presentation of this and other background information, Petruzzi and Stanley proceed to an informative short discussion of the battle itself. The authors cover the beginning of the Gettysburg campaign and then devote brief chapters to each of the three days of battle together with a chapter on Lee's difficult retreat back to Virginia. The retreat has received substantial attention by writers on Gettysburg in recent years. It was not discussed in the 2009 book. Although this new book is short, it discusses some of the obscure cavalry actions in the environs of Gettysburg that frequently are not addressed. Petruzzi has a particular interest in studying cavalry. With the discussion of some little-known aspects of the battle, the focus remains on events and places that have become ingrained in American memory, including McPherson Ridge, Cemetery Hill, Little Round Top, Devil's Den, the Wheatfield, the Peach Orchard, and Pickett's Charge.

The Battle of Gettysburg, as any subject of moment or any subject that properly inspires passion, can be studied for long periods of time and from many points of view without exhausting the material. Although I have read a great deal about the battle, I found this little book deepened my understanding and rekindled my interest. The book will appeal to readers new to the battle and to those, such as myself, who have long been fascinated by it. A recognition of the role of African Americans in the Civil War and in the town of Gettysburg itself would have been more than appropriate in this otherwise comprehensive and eloquent handbook. In our country's troubled times, I found it worthwhile to revisit Gettysburg and to think about its importance.

Robin Friedman