As If It Were Glory (eBook, ePUB)

Robert Beecham's Civil War from the Iron Brigade to the Black Regiments
Redaktion: Stevens, Michael E.

• Format: ePub

Produktbeschreibung

In this powerful and moving memoir, Robert Beecham tells of his Civil War experiences, both as an enlisted man in the fabled Iron Brigade of the Army of the Potomac and as an officer commanding a newly raised African-American unit. Written in 1902, Beecham recounts his war experiences with a keen eye toward the daily life of the soldier, the suffering and brutality of war, and the remarkable acts of valor, by soldiers both black and white, that punctuated the grind of long campaigns. As If It Were Glory is an unforgettable account of the Civil War, unclouded by sentimentality and insistent that the nation remain true to the cause for which it fought. Beecham's war was a long one-he served from May 1861 through the completion of the war in the spring of 1865. With the Iron Brigade he saw action at such momentous battles as Chancellorsville and then at Gettysburg, where he was taken prisoner. Returned to service in a prison exchange, Beecham was promoted to first lieutenant of the 23rd United States Colored Troops whom he lead in fierce fighting at the Battle of the Crater. At the Crater, Beecham was wounded, again captured, and, after eight months in a Confederate prison, escaped to find his way to Annapolis just before the conclusion of the war. In his narrative, Beecham celebrates the ingenuity of the enlisted man at the expense of officers who are often arrogant or incompetent. He also chides the altered recollections of fellow veterans who remember only triumphs and forgot defeats. In one of the most powerful parts of his memoir, Beecham pays tribute to the valor of the African Americans who fought under his command and insists that they were "the bravest and best soldiers that ever lived."

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
• Erscheinungstermin: 10. August 2007
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9780742570825
• Artikelnr.: 39476980

Autorenporträt

Michael E. Stevens is state historic preservation officer at the Wisconsin Historical Society. He has written and edited several books on common men and women during war including: Letters From the Front, 1898-1945, Women Remember the War, 1941-1945, Remembering the Holocaust, and Voices from Vietnam.

Inhaltsangabe

Foreword Introduction Chapter 1: "As if it were glory and not years of
bitter war": Bull Run and a Winter of Idleness: May 1861-April 1862 Chapter
2: "I was pretty sick": Surviving the Military Hospitals: April
1862-December 1862 Chapter 3: "A campaign of adventure": From the Mud March
to Chancellorsville: January 1863-June 1863 Chapter 4: "We were all boys
then": The First Day at Gettysburg: July 1, 1863 Chapter 5: "The living
prepared for the morrow": The Second Day at Gettysburg: July 2, 1863
Chapter 6: "Into the fiercest hell of battle": The Third Day at Gettysburg:
July 3, 1863 Chapter 7: "The scenes I witnessed there": Life in a Southern
Prison Camp: July-August 1863 Chapter 8: "My first promotion": Becoming an
Officer with the U.S. Colored Troops: August-December 1863 Chapter 9:
"Soldiers till the last man falls": With the Twenty-third U.S. Colored
Troops: January-June 1864 Chapter 10: "We'll show the world today that
colored troops are soldiers": The Battle of the Crater: June-July 1864
Chapter 11: "We were a sorry-looking set": Prisoner of War Again: July
1864-March 1865 Chapter 12: "The paths and the vocations of peace":
March-June 1865