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Battle of Antietam: The Official History by the Antietam Battlefield Board

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Almost 28 years passed before an Act of Congress on 30 August 1890, approved money to survey, locate, and preserve the lines of battle of the Army of the Potomac and the army of Northern Virginia at Antietam. This book gives the specifics of the endeavor and relates it to the reader in a format befitting those early historians, Generals Henry Heth of the Confederacy and Ezra A. Carmen of the Union.

These two men were instrumental in the overall effort of studying the field and movements of the troops, then transforming this information onto iron tablets which were erected upon the hallowed grounds.

Maps and pictures illustrate the specifics of not only the tablets at Antietam, but Shepherdstown, Harpers Ferry and South Mountain as well. In the case of Shepherdstown, only two of the five tablets still remain and they are in poor condition and in need of repair. If it were not for this publication, one would have to dig through the National Archives to gather the data on the three missing tablets.

This work is an invaluable research tool for the modern historian/archivist as well as interesting reading to the casual Civil War buff. Having the script of every tablet at your finger tips is a valuable resource.

This book is essentially a compendium of historic tablets describing what Union and Confederate combat units did and where they stood during the 1862 Maryland Campaign. Most of the tablets reside at Antietam, Maryland, but others are found at South Mountain, Harper's Ferry and a few other locations.

The book serves its purpose well. Anyone interested in a presentation of the locations of the troops involved will find this a handy guide. Messers. Swisher and Large have performed a good service for the historian and serious student of the Campaign.

For the general reader, the synopses of each phase of the campaign will appear too short to give a good impression of what was happening or the significance of various unit locations. I also found the maps a little too loosely drawn and smallish to be of as much help as one may have hoped for.

Nonetheless, this book hits the target at which it aims -- a catalogue of location markers for units involved in the campaign that led to America's single bloodiest day of combat -- September 17, 1862