Customer Reviews

Gettysburg: Day Three

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

As an Australian Army Officer, Gettysburg doesn't represent a pivotal moment in my nation's history, nor in our collective consciousness. However I find the depth to which Gettysburg has been commented on over the years to be an absorbing and captivating area of study.

Almost from the moment that Pickett's, Pettigrew's and Trimble's tired and bloodied soldiers made it back to their line of departure up on Seminary Ridge, blame for the failures of Day 3 of the Gettysburg battle seems to have been laid at the feet of the majority of the key players. Wert describes them all and provides perhaps a deeper insight into the mind-set of each of them.

Wert's book is not one for those who do not possess a reasonable understanding of the 3 day battle in it's entirity. The fighting on days 1 and 2 were equally ferocious and, as Wert describes, pivotal to the Lee's decision to continue the attack on Day 3. Wert deliberately doesn't go into detail - after all, this book is about Day 3 - but it's helpful to have a overall view before buying this book.

The book itself is full of first hand accounts, many of them touching and quaintly mis-spelled, plus a detailed breakdown of what each regiment and unit was up to during Day 3. All in all, an enjoyable read but not without some criticisms:

Firstly, I'm sure the devotee's would disagree, but more maps would have been useful, especially when Wert is describing the actions of several units all with similar numbers. I got sidetracked a few times and had to grab a map from another book to see who was where! Secondly, and a word to the wise consumer, this book has to be the worst quality book that I've ever purchased! The pages look as though they've been guillotined with a serrated bread knife and the binding is already starting to go after one read..

The reviews found on the jacket of this book implied that the reader would become immersed in the human drama of one of the most historically significant days in American history. Unfortunately, I found myself immersed instead in page after page of minutiae on the command structure and order of battle of the opposing forces on the final day of Gettysburg. The first-person accounts that I expected to find, the personal recollections and narratives that I thought would comprise the bulk of the book and bring this extraordinary battle to life, were in fact few and far between. I have read Civil War history for more than two dozen years. It is an interest that was sparked in me, as it was in so many others, by a childhood visit to the field at Gettysburg. Having read a fair number of books on that conflict generally, and on Gettysburg in particular, I do not think that this volume would appeal to any but the most sophisticated students of the tactical and strategic issues of the battle. This book, in my opinion, is one that will be appreciated most by those ardent military historians whose interest in the battle from the view of the participants was long ago satisfied by other works. I believe it is they who will appreciate Wert's massive assemblage of information on unit identification and combat participation on July 3rd on an almost hour-by-hour basis. The review blurbs on the cover led me to believe that this account of the final day at Gettysburg might well be a Civil War version of Cornelius Ryan's extraordinarily compelling history of June 6, 1944, "The Longest Day". Unfortunately, I just found this book to be a very long read.

After 30 years of reading books about the Civil War and about Gettysburg in particular, I recently have found very little to keep my interest. It was almost as if I had "read it all". I picked up Jeffert Wert's book "Gettysburg :Day Three" primarily because of his past books. I had read one on Longstreet and one on Custer. In the past I have found Wert to be highly readable yet consistly knowledgable on his chosen subject. I was not disappointed. Suddenly I was on the battlefield I had visited over 25 year ago. Seeing Culp's Hill,Spangler's Spring and the surrounding woods.I was reminded of standing at Hay's position at the stone wall and viewing Seminary Ridge and the Blue Ridge Mountain range behind it.When you read the section on the cannonade against the oncoming Confederates the distance takes on a completely new meaning.( If you've ever visited Gettysburg on a hot July day you have a greater appreciation of how suffocating it must have felt.)

Wert transports the reader to the field of battle. To read this book makes the reader feel the temor of the earth during the cannonade prior to the Confederate charge. You also sense the desperation in the fighting on both sides. The reader comes to, somewhat, understand the hesitation yet the fortitude of the men in gray as they rose to march against the postion so prominent and so formidable yet so far away. I found the book even handed and fair to both sides of the battle. I agree with the previous writer that more maps would have been better but I always complain about a lack of maps.

I highly recommend to those that have become jaded,as I had, to pick this book up and once again experince this battle in the only way left to us. You won't be disappointed.

The book provides new (to me) insights into often overlooked portions of the battle, specifically the cavalry actions of July 3rd. This concludes the good part of this review...

The attention received by Culp's Hill and Pickett's Charge is abbreviated and generally lacking when compared to other available texts on these subjects. A hard-core buff can find more depth and less confusion elsewhere, yet it's a bit much for casual readers.

The writing is painfully inconsistent. Some sections are written around first person accounts and are clean, clear and exciting. In contrast, the technical passages that attempt to detail the "what where how when" of units' movements and activities are muddy and confusing and sometimes inconsistent with the maps that are juxtaposed throughout the book.

Any serious student of the American Civil War knows the significance of the Battle of Gettysburg, a series of desperate battles that took place July1-3, 1863. Many, including myself, believe that it was the turning point for both the Union and Confederate causes. It was the beginning of the end.

Jeffry Wirt is a superb historian and very skillful writer. This is a highly readable and informative story of the third and final day of that battle when so many events that could have changed the outcome of the fighting and therefore possibly the war took place.

We all think we know about Pickett's Charge. But Wirt presents the case better than I have ever seen that 'Old Peter' Longstreet had been right but unheeded by Marse Robert who made the worst tactical mistake of his career. Fifteen thousand men, no matter how gallant or brave, could have taken Cemetery Hill that afternoon, especially following the bloody repulse at Culp's Hill. The Yanks had superiority of numbers, topography and artillery and, most of all, confidence gained over the first two days and that morning's fighting that they could stand toe to toe with Lee's veterans and win. And win they did.

The story of Gettysburg was the very series of events that took place in an uncoordinated manner. Lee never got everything going at once, the secret to taking the offensive in any battle. The Union could do what Lee often did so well. Operating on interior lines and on the defensive they could shift both men and their terribly effective artillery to the point of attack, when there was only one such point at a time.

This book also presents Stuart at his worst . . . 48 hours late, wandering around Pennsylvania with captured wagons, negating his primary weapons of speed and mobility, and failing to get behind Cemetery Ridge at the cavalry fight at Rummel's barn. The Knight of the Golden Spurs was too little, too late. The Union cavalry was coming into it's own, better horses, tougher troopers, and outstanding young generals: Buford, Gregg, Custer, Merritt and soon the best of them all, Phil Sheridan. The edge in firepower alone given by the Spencer repeater carbine was to prove significant to the ascendancy of the Union cavalry. The days when the Reb cavalry could intimidate their rivals were over. I'm not sure Stuart understood that up until the end at Yellow Tavern.

But what if Ewell had coordinated his attack with Pickett? What if Pickett had arrived earlier on the field? What if Stuart had gotten to Gettysburg a day or two earlier and had all of his cavalry, rested and ready to fight, at the same time as two coordinated attacks by Ewell and Longstreet? We'll never know but this wonderful book makes you wonder. It's an outstanding read!

As anyone who made it to this page knows, books hundreds of pages long have been written on particular portions of the Gettysburg battlefield, from the railroad cut on Day 1 to McPherson's Woods etc. Plenty of large books have specifically discussed the individual days, but most books dealing with July 3 inevitably focus on Pickett's Charge. So when Wert, who's written biographies on Longstreet and Custer, attempted to write a book focusing on all of the action on Day Three, it was a very large undertaking. Inevitably, Wert comes up short.

Wert is largely uninspiring compared to the Pantheon of Gettysburg authors, like Pfanz and Coddington. And to justify writing a book about Gettysburg or July 3rd, topics that have been written about endlessly, there has to be some originality involved to give the narrative meaning. Wert simply does not accomplish this, except perhaps on the cavalry actions, and it isn't surprising when the book is only 300 pages long.

July 3rd's action begins near dawn on Culp's Hill. Pfanz covers this action infinitely better in his book on Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill compared to Wert's book. Pfanz book has just as many interesting first hand accounts, and it's a more descriptive narrative concerning the military movements and combat on Culp's Hill.

Pickett's Charge is, of course, the highlight of the action on July 3. Wert's book has nothing groundbreaking regarding any aspect of the charge, from the action to the Confederate command chain before the offensive. That's not surprising, considering the Charge has been discussed to death. However, you'll find much more description on the action in both Sears' and Coddington's books, and those are books covering the entire campaign, not just Day Three.

The only thing that separates this Day Three study from the rest is the detail it gives to the 4 cavalry actions on July 3rd. Generally most only mention Custer's and Stuart's action southeast of the field and Kilpatrick's assault on the Confederate right. This book describes those actions in strong detail and analyzes two less significant cavalry skirmishes.

Still, for anyone who wants to read 300 pages worth of text on July 3 at Gettysburg, it would benefit you to read a more specific book on Pickett's Charge or the Culp's Hill chapters of the Pfanz book. Put simply, Wert's sum is not greater than Day Three's parts.

A single-volume narrative account of the third day at Gettysburg.

In all honesty, as uncharitable as this sounds, I'm not sure another study of the third day at Gettysburg was needed. Pfanz' magisterial volumes have already covered much of this material in more detail and equal narrative interest. The cavalry battles, which are Wert's addition to his narrative of the third day, are covered here in adequate detail with rather little discussion of their contribution to the battle overall. (I'd recommend Longacre's work for more detail on the cavalry.)

Wert does do an excellent job of integrating primary sources throughout his text, bringing his narrative alive. He pays more attention to Pickett(et al.)'s Charge than other events, including the assaults on Culp's Hill, and his account saves its most descriptive language for that event, sometimes slipping over the line into melodrama. His analysis of why the battle turned out as it did seems solid but not revolutionary, with some interesting comments about the limitations of Confederate artillery.

I think this would be a useful, engaging read for a person wanting a single-volume account of the Civil War's most famous battlefield moment. For more advanced researchers, I don't think that it replaces preexisting resources.

While this book is exhaustive in it's verbal detail, it is too lacking in visual support - maps - to keep it all in mind while wading through it. And, what few maps there are are hard to find, and hard to refer back to because of the rag-edge paper the book is printed on. All in all, I would suggest another source for this battle.

1.) It contains no new information. More information is contained in Coddington's "Gettysburg: A Study in Command", which I just re-read prior to Wert's book. But, with regard to Culp's Hill, the best is Pfanz's "Gettysburg: Culp's Hill and Cemetery Hill". And if you want information on Pickett's Charge, there are numerous books MUCH better than Wert's, including that by George R. Stewart, as well as the "letter" (a really long description, not the usual letter) by Lt. Frank Haskell (Gibbon's aide), along with Vol 3 of "Battles and Leaders of the Civil War" in 4 volume version by Johnson and Buel (editors).

2.) It is printed on REALLY cheap paper, not much more durable than a paper towel (No kidding!!) and with edges cut by something resembling a rusty butter knife. Further, pages were separating from the binding before I completed it - and this is the HARDCOVER version!!

The publisher (Simon and Schuster) should be ashamed! The author should be mortified, as he has done some fine research and writing in his previous books.

All in all, a total waste of money

This book has real plusses and minuses.

On the plus side, the research is meticulous, with names, quotes, maps, order of battle and precise citations on troop movements and actions. On the negative side, there is little previously uncharted territory and even less drama. The text is so chock full of short quotes, terms, phrases, names, units and minor details that the story is lost among the data.

For a person keenly interested in the precise alignment of troops, the battle organizational details, and plentiful quotations from common soldiers as well as generals, this is a fine work. Culp's Hill and cavalry action are detailed, not just Pickett's charge. Yet the overall impression fails to capture the glory, the courage, the drama or the simple bewilderment of the day. Several Medal of Honor winners receive less than a paragraph's treatment. Late analysis of some of the shortcomings of leadership, staff work, and vision found in the Confederacy's failure that day comes too little and too late. Despite generally good maps (two or three more with a few more details on barns, houses, roads, fences, etc. would have helped) some movements and progressions are hard to follow.

The author deserves full marks for copious research. The book just needs some more attention to life, a story, or simply a connecting theme to characterize the drama that may have determined the destiny of our nation.