Crossroads of Freedom
Antietam
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Narrated by:
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Nelson Runger
About this listen
Through historical newspaper accounts and the personal letters of soldiers, the events leading up to the battle and the battle itself are stunningly recreated. You will enter the mind of Robert E. Lee as he makes the fateful decision to cross the Potomac River and take the offensive. You will feel the frustration of Abraham Lincoln as he struggles to convince George McClellan to fight. And you will stand side-by-side with foot soldiers as the peaceful Maryland countryside explodes into terrifying, unforgettable carnage. In vivid detail and with remarkable insight, McPherson makes a convincing case that Antietam was the "battle that changed the course of the Civil War."
The “Pivotal Moments in American History” series seeks to unite the old and the new history, combining the insights and techniques of recent historiography with the power of traditional narrative. Each title has a strong narrative arc with drama, irony, suspense, and – most importantly – great characters who embody the human dimension of historical events. The general editors of “Pivotal Moments” are not just historians; they are popular writers themselves, and, in two cases, Pulitzer Prize winners: David Hackett Fischer, James M. McPherson, and David Greenberg. We hope you like your American History served up with verve, wit, and an eye for the telling detail!
©2002 James M. McPherson (P)2002 Recorded Books, LLCListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"McPherson convincingly establishes the Battle of Antietam as the [Civil War]'s pivotal moment militarily, politically, and morally." (Publishers Weekly)
"A fine study." (Library Journal)
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- Length: 26 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In this gripping chronicle of America's struggle for independence, award-winning historian John Ferling transports listeners to the grim realities of that war, capturing an eight-year conflict filled with heroism, suffering, cowardice, betrayal, and fierce dedication. As Ferling demonstrates, it was a war that America came much closer to losing than is now usually remembered. General George Washington put it best when he said that the American victory was "little short of a standing miracle."
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Dramatic Backstory of The War for Independence
- By Amazon Customer on 11-22-15
By: John Ferling
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The 10 Biggest Civil War Blunders
- By: Edward H. Bonekemper III
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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What makes the Civil War so fascinating is that it presents an endless number of "what if" scenarios - moments when the outcome of the war (and therefore world history) hinged on a single small mistake or omission. In this audiobook, Civil War historian Edward Bonekemper highlights the 10 biggest Civil War blunders, focusing in on intimate moments of military indecision and inaction involving great generals like Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, and William T. Sherman as well as less effective generals such as George B. McClellan and Benjamin Butler.
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Mistakes or Missed Opportunities a Better Title
- By Anonymous User on 05-10-21
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Lincoln's Lieutenants
- The High Command of the Army of the Potomac
- By: Stephen W. Sears
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 32 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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The high command of the Army of the Potomac was a changeable, often dysfunctional band of brothers, going through the fires of war under seven commanding generals in three years, until Grant came east in 1864. The men in charge all too frequently appeared to be fighting against the administration in Washington instead of for it, increasingly cast as political pawns facing down a vindictive congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War.
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Good, but not what I thought
- By Paul S. on 08-10-17
By: Stephen W. Sears
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The American Civil War
- A Military History
- By: John Keegan
- Narrated by: Robin Sachs
- Length: 16 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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For the past half century, John Keegan, the greatest military historian of our time, has been returning to the scenes of America’s most bloody and wrenching war to ponder its lingering conundrums: the continuation of fighting for four years between such vastly mismatched sides; the dogged persistence of ill-trained, ill-equipped, and often malnourished combatants; the effective absence of decisive battles among some two to three hundred known to us by name.
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A Novel Approach (As Opposed to Novelistic)
- By margot on 11-18-12
By: John Keegan
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The Man Who Saved the Union
- Ulysses Grant in War and Peace
- By: H. W. Brands
- Narrated by: Stephen Hoye
- Length: 27 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Ulysses Grant rose from obscurity to discover he had a genius for battle, and he propelled the Union to victory in the Civil War. After Abraham Lincoln's assassination and the disastrous brief presidency of Andrew Johnson, America turned to Grant again to unite the country, this time as president. In Brands' sweeping, majestic full biography, Grant emerges as a heroic figure who was fearlessly on the side of right.
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Underrated hero
- By Tad Davis on 12-22-12
By: H. W. Brands
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A Savage War
- A Military History of the Civil War
- By: Wayne Wei-siang Hsieh, Williamson Murray
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 24 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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The Civil War represented a momentous change in the character of war. It combined the projection of military might across a continent on a scale never before seen with an unprecedented mass mobilization of peoples. Yet despite the revolutionizing aspects of the Civil War, its leaders faced the same uncertainties that have vexed combatants since the days of Thucydides and the Peloponnesian War.
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A Book about Conclusions
- By Terry Masters on 10-18-17
By: Wayne Wei-siang Hsieh, and others
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General Ulysses S. Grant
- The Soldier and the Man
- By: Edward G. Longacre
- Narrated by: Jonathan Walker
- Length: 13 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Despite his reputation for rash decisions, brutal tactics, and intemperate behavior, Ulysses S. Grant was the only Union general who could win the war for Lincoln. Grant's aggressive strategies, swift movements and uncompromising battlefield attacks were praised in the North, feared in the South, and reviled by many of his own associates and staff. General Grant is, perhaps, one of the most controversial, enigmatic, and misunderstood generals in our nation's history.
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Good Biography
- By Morgan on 07-14-11
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American General
- The Life and Times of William Tecumseh Sherman
- By: John S.D. Eisenhower
- Narrated by: Jack Garrett
- Length: 9 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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From respected historian John S. D. Eisenhower comes a surprising portrait of William Tecumseh Sherman, the Civil War general whose path of destruction cut the Confederacy in two, broke the will of the Southern population, and earned him a place in history as "the first modern general". Yet behind his reputation as a fierce warrior was a sympathetic man of complex character. A century and a half after the Civil War, Sherman remains one of its most controversial figures...
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War is Hell?
- By Sandra on 03-27-15
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The Myth of the Lost Cause
- Why the South Fought the Civil War and Why the North Won
- By: Edward H. Bonekemper III
- Narrated by: C.J. McAllister
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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The former Confederate states have continually mythologized the South's defeat to the North, depicting the Civil War as unnecessary, or as a fight over states' Constitutional rights, or as a David v. Goliath struggle in which the North waged "total war" over an underdog South. In The Myth of the Lost Cause, historian Edward Bonekemper deconstructs this multi-faceted myth, revealing the truth about the war that nearly tore the nation apart 150 years ago.
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The Civil War was about Slavery. Period.
- By Reg on 02-07-17
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The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Civil War
- By: H. W. Crocker III
- Narrated by: Bill Wallace
- Length: 12 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Get ready for a rousing rebel yell as best-selling author H. W. Crocker III charges through bunkers and battlefields in The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Civil War. Crocker busts myths and shatters stereotypes as he profiles eminent and colorful military generals, revealing little-known truths, like why Robert E. Lee had a higher regard for African-Americans than Lincoln did.
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The American Civil War Made Simple
- By Vincent Tume on 12-18-08
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From Offshore, This War Looks Completely Different
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James McPherson shows that, contrary to what many scholars believe, the soldiers of the Civil War remained powerfully convinced of the ideals for which they fought throughout the conflict. Motivated by duty and honor, and often by religious faith, these men wrote frequently of their firm belief in the cause for which they fought: the principles of liberty, freedom, justice, and patriotism. For Cause and Comrades lets these soldiers tell their own stories in their own words to create an account that is both deeply moving and far truer than most books on war.
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Ambitious idea but falls short
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Excellent Book
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A Different Kind of History from McPherson
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From Offshore, This War Looks Completely Different
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James McPherson shows that, contrary to what many scholars believe, the soldiers of the Civil War remained powerfully convinced of the ideals for which they fought throughout the conflict. Motivated by duty and honor, and often by religious faith, these men wrote frequently of their firm belief in the cause for which they fought: the principles of liberty, freedom, justice, and patriotism. For Cause and Comrades lets these soldiers tell their own stories in their own words to create an account that is both deeply moving and far truer than most books on war.
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Ambitious idea but falls short
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The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Battle Cry of Freedom and many other award-winning books, James M. McPherson is America's preeminent Civil War historian. Now, in this collection of provocative and illuminating essays, McPherson offers fresh insight into many of the most enduring questions about one of the defining moments in our nation's history.
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Landscape Turned Red
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The Civil War battle waged on September 17, 1862, at Antietam Creek, Maryland, was one of the bloodiest in the nation's history: On this single day, the battle claimed nearly 23,000 casualties. In Landscape Turned Red, the renowned historian Stephen Sears draws on a remarkable cache of diaries, dispatches, and letters to recreate the vivid drama of Antietam as experienced not only by its leaders but also by its soldiers, both Union and Confederate.
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Excellent Book
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The Cornfield
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For generations of Americans, the word Antietam - the name of a bucolic stream in western Maryland - held the same sense of horror and carnage that the date 9/11 does for Americans today. But Antietam eclipses even this modern tragedy as America's single bloodiest day, on which 22,000 men became casualties in a war to determine our nation's future.
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Micro history at its finest
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This audiobook is the classic one-volume history of the American Civil War by Pulitzer Prize winner Bruce Catton. Covering events from the prelude of the conflict to the death of Lincoln, Catton blends a gripping narrative with deep, yet unassuming, scholarship to bring the war alive in an almost novelistic way. It is this gift for narrative that led contemporary critics to compare this book to War and Peace, and call it a "modern Iliad." Now over 50 years old, This Hallowed Ground remains one of the best-loved and admired general Civil War books.
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Still one of the best!
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By: Bruce Catton
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Shiloh
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This fictional recreation of the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862 is a stunning work of imaginative history, from Shelby Foote, beloved historian of the Civil War. Shiloh conveys not only the bloody choreography of Union and Confederate troops through the woods near Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, but the inner movements of the combatants' hearts and minds.
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Great so detailed
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By: Shelby Foote
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The Battle of Gettysburg
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From the opening shots to General George Pickett's ill-fated charge, Bruce Catton tells the dramatic story of the battle that resulted in more than 51,000 Union and Confederate casualties and changed the course of the war.
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A very good, short narrative
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By: Bruce Catton
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On to Petersburg
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On to Petersburg follows the Union army's movement to the James River, the military response from the Confederates, and the initial assault on Petersburg, which Rhea suggests marked the true end of the Overland Campaign. Beginning his account in the immediate aftermath of Grant's three-day attack on Confederate troops at Cold Harbor, Rhea argues that the Union general's primary goal was not - as often supposed - to take Richmond, but rather to destroy Lee's army by closing off its retreat routes and disrupting its supply chain.
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Important to understanding the Overland Campaign
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The Civil War: A Narrative, Volume I, Fort Sumter to Perryville
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The Civil War: A Narrative, Volume 1 begins one of the most remarkable works of history ever fashioned. All the great battles are here, of course, from Bull Run through Shiloh, the Seven Days Battles, and Antietam, but so are the smaller ones: Ball's Bluff, Fort Donelson, Pea Ridge, Island Ten, New Orleans, and Monitor versus Merrimac.
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OUTSTANDING! I'M PROUD TO BE A BLACK AMERICAN!!
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By: Shelby Foote
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The Civil War
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For a person seeking a single volume to serve as a captivating introduction and a dependable guide through all the maze of battles and issues of the Civil War, this is an audiobook without parallel. Bruce Catton understood the Civil War - its participants and battles - and he unfolds it with skill and simplicity.
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good book, fair sound
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Gettysburg
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The greatest of all Civil War campaigns, Gettysburg was the turning point of the turning point in our nation’s history. Volumes have been written about this momentous three-day battle, but recent histories have tended to focus on the particulars rather than the big picture: on the generals or on single days of battle—even on single charges—or on the daily lives of the soldiers. In Gettysburg Sears tells the whole story in a single volume.
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A Fresh Analysis of The Most Examined Battle in US History
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By: Stephen W. Sears
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Gettysburg: The Last Invasion
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From the acclaimed Civil War historian, a brilliant new history–the most intimate and richly readable account we have had–of the climactic three-day battle of Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), which draws the reader into the heat, smoke, and grime of Gettysburg alongside the ordinary soldier, and depicts the combination of personalities and circumstances that produced the greatest battle of the Civil War, and one of the greatest in human history.
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A Fresh Look at a Famous Battle
- By W. F. Rucker on 07-03-13
By: Allen C. Guelzo
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The Napoleonic Wars
- By: Alexander Mikaberidze
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 35 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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The Napoleonic Wars saw fighting on an unprecedented scale in Europe and the Americas. It took the wealth of the British Empire, combined with the might of the continental armies, almost two decades to bring down one of the world's greatest military leaders and the empire that he had created. Napoleon's ultimate defeat was to determine the history of Europe for almost 100 years. From the frozen wastelands of Russia, through the brutal fighting in the Peninsula to the blood-soaked battlefield of Waterloo, this book tells the story of the dramatic rise and fall of the Napoleonic Empire.
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No description of battles
- By John Gaston on 01-15-21
What listeners say about Crossroads of Freedom
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Paul Peart
- 06-14-21
Very well done presentation of an important subject. I learned a lot from this book.
I’ve bought more books on the civil war because of this book and my desire to learn all I can on this important subject.
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- A. McDonald
- 01-26-04
Far beyond the scope of the battle
This excellent book is not a standard battle history of Antietam (called Sharpsburg by the South) -- it is an excellent summary of the war to that point, and why the battle was so important in shaping issues beyond the battlefield. It examines examining the changing moods of both North and South up to that point, their changing expectations, what they were willing to put up with in terms of sacrifice and casualties. There is no sense of inevitability to the North's eventual victory here; the war was at midpoint and at the time a strategic draw. And although Antietam was the single bloodiest day in American history, while not to be ignored, this is hardly its significance. As a Union victory, it gave Lincoln the political capital to finally issue the Emancipation Proclamation freeing the slaves in the Southern states. This changed the war decisively, rendering it a battle for and against slavery that it hadn't explicitly been to that point. For this reason it also foreclosed the possibility of any European recognition of the South, which was quite eminent and perhaps the South's closest means of drawing the war to a close in its favor.
In addition to these strategic issues, McPherson is also quite good at drawing out several personalities involved in the battle. Lincoln's difficult balance in withholding his Emancipation Proclamation without some tangible Union success is explained thoroughly, some generals are described, various European reactions are explored -- but the character one remembers most is the ambivalent general of the Army of the Potomac, McClellan. It is an excellent study of failings and success in command, and failings and success in character.
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19 people found this helpful
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Overall
- David
- 05-11-05
A nice civil war read
If you are looking for a long and detailed analysis of the battle of Antietam then this is not the book. But I enjoyed the analysis of the early phases of the civil war and the crtical juncture Antietam was. The author does a nice job telling the story and even the ending provides yet another good summary of what happens after the battle.
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6 people found this helpful
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- Mickey Tallent
- 03-28-21
Antietam in its Sociopolitical Constellation
Solid wave top narrative of the campaign and battle and the political environment it took place and its reverberations.
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Overall
- Stephen
- 02-15-10
Great way to help your kid with a project
Before this, I knew very little about the Civil War. I had no idea how close the North came to losing to the South. I must have slept through that portion of my schooling. My boy needed to do a project on the Civil War for his History class, and this book was a quick listen and learn about the war and this pivotal battle. I was able to listen to it while skiing down the slopes Up North, and come to his aid as he completed his project. The author, James MacPherson, is one of the most respected historians on the Civil War, and the information in this work is encyclopedic, but fascinating. The audiobook narrator kept it interesting and alive for me. No regrets at all.
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Overall
- John
- 06-02-09
good review of history
I enjoy Civil War history and this book is no exception to the thorough study I would expect of this author. The reader is very good and the outline of the battle and surrounding events leading up to the engagement is well researched. I would recommend this to Civil War buffs and plan to read more by this same author.
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- Ron&Bridget
- 02-16-24
Detailed political analysis of Antietam and result
Another great book for history nerds... and I mean nerds! McPherson analyses the tactical and strategic decisions made by McClellan, Lincoln and many other Leaders within both international and domestic contexts. I appreciate this book because of the detail. Other, very worthy books cover Antietam as part of the overall Civil War but this book is a microscope focused only on that trajectory inflecting battle. Note: for anyone wishing to add to the reasons to despise Gen McClellan, this book is for you. "Little Napoleon" was at best an egotistic bumbler; at worst, a Confederate sympathizer.
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- JudieBee
- 08-24-15
Another excellent McPherson!
If you could sum up Crossroads to Freedom in three words, what would they be?
Detail, detail, detail!
What was one of the most memorable moments of Crossroads to Freedom?
Overriding evidence regarding McClelland's murderous ego. Pathologic.
Would you listen to another book narrated by Nelson Runger?
Not my favorite narrator. I won't NOT get a book narrated by him but .. Well, not my favorite.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
Antietam is a tragedy. McClelland's lack of expertise and just plain old courage made this a tragedy.
Any additional comments?
I recommend this book.
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- Matthew P Wood
- 08-14-24
Excellent read
I really enjoyed how this book helped bring focus on why the battle at Antietam was a pivotal moment in the American Civil War. Obviously the death toll makes it significant, but the author really helps the reader understand the greater significance of the politics surrounding that victory.
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- JHR
- 08-21-24
Good research
Great study of Antietam battle or Sharpsburg, Maryland 9/17/1862 by a respected historian, James M. McPherson. Gives a balanced account od the conflict. -JHR
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