Guide to the Vicksburg Campaign Edited by Leonard Fullenkamp, Stephen Bowman, & Jay Luvaas xiv, 482 pages, 55 illustrations, 23 maps, 5-1/2 x 8-1/4 U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles Cloth ISBN 978-0-7006-0922-2, $39.95 Paper ISBN 978-0-7006-0923-9, $17.95 In the same week that Union forces triumphed at Gettysburg, they also captured the river fortress at Vicksburg, Mississippi. Although much less memorialized than Gettysburg, the fall of Vicksburg was every bit as crucial to the Union cause. Pitting Ulysses S. Grant and William T. Sherman against John Pemberton and Joseph Johnston, the victorious Vicksburg Campaign helped revive a war-weary North, gave it absolute control of the Mississippi River, severed the western Confederacy from the East, and further constricted the South's ability to wage war as the Union drove ever deeper into its heartland. It also gave Grant--the campaign's chief architect--a dramatic venue for demonstrating his maturing skills and intelligence as a strategist and field commander. Unlike other volumes in the U.S. Army War College Guides to Civil War Battles series, this one examines an entire campaign, looking at many interlinked battles and joint Army-Navy operations as they played out over seven months and thousands of square miles of rivers, streams, swamps, lakes, forests, hills, and plains surrounding Vicksburg. In addition to detailed coverage of the actual Siege of Vicksburg, the book also chronicles the battles at Jackson, Port Gibson, Raymond, Champions Hill, and Big Black Ridge. Eyewitness accounts by battle participants make these guides an invaluable resource for travelers and nontravelers who want a greater understanding of five of the most devastating yet influential years in our nation's history. Explicit directions to points of interest and maps--illustrating the action and showing the detail of troop position, roads, rivers, elevations, and tree lines as they were 130 years ago--help bring the battles to life. In the field, these guides can be used to recreate each battle's setting and proportions, giving the reader a sense of the tension and fear each soldier must have felt as he faced his enemy. "These guides are the most thorough, detailed, and accurate books of their kind. Indeed, they are unique. I have used them to lead guided tours of several battlefields, with great success."--James M. McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom: The Era of the Civil War "I most highly recommend this important and valuable series of guidebooks."--Herman Hattaway, coauthor of How the North Won the Civil War and Why the South Lost the Civil War "These guides bridge the gap between sound military history and battlefield touring literature. They can be enjoyed without ever leaving the easy chair or they can become indispensable companions on tramps over the scenes of the greatest engagements of the Civil War."--William C. Davis, author of Jefferson Davis: The Man and His Hour and former editor of Civil War Times Illustrated COL. LEONARD FULLENKAMP teaches in the Department of National Security and Strategy at the U.S. Army War College.   Home | About the Press | Recent Awards | Contact Us | Order New Books: | By Author | By Subject | By Title | By Series Books in Print: | By Author | By Subject | By Title | By Series ©2007 University Press of Kansas 2502 Westbrooke Circle, Lawrence, KS 66045-4444 Phone (785) 864-4155; Fax (785) 864-4586