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Chapters (56)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright Notice
  4. Dedication
  5. Note
  6. Introduction
  7. Book One: The Woman and the Buzzards
  8. Chapter 1
  9. Chapter 2
  10. Chapter 3
  11. Chapter 4
  12. Chapter 5
  13. Chapter 6
  14. Chapter 7
  15. Book Two: Elijah’s Army
  16. Chapter 1
  17. Chapter 2
  18. Chapter 3
  19. Chapter 4
  20. Chapter 5
  21. Chapter 6
  22. Chapter 7
  23. Chapter 8
  24. Book Three: The Chambersburg Pike
  25. Chapter 1
  26. Chapter 2
  27. Chapter 3
  28. Chapter 4
  29. Chapter 5
  30. Chapter 6
  31. Chapter 7
  32. Book Four: July First
  33. Chapter 1
  34. Chapter 2
  35. Chapter 3
  36. Chapter 4
  37. Chapter 5
  38. Chapter 6
  39. Chapter 7
  40. Chapter 8
  41. Book Five: Stars Cease to Shine on the Brave
  42. Chapter 1
  43. Chapter 2
  44. Chapter 3
  45. Chapter 4
  46. Chapter 5
  47. Chapter 6
  48. Chapter 7
  49. Chapter 8
  50. Chapter 9
  51. Chapter 10
  52. Chapter 11
  53. Chapter 12
  54. Chapter 13
  55. Bibliography
  56. About the Author

In our so very modern of times we choose to believe that it is better to become detached, that our world is too annoying, too troublesome to venture into. We read newspapers and watch television, and sit comfortably removed from the horrors of our time, staring dispassionately while images too grotesque to fathom wash over us in a numbing cascade. If we are suddenly uncomfortable, we turn the page, change the channel. To many, involvement means risk. To many more patriotism is an outdated, misguided, and laughable notion. Dan Bale could easily live in our time.

Today, as in 1863, many peole spout noisy pronouncements about the depths of their own courage. Whether we believe our own boasts, or whether the noise is simply a mask for our fear, it is often the soldier who will alone discover the truth. No one shouldering a rifle will be able to predict how he will react under fire. No loud bravado will ever accurately portray how carefully you will aim, how much precision you can muster, how you will truly react to that other man with the gun who thrusts his bayonet at your heart. The hero and the coward may share everything else, may even be friends, brothers. But when they are pulled into the great hell of war, the true character of a man emerges, and only then does he meet his own soul. This is a theme critical to the telling of this story. To Dan Bale, this is meaningless chatter.

Passion is at once liberating and dangerous. More often it is a misguided passion of one kind or another that creates the war itself. But sometimes, it is the war that creates the passion, swirling men and women together with an unexpected fire, transforming the coolness of reason or even propriety into hot lather. For Dan Bale, passion is an unwanted surprise. But there are surprises beyond his control, beyond his own turmoil. In Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, in July 1863, the mosaic texture of small-town life is swallowed alive by the extraordinary hell of a great war. But through the eyes of one man, the lives of the people unfold in a magnificent blend of passion, horror, and discovery.

“Now he lived in a feverish and blasted world, and suffered the knowledge that he had helped to make it feverish and blasted…”

—Jeff M. Shaara

April 2000

Book One: The Woman and the Buzzards

Book One

THE WOMAN AND THE BUZZARDS

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Chapter 1

1.