Although Stonewall Jackson was dead, Confederate moral was never higher. The victory at Chancellorsville had come against overwhelming odds, and the Union army was in retreat. In less than a year, the Federals had been pushed back from the outskirts of Richmond and, now, virtually out of Virginia.
Will and Mac, the two eldest Brannon sons, are in the ranks of the Stonewall Brigade and Jeb Stuart's cavalry. A short bivouac allows them to visit the family farm, but almost as soon as Will rejoins his company, Jackson's former corps marches up the Shenandoah Valley, sweeping the Union troops out of Winchester. A natural route to the North lies open, and Lee's army heads in that direction. They eventually clash at Gettysburg.
Will, who is involved from the first day, is kept in the thick of the combat around Culp's Hill and the right side of the Union line. Mac arrives on the evening of the second day, and he sees action with the Southern cavalry at Hanover. Both are swallowed up in the melee of the fighting, and neither emerges unscathed.
Bruised and bleeding, the Confederate army stumbles back into Virginia, leaving a fourth of their number behind on the Pennsylvania ground. News of the defeat and the massive number of casualties spreads quickly. Like thousands of families across the South, the Brannon clan in Culpeper County anxiously awaits word of the fates of two sons.
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"Like the others, a great account of the military actions - including some close to 'home'."
— Josh (4 out of 5 stars)
“Robust, detail rich, and well-paced…Reasoner’s battle narrative provides equal parts pathos and accuracy.”
— Publishers Weekly, praise for the series“Fraught with passion, tension, and tenderness.”
— Booklist, praise for the series“[We] recommend these books.”
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James Reasoner, a veteran writer of historical fiction, is the author of the Civil War Battle series and the Wagons West series. He has also written Westward, Expedition, and Outpost, a frontier trilogy set in the years before the Lewis and Clark expedition. He received the 2014 ReadWest Award for Literary Excellence in Fiction.
Lloyd James (a.k.a. Sean Pratt) has been a working professional actor in theater, film, television, and voice-overs for more than thirty years. He has narrated over one thousand audiobooks and won numerous Earphones Awards and nominations for the Audie Award and the Voice Arts Award. He holds a BFA degree in acting from Santa Fe University, New Mexico.