Matthew a Holzman

Civil Warscapes: Antietam, Images from the 17th of September Matthew a Holzman

Publisher Marketing: When woodcuts of the photographs Alexander Gardner had taken just days after the Battle of Antietam were spread across the country, it absolutely shocked the public. Never before had images of the unburied dead and destruction on a battlefield been presented in such a matter. Fought in and around the small farming community of Sharpsburg, Maryland on September 17, 1862, the battle produced more casualties in one day than any other single day in American military history. What transpired was the devastating infliction of roughly 23,000 combined casualties to both sides. All throughout the day, Confederate General Robert E. Lee's line had wavered but clingingly held. However, this ultimate damage to Lee's significantly smaller force inevitably compelled him to give up the campaign and retreat back into Virginia. With the failed invasion of the North, President Abraham Lincoln used the timely claiming of a victory to issue the war's most important document, the Emancipation Proclamation. In "Civil Warscapes: Antietam, Images from the 17th of September," Matthew A. Holzman presents the scenic locations where these monumental events occurred in Western Maryland. Events that forever changed the course of American history.