AEI is rereleasing some of its most prescient and groundbreaking works from its earliest thinkers and innovators. These books, part of a series called AEI Classics, are available for download as Adobe Acrobat PDFs.
The Civil War is the American Iliad. Lincoln, Stonewall Jackson, Grant, and Lee endure as heroic ideals, as stirring to our national memory as were the legendary Achilles and Hector to the world of the ancient Greeks. Within the story of our Iliad one battle stands above all others: Gettysburg.
Millions visit the Gettysburg battlefield each year to walk those fields and hills where Joshua Chamberlain made his legendary stand and Pickett went down to defeat, forever becoming a symbol of the heroic Lost Cause. As the years passed, and the scars healed, the debate, rather than drifting away, has intesified. It is the battle that has become the great "what if?" of American history and the center of a dreamscape where Confederate banners crown the heights above town.
An action-packed and painstakingly researched masterwork, Gettysburg stands as the first book in a trilogy to tell the story of how history could have unfolded, how a victory for Lee would have changed the destiny of the nation forever. In the great tradition of The Killer Angels and Jeff Shaara's bestselling Civil War trilogy, this is a novel of true heroism and glory in America's most trying hour.
Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, is the author of five books, including bestsellers Contract with America and To Renew America. He is the CEO of the Gingrich Group and an analyst for the Fox News Channel. He holds a Ph.D. in history from Tulane University. Newt serves Secretary Donald Rumsfeld as a member of the Defense Policy Board, teaches officers from all five services as a distinguished visiting scholar and professor at the National Defense University, and is the longest-serving teacher of the Joint War Fighting course for major generals. In 1999, he was appointed to the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century-The Hart/Rudman Commission, which he and President Clinton created to look at national security challenges as far out as 2005. He is a senior fellow at AEI.
William R. Forstchen is the author of more than thirty works of historical fiction, science fiction, young-adult works, and traditional historical research. He holds a Ph.D. with a specialization in military history from Purdue University and is an associate professor of history at Montreat College, North Carolina.
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