Book Review: The Medal of Honor at Gettysburg
The Medal of Honor at Gettysburg. By James Gindlesperger. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2023. Softcover, 222 pp. $24.99.
Reviewed by Peter Miele
In my office library, I boast two full shelves of Gettysburg narratives, followed by a half shelf of Gettysburg reference books. Here resides Brad Gottfried’s Brigades at Gettysburg, John Busey’s These Honored Dead, and Ben Dixon’s Learning the Battle of Gettysburg. Now, James Gindlesperger has provided a new book for this shelf with The Medal of Honor at Gettysburg, a reference work that profiles all 72 Medal of Honor (MOH) recipients from the July 1-3, 1863, battle and accompanying campaign actions. This effort is an outgrowth of Gindlesperger’s monthly contributions to Congressional Medal of Honor Society’s daily blog.
The book opens with a brief overview of the Gettysburg Campaign, followed by a history of the MOH. The succeeding chapters contain short narratives of MOH recipients, which vary in length from one and a half pages (Capt. John Lonergan) to four pages (Maj. Gen. Daniel E. Sickles). There are the well-known recipients, like the aforementioned Sickles, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, and Frederick Fuger, along with many who are lesser known but just as brave. Each profile is similarly structured, with a brief biography of the individual, the actions at Gettysburg that warranted receipt of the MOH, the soldier’s experiences after Gettysburg, the citation on the MOH, and circumstances of death and final resting place. In some cases, when there are multiple recipients from the same regiment, Gindlesperger combines the profiles into a single narrative. This is efficient for the structure of the book as some men, such as six soldiers from the 6th Pennsylvania Reserves, received the MOH for the same deed on July 2nd. Rather than tell the same story six times, Gindlesperger discusses the single action that resulted in receipt of the MOH, while also briefly telling the fates of the individual men. Written profiles are augmented with historic photos of soldiers, mostly sourced from the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, and black-and-white images of regimental monuments.
Where applicable, Gindlesperger addresses the conditions and sometimes controversy surrounding the receipt of the MOH. In his profile of Francis Asbury Waller of the 6th Wisconsin, who was awarded the MOH for capturing the flag of the 2nd Mississippi in the Railroad Cut on July 1, the author discusses how there were two other soldiers who claimed that they had captured the flag of the enemy. Gindlesperger tells of the steps that Waller took to fend off these attacks, referencing letters to the editor that Waller wrote in defense of his actions. The author concludes Waller’s profile by discussing the disposition of the medal itself, which was stolen from a museum in 1977 and recovered in the early 1990s. Gindlesperger discusses, at some length, the circumstances (well-known to many Gettysburg students) surrounding Alonzo Cushing’s receipt of the MOH in 2014, more than 150 years after Cushing’s death on Cemetery Ridge on July 3, 1863.
While highly accessible to the lay reader, the book’s drawbacks include both a lack of organization and footnotes, which may cause frustration. Aside from being grouped by the day of fighting, there is no apparent order to how the names are presented. This is, however, alleviated somewhat by a useful table of contents and index. Absent footnotes, Gindlesperger leaves the reader guessing as to where he drew specific information for the profiles. He does, however, provide, a “works cited” section, which enumerates source material for each individual profile. Most of the sources are web-based, including references to Wikipedia and Stone Sentinels, a website that profiles all of Gettysburg’s monuments. The author does draw information from some primary sources, including The War of the Rebellion (the “O.R.’s”) and Samuel Hurst’s Journal-History of the Seventy-Third Ohio Volunteer Infantry. As expected, he also cites the Congressional Medal of Honor Society blog, for which Gindlesperger and others regularly write.
Ultimately, while this book does not tread any new Gettysburg ground, it brings to light some of the lesser-known stories of heroism during the battle. By compiling what were once divergent stories in a single work, Gindlesperger has provided students of the Gettysburg Campaign with a book that will be a useful accompaniment when studying narratives on the battle and campaign. I trust that it will find a home on many shelves besides my own.
Peter Miele is the executive director for the Seminary Ridge Museum and Education Center in Gettysburg. Born and raised in northern New Jersey, Miele received his Bachelor of Arts in History and Secondary Education from Ramapo College of New Jersey in 2011. In 2013, he relocated to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and earned his Master of Arts in Applied History from Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania in 2014. In fall 2021, he will begin coursework towards a Ph.D. in American Studies at The Pennsylvania State University, Harrisburg.
