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This month, our Five Things column features Brian Swartz, whose Passing Through the Fire: Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain in the Civil War was released July 2021. Here, Brian tells of five facts he discovered while researching and writing this book.
Take it away Brian . . .
1. The power struggle between the Bowdoin College faculty and the school's administration/trustees boiled over when Joshua L. Chamberlain offered his military services to Maine Governor Israel Washburn Jr. in mid-July 1862. The faculty lost.
2. When Dr. Morris W. Townsend reported that the badly wounded Joshua Chamberlain could not survive an ambulance ride on June 19, 1864, Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade ordered eight soldiers to carry the colonel by stretcher the entire hot, dusty 16 miles to City Point. He remembered the unidentified soldiers as "my forlorn hope."
3. I never realized until researching Chamberlain's post-war life just how seriously his 1864 Petersburg wound affected his next 50 years.
4. A top-notch college professor and infantry commander, Joshua Chamberlain proved politically inept when seeking a Senate seat after his four-term governorship. He placed principle above party and stood up to Maine Republican boss (and bully) James G. Blaine.
5. Writing about Joshua Chamberlain took me places I'd never been in Maine and Virginia — and I want to return to those places.
Click here and buy your copy!
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