On July 4, 1863, two defeats assured the demise of the Confederate cause. From the ridges and meadows of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Robert E. Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia retreated. After a forty-seven-day siege of Vicksburg, Mississippi, shattered Confederate forces surrendered to the Union Army and General Ulysses S. Grant. These two books of photographs by award-winning photojournalist Timothy T. Isbell commemorate the sacrifices made and the landscapes that were witness to violence and valor. In Gettysburg: Sentinels of Stone, the battlefield’s mighty panoramas are brought to life. Accompanying the eighty-five full-color photographs are stories of the soldiers who fought and citizens who witnessed this pivotal battle. These stories serve to bring special meaning to the photographs of statues, monuments, and terrain. Gettysburg: Sentinels of Stone features new monuments added to the park in the last five years, including the Elizabeth Thorn monument and the 11th Mississippi monument, which has the distinction of being the final monument allowed on the Gettysburg battlefield. With its photographs and chronicle of events, Gettysburg: Sentinels of Stone offers the perfect keepsake for park visitors and anyone wanting a photographic record of Gettysburg’s scenery. Vicksburg: Sentinels of Stone reveals the breadth and scope of Grant’s siege and the city’s stalwart defense in eighty-five color photographs of the monuments, the bluffs, the Mississippi river, the redoubts, and the redans that remain in the national park. Accompanying text explores the stories of the soldiers and citizens who participated in this devastating engagement. In words and images, Vicksburg: Sentinels of Stone creates an ideal memento and a superb photographic record of the monuments and scenery that make a visit to Vicksburg National Military Park an unforgettable encounter with Civil War history. Timothy T. Isbell is a former Knight Foundation and National Endowment of the Arts award recipient for his photographic study of the Vietnamese people of the Mississippi Gulf Coast. He is a photojournalist at the Sun Herald newspaper in Biloxi and a former photojournalist-in-residence at the University of Southern Mississippi. Isbell is the author and photographer of Shiloh and Corinth: Sentinels of Stone and Vicksburg: Sentinels of Stone. Read more about the books and Timothy T. Isbell at http://www.timisbell.com/.
