- Joined
- Feb 23, 2013
- Location
- East Texas
... I have a trip planned to Franklin and Stones River,et.al.,in June and am planning a trip to Mobile Bay within the next 12 months. Ordering the back issues on those battles from Blue & Gray today. This might change my whole approach to studying particular battles and visiting the battlefields.
I realize it may be too late for you now, but the NPS visitor center at Stones River had copies of the Stones River issue of B&G for sale autographed by the park ranger who wrote the text for it. One word of caution (?) about it and other issues I have (Third Winchester/Opequon and Honey Springs): they appeared in concert with relatively new developments in land acquisition and/or interpretation, so are largely geared to that. For example, the Opequon one features almost exclusively the park and its trail system and largely ignores anything outside it. Likewise, the Stones River one concentrates on the paltry land remaining over which that sprawling battle was fought, so there's basically nothing on the opening of the battle or the climax on the third day. That particular issue replaces a much earlier one written before some of the urban sprawl destroyed so much of the land along the Franklin Pike, though they DO acknowledge several historic houses that were used as hospitals that were lost in the process! Also, very early back issues are often rather simplified in nature and are one reason so many sites have been rewritten in enlarged and sometimes (like the Chickamauga series) multi-issue sets.