I was going to let all this pass, as I actually can't add that much to the discussion other than what has already been posted. However, it is something that sticks in my craw a bit and maybe it shouldn't. First, Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said: "You are entitled to your own opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts." I have used that one myself so many times I sometimes forget where exactly I first heard it, but it stuck with me. Similar in spirit is what I usually respond when people ask why I don't write something more commercially viable than history books...in other words "fiction." It's because most of what is published as history is already full of unintentional fiction. And Moynihan has the right of it.
I have found most writers can be quite prickly when you point out factual discrepancies, even if they asked you for the feedback. There was a recent book signing at Stones River battlefield and I bought a copy of the book as I often do when an author has a table set up and will be presenting something as a "subject matter expert" or on events relevant to the programs for that weekend. The book was on the Orphan Brigade and it was a novel, not a history. The author asked if I would provide feedback on the "history" upon which he loosely hung his narrative. Well, you know where this story is going. I dog-eared the pages with factual or contextual errors for both the history and and material culture of the time period. It was basically every page, some pages both top and bottom. No extra credit for predicting he was not really interested in finding any of that out.
Similarly, Krause published a book in 2005 called Warman's Civil War Weapons. It was so full of obvious mistakes that it could have been passed off as not only fiction, but perhaps as comedy. Before a review of the book was printed I offered the publisher my comments in case the author wanted to offer some explanation for the mistakes, but really all he could hope to do was make corrections for a future edition. Again, no extra credit for predicting their reaction was to offer a variety of excuses, etc. Anything but "own the errors." The same thing is in play here, the facts simply are what they are and were Shelby Foote living, the facts such as they are would not be any different. Every work great and small has its share of errors. Maybe he would apologize for the small factual error about repeaters at Gettysburg---writers (self included)--- all make errors. I hate reading my own material because all I see are the mistakes. And there are plenty. Or maybe he wouldn't. We will never know.