Civil War Sites in Virginia: A Tour Guide

Since 1982, the renowned Civil War historian James I. "Bud" Robertson’s Civil War Sites in Virginia: A Tour Guide has enlightened and informed Civil War enthusiasts and scholars alike. The book expertly explores the commonwealth’s Civil War sites for those hoping to gain greater insight and understanding of the conflict. But in the years since the book’s original publication, accessibility to many sites and the interpretive material available have improved dramatically. In addition, new historical markers have been erected, and new historically significant sites have been developed, while other sites have been lost to modern development or other encroachments. The historian Brian Steel Wills offers here a revised and updated edition that retains the core of the original guide, with its rich and insightful prose, but that takes these major changes into account, introducing especially the benefits of expanded interpretation and of improved accessibility. The guide incorporates new information on the lives of a broad spectrum of soldiers and citizens while revisiting scenes associated with the era’s most famous personalities. New maps and a list of specialized tour suggestions assist in planning visits to sites, while three dozen illustrations, from nineteenth-century drawings to modern photographs, bring the war and its impact on the Old Dominion vividly to life. With the sesquicentennial remembrances of the American Civil War heightening interest and spurring improvements, there may be no better time to learn about and visit these important and moving sites than now.

James I. Robertson Jr. is Alumni Distinguished Professor in History at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including such award-winning studies as Stonewall Jackson: The Man, The Soldier, The Legend,Civil War! America Becomes One Nation, and Soldiers Blue and Gray. Brian Steel Wills is Director and Professor of History at the Center for the Study of the Civil War Era at Kennesaw State University. He is the author of Gone with the Glory: The Civil War in Cinema and The War Hits Home: The Civil War in Southeastern Virginia (Virginia).