What If YOU Could Interview Key Players at Gettysburg?

What questions would YOU ask them?  Publisher Wild River Press wants to know, and they’ll be using those questions in an upcoming book which puts a unique new spin on the often overdone Battle of Gettysburg.  Tom Pero, the founder of Wild River Press, explains:

Wild River Press (a small publisher of high-quality fishing and hunting books) is planning a substantial book commemorating the 150th anniversary of Gettysburg. It will feature a blend of photography of the reenactments, portrait drawings of key individuals (Longstreet, Pickett, Chamberlain, et al) and fictional interviews with all of them. These interviews will be in depth and based on facts of the battle and biographical knowledge of the individuals, before and after the various stages of the Gettysburg conflagration–perhaps even during. I invite you and your readers to help by suggesting a list of, say, 12 or 15 key individuals, along with a set of probing questions to ask each. For example, wouldn’t it have been fascinating to ask Stuart, “Where the hell were you?”

Where the hell indeed.  I’ll bite.  Here are some of the things I’d ask key figures at Gettysburg if I had the chance:

• To John Buford: What did you think the seize was of the Confederate forces confronting you on the morning of July 1, 1863?  Did you pattern your delaying action on any other in history, or was your own genius at work?

• To Richard S. Ewell: What was your thought process on the evening of July 1 with the fate of the battle potentially in your hands?   Were your men just too worn out to make the one last push needed to drive the Federals from Cemetery Hill?  Would you do the same thing again in the same situation?

• To Robert E. Lee: Where on earth was your famed tactical acumen on the afternoon of July 2?  Why did you not give James Longstreet the green light to move further around the Union left?

• To George Meade: How did you correctly predict Lee would attack your center on July 3, 1863?  What experiences and observations led you to believe the center would be attacked?

Those would be my most pressing questions.  What would YOU ask the key figures in the Gettysburg Campaign and WHO would you ask?  Your questions may be used in Wild River Press’ upcoming books, so leave some questions in the comments section below!