A Day in September
The Battle of Antietam and the World It Left Behind
One of the Wall Street Journal's 10 Best Books of 2024 The Battle of Antietam, which took place on September 17, 1862, remains the single bloodiest day in America’s history: more than 3,600 men died in twelve hours of savage fighting, and more than 17,000 were wounded. As a turning point in the Civil War, the narrow Union victory is well-known as the key catalyst for Lincoln to issue his Emancipation Proclamation. Yet Antietam was not only a battle that dramatically changed the fortunes and meaning of the war; it also changed America in ways we feel today. No army in history wrote so many…
A panoramic account of the fateful Civil War battle and its far-reaching consequences for American society and culture.