Jennifer M. Murray - Böcker

The death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers in 2020 reignited a passionate nationwide debate over Confederate memorials and flags as symbols of white supremacy in our public landscape. Controversies about Confederate monuments, however, have overshadowed more consequential battles over Civil War memory taking place in American politics, popular culture, and civil society today.Integrating the voices of Civil War historians, public historians, and scholars of contemporary America, They Are Dead and Yet They Live explores the use (and abuse) of Civil War memory in the modern era, from the Civil War Centennial and the civil rights era through the political turmoil of the present day. Moving the conversation of Civil War memory beyond Confederate monuments to crucial debates about the Civil War’s usefulness as a frame for understanding America’s recent struggles, these essays show how Civil War memory is as politically urgent and socially relevant today as it was a half century ago.

The death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers in 2020 reignited a passionate nationwide debate over Confederate memorials and flags as symbols of white supremacy in our public landscape. Controversies about Confederate monuments, however, have overshadowed more consequential battles over Civil War memory taking place in American politics, popular culture, and civil society today.Integrating the voices of Civil War historians, public historians, and scholars of contemporary America, They Are Dead and Yet They Live explores the use (and abuse) of Civil War memory in the modern era, from the Civil War Centennial and the civil rights era through the political turmoil of the present day. Moving the conversation of Civil War memory beyond Confederate monuments to crucial debates about the Civil War’s usefulness as a frame for understanding America’s recent struggles, these essays show how Civil War memory is as politically urgent and socially relevant today as it was a half century ago.

Of the more than seventy sites associated with the Civil War era that the National ParkService manages, none hold more national appeal and recognition than Gettysburg NationalMilitary Park. Welcoming more than one million visitors annually from across thenation and around the world, the National Park Service at Gettysburg holds the enormousresponsibility of preserving the war’s “hallowed ground” and educating the public, notonly on the battle, but also about the Civil War as the nation’s defining moment. Althoughhistorians and enthusiasts continually add to the shelves of Gettysburg scholarship, theyhave paid only minimal attention to the battlefield itself and the process of preserving,interpreting, and remembering the bloodiest battle of the Civil War. In On a Great Battlefield,Jennifer M. Murray provides a critical perspective to Gettysburg historiography byoffering an in-depth exploration of the national military park and how the Gettysburgbattlefield has evolved since the National Park Service acquired the site in August 1933.As Murray reveals, the history of the Gettysburg battlefield underscores the complexityof preserving and interpreting a historic landscape. After a short overview of earlyefforts to preserve the battlefield by the Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association(1864–1895) and the United States War Department (1895–1933), Murray chronicles theadministration of the National Park Service and the multitude of external factors—includingthe Great Depression, the New Deal, World War II, the Civil War Centennial, andrecent sesquicentennial celebrations—that influenced operations and molded Americans’understanding of the battle and its history. Haphazard landscape practices, promotion oftourism, encouragement of recreational pursuits, ill-defined policies of preserving culturalresources, and the inevitable turnover of administrators guided by very differentpreservation values regularly influenced the direction of the park and the presentationof the Civil War’s popular memory. By highlighting the complicated nexus between preservation,tourism, popular culture, interpretation, and memory, On a Great Battlefieldprovides a unique perspective on the Mecca of Civil War landscapes.Jennifer M. Murray, assistant professor of history at the University of Virginia’s Collegeat Wise, is the author of The Civil War Begins. Her articles have appeared in Civil WarHistory, Civil War Times, and Civil War Times Illustrated.