The 1st MN Second To None

My Civil War Book Of The Month is by local historian Richard Krom and titled The 1ST MN SECOND TO NONE. Here you can journey through the Civil War, along with Edward Bassett, the young farmboy from the Minnesota frontier, who rushes immediately to join the defense of his country. He encounters all the dangers and struggles that he and his comrades in The First Minnesota Volunteer Infantry Regiment faced. While not a complete story of the war the book follows that regiments participation in the many famous battles and skirmishes that defined them as one of the most celebrated and honored of the Army of the Potomac. They were known as "The Regiment that never runs." And they never did from Bull Run to Gettysburg.
They saved the day at Antietam, charged into a wall of whistling death at Gettysburg, where ordered to fill a gap in the Union line by
General Hancock, this band of brothers faced six times their number and stopped the rebel advance. What makes this book special is that it consists of over two hundred previously unpublished letters of the young pioneer farm boy Ed Bassett to his parents, siblings and friends back in Minnesota. These letters and the accompanying narrative provide an illuminating look into the daily life of the common soldier, both in camp and on the battlefield. In explicit detail they reveal the elation, humor and sorrow of the soldiers toward the war and their longing to return to their homes. I loved it.

Some reenactors resting at the Minnesota monument at Gettysburg.