Portraits of Lee, Longstreet, Pickett, Buford, Hancock, and other Civil War leaders are interwoven with historical detail to provide a fictional re-creation of the bloody battle at Gettysburg. A central figure in the book, however, is Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, whose 20th Maine regiment of volunteers held the Union's left flank on the second day of the battle. This unit's bravery at Little Round Top helped turned the tide of the war against the rebels. There are also plenty of maps, which convey a complete sense of what happened July 1-3, 1863.