The Killer Angels

Plot introduction

The title: J.L. Chamberlain, a major character, recites to his friend and sergeant, Kilrain, the speech from Hamlet: "What a piece of work is man...in action how like an angel!" Kilrain comments, "Well, boy, if he's an angel, he's sure a murderin' angel."

In late June 1863, General Robert E. Lee leads his army into Pennsylvania. By threatening Washington, D.C., he hopes to draw the Union army into battle and inflict a crushing defeat, which will bring an end to the war. Harrison, a spy, tells General James Longstreet, Lee's friend, that the Union army is drawing near. They go to Lee, who is reluctant to trust a spy, but has to, because his usual source of intelligence, Jeb Stuart's cavalry, is out of touch. He sets out to meet the enemy.

At the road junction of Gettysburg, Confederate infantry encounters the Union cavalry of General John Buford. He seizes the high ground and holds it against a Confederate attack at dawn on July 1. Troops of General John Reynolds come to support Buford. Reynolds is killed and the Union troops are pushed back, but at nightfall they entrench on high ground while the Confederates celebrate what appears to them to be another Lee victory.

Longstreet is filled with foreboding. On July 2, he tries to persuade Lee that the Union position is too strong. He urges Lee to march away and make the fight on more favorable ground. But Lee orders a flanking attack on the Union position. Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain of Maine is told by his superiors that he occupies the end of the Union line, and that he must hold at any cost. In a brilliant, costly action, Chamberlain succeeds in repulsing the Confederate attack.

On July 3, Lee orders a frontal assault on the center of the Union line. Knowing it is doomed, Longstreet argues against it. But Lee is confident and Longstreet despairs. General George Pickett leads the charge, which is turned back with heavy losses. A shaken Lee orders retreat. Chamberlain is now confident of Union victory.

Layout

Beginning with the famous section about Longstreet's spy Harrison gathering information about the movements and positions of the Federals, each day is told primarily from the perspectives of commanders of the two armies, including Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet for the Confederacy, and Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and John Buford for the Union. Most chapters describe the emotion-laden decisions of these officers as they went into battle. Maps depicting the positioning of the troops as they went to battle, as they advanced, add to the sense of authenticity as decisions are made to advance and retreat with the armies. The author also uses the story of Gettysburg, one of the largest battles in the history of North America, to relate the causes of the Civil War and the motivations that led old friends to face each other on the battlefield.

Characters

Publication

Publication of The Killer Angels and release of the movie have had two significant influences on modern perceptions of the Civil War. First, the actions of Chamberlain and the 20th Maine Infantry on Little Round Top have achieved enormous public awareness. Visitors touring the Gettysburg Battlefield rank the 20th Maine monument as their most important stop. Second, since Shaara used the memoirs of General James Longstreet as a prime source for his history, the book has renewed the modern re-evaluation of Longstreet's reputation, damaged since the 1870s by the Lost Cause writers, such as Jubal A. Early.

Literary significance

General H. Norman Schwarzkopf described The Killer Angels as "the best and most realistic historical novel about war that I have ever read." The filmmaker Ken Burns has mentioned the influence of the book in developing his interest in the Civil War and his subsequent production of the PBS series on the subject. The book has also been cited by Joss Whedon as the original inspiration for his science fiction/Western hybrid series Firefly.

Awards and nominations

The Killer Angels received the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

The Killer Angels has been required reading, at various times, at the US Army Officer Candidate School, The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina, the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, the U.S. Army War College, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, the U.S. Army Special Forces Detachment Officer Qualification Course, The Basic School for Marine Officers (TBS) and Saint Joseph's University. It is one of only two novels (the other being Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer) on the U.S. Army's recommended reading list for Officer Professional Development.

Other media

The Killer Angels was the source for the screenplay for the 1993 movie Gettysburg. Much dialogue in the movie comes directly from the book.

The Firefly science fiction television series was developed by Joss Whedon after reading The Killer Angels. Homage to Shaara's novel was paid in the series' final episode, "Objects in Space".

Singer-songwriter Steve Earle included a song on his 1999 bluegrass album, The Mountain, called "Dixieland", sung from the point of view of the character Buster Kilrain.

A stage adaptation by Karen Tarjan was originally produced at Lifeline Theatre in Chicago in 2004, and again in the Fall of 2013. The adaptation was subsequently produced at Anchorage Community Theatre, the Wayside Theatre in Virginia, the Heritage Theatre in Maryland and Mother Road Theatre in New Mexico.

The Killer Angels was the title of the 2013 album by Swedish heavy metal artists Civil War

A second stage adaptation by Brian Newell, "The Killer Angels, Soldiers of Gettysburg," opens May 5th, 2017 at the Maverick Theater in Fullerton California.

The Killer Angels is the favorite book of Conan O'Brien.