The Beleaguered City ─ The Vicksburg Campaign December 1862-July 1863

Shelby Foote has drawn from his epic account another of the Civil War's most dramatic episodes, the taking of the city of Vicksburg by the Union forces. Ulysses S. Grant fought a long campaign over tricky terrain to get to the heavily fortified city. All the while, he had to fend off his colleague and rival General John McClernand, who decided that his aspirations to Lincoln's White House could best be realized by his possession of Vicksburg. When the city fell on July 4, 1863, after a protracted siege, it was a personal triumph for Grant and contributed largely to his later promotion to command of all the Union armies. Lincoln said that his general's campaign to reach Vicksburg had been "one of the most brilliant in the world."

Shelby Foote was an American historian and novelist. He was born on November 7, 1916, in Greenville, Mississippi, and attended school there until he entered the University of North Carolina. During World War II he served as a captain of field artillery but never saw combat. After World War II he worked briefly for the Associated Press in their New York bureau. In 1953 he moved to Memphis, where he lived for the remainder of his life.Foote was the author of six novels:?Tournament,?Follow Me Down,?Love in a Dry Season,?Shiloh,?Jordan County, and?September, September. He is best remembered for his 3-volume history?The Civil War: A Narrative, which took twenty years to complete and resulted in his being a featured expert in Ken Burns' acclaimed PBS documentary, The Civil War. Over the course of his writing career, Foote was also awarded three Guggenheim fellowships.Shelby Foote died in 2005 at the age of 88.