Left Bank Books Event – Ronald White, Joshua Chamberlain

Join us for a very special event when New York Times best-selling author and historian Ronald C. White discusses his acclaimed biography On Great Fields: The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshual Lawrence Chamberlain. Born in Brewer, Maine in 1828, Chamberlain graduated from Bowdoin College, studied at the Bangor Theological Seminary, returned to Bowdoin to teach languages and rhetoric, later served as president of the college, and was elected governor of Maine four times.  Chamberlain spoke at First Church in Belfast as part of his pastoral career!

But Chamberlain is best known as one of the Civil War’s greatest heroes. On the second day at Gettysburg, after running out of ammunition at Little Round Top, he ordered his men to wield their bayonets in a desperate charge down a rocky slope that routed the Confederate attackers. In his review of On Great Fields, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jon Meacham writes, [this is] a vital and vivid portrait of an unlikely military hero who played a key role in the preservation of the Union and therefore in the making of modern America.

In his cradle-to-grave biography, Ron delves into Chamberlain’s life and shines light on the man’s tenacious, empathetic military leadership and his influential postwar public service. This is a rare chance to hear about one of Maine’s greatest citizens from a man who has written what is being hailed as the definitive biography of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain.