"While the excitement of battle lasts, and we hear the roar of artillery, and the shock of contending armies, the terrible reality of the occasion hardly presents itself to our minds, and it is only when we survey the bloody field, strewed with the mangled, lifeless remains of friend and foe, or walk through the hospitals, where the unfortunate victims of battle writhe in the agony of their wounds, that we realize the terrible nature of a great battle."George Stevens served for three years as a regimental surgeon with General John Sedgwick's VI Corps. Like most of the VI Corps men, Stevens had great regard and affection for "Uncle John" and was devastated by his death at Spotslyvania.Written immediately after the war, Stevens' history of the corps is the most detailed account of Sedgwick's command and is full of excitement, pathos, horror, and humor.Every memoir of the American Civil War provides us with another view of the catastrophe that changed the country forever.