Civil War

Civil War

Was Sherman’s March a “Counterinsurgency Campaign”?

It isn’t how most would characterize William T. Sherman’s famous march across Georgia in 1864, but Thomas Ricks of Stars and Stripes begs to differ. Read more

Civil War

Avenues of Invasion: Captain Andrew Foote and Ulysses S. Grant

by Pedro Garcia

Seen from the Atlantic coast, the task of Northern armies appeared (at least to a skeptic) almost impossible, for the South looked truly boundless, an ocean of fields, valleys, mountains, forests, and rivers. Read more

Civil War

Fort Sumter: A Photographical Diary

by Al Hemingway

As the epicenter of the Civil War, Fort Sumter naturally attracted much photographic attention. The first photographer to visit the fort after the 1861 bombardment and surrender was F.K. Read more

Civil War

Robert E. Lee’s “Right Arm”

Following his greatest victory, at the Battle of Chancellorsville on May 2, 1863, Confederate Lt. Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson was scouting ahead of the lines with members of his staff when tragedy struck. Read more

Civil War

The Battle of Chancellorsville and the Death of Stonewall Jackson

Following his greatest victory at the Battle of Chancellorsville on May 2, 1863, Confederate Lt. Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson was scouting ahead of the lines with members of his staff when tragedy struck. Read more

Civil War

The Confederate Army: Letters Home

by Earl Echelberry

On May 10, 1861 the Confederate Secretary of War, L.P. Walker, assigned “control of the forces of the Confederate States in Virginia” to Maj. Read more

Civil War

Abraham Lincoln and the Election that Shaped the Confederacy

by Roy Morris Jr.

The sudden wreck of the Whig Party in the 1850s led to the development of a new political party to contend with Stephen Douglas and the Democrats. Read more

Civil War

The Decline of Stephen Douglas and the American Whig Party

By Roy Morris Jr.

It was unseasonably warm in Charleston when the Democratic National Convention opened for business at noon on April 23, 1860. Read more

Civil War

Union Army Defeat at the Battle of Ball’s Bluff

By Conan Brew

In the wake of the humiliating and unexpected defeat, and fourth in a line that stretched back to Fort Sumter, the Battle of Bull Run, and the Battle of Wilson’s Creek, the Union Congress created a seven-man Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War to oversee and review all battles and the events surrounding them. Read more

Civil War

Missouri Joins the Civil War: Prelude to the Battle of Wilson’s Creek

by Joshua van Dereck

At the beginning of 1861, Missouri was in turmoil. A slave state since its inception in 1820, Missouri had grown increasingly tied to urban industry. Read more

Civil War

Ulysses S. Grant: Clerk to Commanding General

by Donald J. Roberts II

The Confederate attack on Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, marked the beginning of the American Civil War. Read more

Civil War

The Anaconda Plan: Lincoln and Scott’s Move on the Mississippi River

by Donald J. Roberts II

In theory, sealing off Southern seaports was supposed to cause economic ruin in the South, which in turn would diminish the Confederacy’s ability to wage war. Read more

Civil War

Women in the Civil War: Private Albert D.J. Cashier

by John Walker

Jennie Irene Hodgers was born in Ireland in 1843 or 1844 and sailed to New York with her family. Read more

Civil War

Civil War Cavalry Units: Worth the Cost?

by Don Roberts

During the Mexican-American War, the great distances between objectives had dictated a need for highly mobile cavalry troops. Read more

Civil War

ESRI Creates Interactive Map of the Battle of Gettysburg

The British Joint Services Command and Staff College defines the “fog of war” as “the uncertainty in situational awareness experienced by participants in military operations.” Read more

Civil War

Facts About the Battle of Gettysburg

Gettysburg Fact #1: There Were 50,000 Military Casualties, 1 Civilian

Despite roughly 50,000 casualties reported on both sides during the Battle of Gettysburg, there was only one reported civilian casualty: Mary Wade, a seamstress, was hit by a stray bullet while making bread in her kitchen. Read more

Civil War

A Murderous Order at Culp’s Hill

By Joshua Sheperd

Although Union Colonel Silas Colgrove had previously led his men through some of the most horrific fighting in the eastern theater of the Civil War, the order he received on the morning of July 3, 1863, in the woods near Culp’s Hill at Gettysburg, was the most unnerving he had ever received. Read more

Civil War

Bushrod Johnson: Yankee Quaker, Confederate General

By Roy Morris Jr.

Of all the unlikely heroes of the Civil War, none was more unlikely than Bushrod Johnson, Ohio-born Quaker turned Confederate general. Read more

Civil War

Confederate Major General Earl Van Dorn

By William F. Floyd, Jr.

Confederate Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn had a glaring flaw. Although the Mississippi-born general had a son and daughter from his marriage to Caroline Godbold, he committed adultery on multiple occasions. Read more

Civil War

The Fort Pillow Incident

By Roy Morris Jr.

When Confederate Maj. Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest and his 3,000 battle-hardened troopers rode back into their homeland of West Tennessee in late March 1864, they were not in the best of moods. Read more