Civil War

Civil War

An Occurrence at Wrightsville Bridge

The citizens of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, awoke one morning in late June 1863 to find the Civil War literally at their doorsteps. Read more

Civil War

The Confederate Spy Ring: Spreading Terror to the Union

The Civil War was fought out in the open on battlefields across the United States. But beginning in early 1864, the highest levels of the Confederate government decided that another, more clandestine war would be fought behind the lines in the North. Read more

Civil War

Civil War Spies: Timothy Webster

Spying is a dangerous game.

Even the best spies sometimes get caught, as Confederate raider John Yates Beall, “the Mosby of the Chesapeake,” learned the hard way in 1865, and the consequences are never pretty to contemplate. Read more

Civil War

American Civil War Timeline – Southern Offensives Turned Back

Confederate offensives into two border states, Maryland and Kentucky, formed the key highlights of the second half of 1862 for the Confederacy. Read more

Civil War

The Battle of Cedar Creek Offers Insight into Valley’s Final Months

Out of the mist on the rolling ground of the Shenandoah Valley the bulk of the Confederate Army bore down on the Union left flank on the morning of October 19, 1864. Read more

Civil War

Winfield Scott Hancock & George Armstrong Custer After Hancock’s War

Tall, handsome, and ramrod-straight Winfield Scott Hancock perfectly embodied his flattering nickname, “Hancock the Superb.” His performance on Civil War battlefields from Antietam to Gettysburg underscored that sobriquet. Read more

Civil War

John Pope vs. Little Crow: The Sioux Uprising

John Pope’s second campaign as an army commander went considerably better than his first. Not that it did his reputation—or Abraham Lincoln’s, for that matter—any particular good. Read more

Civil War

Walt Whitman—The Civil War’s One-Man Sanitary Commission

When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, the great American poet Walt Whitman was a man on the skids, personally and professionally. Read more

Civil War

The Curse of the Whig Party

The short-lived Whig Party had a fair degree of success electing candidates for president, winning two of the five presidential elections in which it fielded a candidate. Read more

Civil War

Civil War’s End: The Battle of Appomattox Court House

When Confederate General Robert E. Lee learned on the morning of April 9, 1865, that Union infantry was both in front and behind of his meager army of 12,500 effectives as it approached Appomattox Court House in central Virginia, he resigned himself to the sad task before him. Read more

Civil War

Swan Song for the CSS Shenandoah

The River Mersey was fog shrouded on the morning of November 6, 1865, and the city of Liverpool was scarcely visible from the deck of the CSS Shenandoah. Read more

Civil War

Mark Twain Joins the Marion Rangers

Twenty-five-year-old Mississippi River pilot Samuel Clemens (not yet known by his famous pen name, Mark Twain) was in his home port of New Orleans in late January 1861 when word reached the city that Louisiana had seceded from the Union. Read more

Civil War

The Chattanooga Campaign: Then and Now

Living in Chattanooga is a little like living inside a museum. American Civil War reminders are all around: many of us remember going as students on field trips to Point Park and Chickamauga Battlefield and spending long Sunday afternoons driving with our families along the winding, monument-strewn Crest Road on Missionary Ridge. Read more

Civil War

Tapping Into the Spirit of Freedom at Harpers Ferry Historical Park

Like the tall hills that surround it, the history of Harpers Ferry has many layers. While some of the nearby Civil War battlefields, most notably Antietam National Battlefield, are picturesque, they can’t compete with the grandeur of Harpers Ferry. Read more

Civil War

The Mystery Behind Custer’s Last Stand & The Battle of Little Bighorn

A single cavalryman burst from the copse in mid-afternoon on June 25, 1876, riding hell-bent for the swift flowing river. Read more

Civil War

John Chivington: From Glorieta Pass to the Sand Creek Massacre

Major John M. Chivington, Colorado’s “fighting parson,” played a large role in the Union victory at Glorieta Pass, New Mexico, in 1862. Read more

Civil War

What to See at Fort Donelson National Battlefield

The soldiers of the two armies at Fort Donelson awoke on the morning of February 15, 1862, to another frigid morning. Read more

Civil War

Union General John T. Croxton’s Southern Odyssey

After escaping from Brig. Gen. William H. Jackson’s Confederate division on April 1, Union Brig. Gen. John T. Read more

Civil War

Failed Confederate Ambush at the Battle of Bentonville

The weary Union foot soldiers tramped north toward Goldsboro the morning of March 19, 1865. Foragers who had gone out at sunup reported the heavy presence of Confederate cavalry on the route of march. Read more

Civil War

Victory Slipped Through Confederate Fingers at the Battle of Pea Ridge

The Rebels sensed victory over Yankees on the crisp late winter morning in northwest Arkansas. They had driven off the Union cavalry that tried to block their advance into battle and captured a battery in the process. Read more