This image of three hard-bitten Confederates, taken prisoner at Seminary Ridge outside Gettysburg, is one of Mathew Brady’s most iconic photographs. The town itself is visible in the background at left.

Early Spring 2014

Volume 4, No. 1

COVER: A soldier from Company H of a Vermont Regiment had his photograph taken, perhaps as a keepsake for his family. See story page 22 for more on photography during the Civil War. Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

In this scroll painting, imperial troops of the Qing dynasty finally recapture the city of Nanjing (Nanking) in 1864. The city had been held by T'ien Wang (“Heavenly King”) and the followers of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom since 1853. In 1860, American Frederick Townsend Ward trained and led an imperial army against the Taiping rebels, but was killed in battle in September 1862.

Civil War Quarterly

The state of Chinese armies in the 19th century.

The Chinese Army of the mid-19th century was in serious decline, its decay a reflection of the Qing Dynasty that produced it. Read more

Detail of a painted scroll depicting the Battle of Tongcheng during the Taiping Rebellion (1850-1864), a civil war in China against the ruling Manchu-led Qing Dynasty, led by Hong Xiuquan—who believed he was the brother of Jesus Christ. An estimated 20 million died during the conflict.

Civil War Quarterly, Soldiers

Frederick Townsend Ward’s Ever Victorious Army

By Kelly Bell

After more than 10 years of the costliest civil war in history, China was writhing in the spring of 1860, the sprawling nation gutted by the fratricidal holocaust history would call the Taiping Rebellion. Read more

Civil War Quarterly, Valor

Private George B. Turner

By Edward F. Murphy

The terse announcement stunned the tightly packed group of young Marines aboard a troop ship in New York Harbor, November 12, 1918. Read more

At left, the Imperial German Navy’s sailing commerce raider SMS Seeadler (Sea Eagle) moves to capture the French bark Cambronne off the coast of Brazil on March 20, 1917.

Civil War Quarterly, Weapons

The SMS Sea Eagle

By Mark Carlson

For more than three centuries, from 1520 in the reign of King Henry the Eighth up until the advent of steam-powered ironclads in the American Civil War, ships under sail ruled the world’s oceans. Read more

Civil War Quarterly, Uniform

German Heer Infantryman, Battle of the Bulge

By Johnny Shumate

The German unified armed forces were renamed Wehrmacht “defense force” from 1935 to 1945, comprising the Heer (army), Kriegsmarine (navy) and Luftwaffe (air force)—all distinctly separate from the paramilitary Waffen Schutzstaffel “armed-protection squad” of the Nazi Party. Read more

Civil War Quarterly

7 Military History Reviews for Winter 2026

By Kevin Seabrooke Full Reviews

Defenders of the Reich: The Luftwaffe’s War against America’s Bombers (Robert Forsyth, Osprey Publishing, New York, NY, 480 pp., Read more

Civil War Quarterly, Simulation Gaming

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7

By Joseph Luster

If the near-future takes on the Call of Duty series are your thing, you likely already have this. Read more

Civil War Quarterly, Simulation Gaming

Hell Let Loose: Vietnam

By Joseph Luster

The world of first-person shooter Hell Let Loose, which originally debuted as a World War II game in 2021, is getting ready to expand into new territory. Read more

Civil War Quarterly

China Strikes Back

By Joshua Shepherd

For the men of the U.S. 9th Infantry Regiment, the evening of November 25, 1950, began routinely enough. Read more

In this painting by Alonzo Chappel, Connecticut Patriot militia have lost all military order against the Loyalists fighting alongside warriors from the Iroquois Confederacy—as the Battle of Wyoming Valley turns into a massacre.

Civil War Quarterly

Blood Along the Susquehanna

By Kelly Bell

Dread gripped the Connecticut settlers of the Wyoming Valley, as the alarm guns boomed from Wilkes-Barre Fort. The sound of those cannons meant trouble and local militiamen grabbed their muskets and rifles and began to gather at Wilkes-Barre and other forts that dotted the valley. Read more

The white-bearded Archimedes (bottom, right), Greek mathematician, physicist, engineer, astronomer, and inventor, directs the defense of his home city of Syracuse against the Roman attack.

Civil War Quarterly

The Siege of Syracuse

By John E. Spindler

From the deck of a quinquereme, one of 60 in his invasion fleet, Roman Consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus surveyed Syracuse’s Little Harbor on the coast of Sicily. Read more

Confederate Brigadier General John McCausland’s cavalry brigade, part of Jubal Early’s Army of the Valley, fords the Monocacy River on July 9, 1864, a few miles south of Frederick, Maryland. Greatly outnumbered, Union Gen. Lew Wallace set up a defensive line at Monocacy Junction to delay Early’s approach to Baltimore or Washington.

Civil War Quarterly

Confederate Raid Panics Washington

By Eric Niderost

Abraham Lincoln peered out of a west-facing window of the White House, scanning the distant Potomac River with his telescope. Read more

A platoon of green troops from the U.S. 106th Infantry Division, somewhere near St. Vith, Belgium. Expecting to occupy a quiet sector of the Allied line in December 1944, the “Golden Lions” found themselves in the path of Hitler’s last major offensive—Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein (Operation Watch on the Rhine).

Civil War Quarterly

The Most Serious Reverse

By Flint Whitlock

The HMS Queen Elizabeth, the largest passenger liner afloat, took only five days to transport the entire 106th Division from New Jersey to Glasgow, Scotland, making port on November 17, 1944. Read more

Civil War Quarterly

Caribbean Gibraltar

By Mark Carlson

For more than a year and a half, 120 British sailors and Marines led a successful blockade of the French “Sugar Island” of Martinique, birthplace of Gen. Read more

This scene depicting the Battle of Nineveh is part of the “Legend of the True Cross” fresco cycle by Renaissance artist Piero della Francesca. Chosroes II, near defeat, appears to be on his knees at the far right. The frescoes were painted in the 15th century in the Basilica of San Francesco (dedicated to St Francis of Assisi) in Arezzo, Tuscany, Italy.

Civil War Quarterly

The Last Epic Battle of Antiquity

By Michael D. Greaney

Though the Western Roman Empire had fallen with the deposition of Romulus Augustulus at Rome in 476, elements of the Empire remained, in fact and influence, for centuries to come. Read more

Early Spring 2014

From Around the Network

Lili Marlene

China Strikes Back

Justus Sherwood: Loyalist Frontiersman

Inside Washington’s Battle Tactics