The Plight and Flight of Unionist Edwin R. McGuire: Divided Loyalties and Violence in Independence County, Arkansas

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The Plight and Flight of Unionist Edwin R. McGuire: Divided Loyalties and Violence in Independence County, Arkansas

On Friday, December 4, 1863, Missouri Corporal John Winterbottom scribbled in his diary that just days before, “20 Rebels attacked the house of a rich unionist 10 miles West of here, by the name of McGuire. He killed two of the Rebels and then made his escape with a slight wound. The Rebels then burned his house, which was the finest in the country.”

The plight of Edwin McGuire and his family owed itself to the confused communal politics and military landscape of Independence County, Arkansas during the American Civil War…

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Chasing Bushwhackers: The 3rd Missouri Cavalry and a "Scout to Hot Spring County," Arkansas

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Chasing Bushwhackers: The 3rd Missouri Cavalry and a "Scout to Hot Spring County," Arkansas

On February 8, 1864, blue-clad troopers of the 3rd Missouri Cavalry rode southwest out of Little Rock, Arkansas on a “scout to Hot Spring County…for the purpose,” explained Private Alexander W.M. Petty, “of driving out a company of bushwhackers reported to be committing all kinds of depredations there upon the persons and property of the loyal citizens.” Over the next week, the Federals journeyed over 200 miles, clashed repeatedly with Rebel guerrillas, suffered casualties, and took enemy prisoners. Their scout through Central Arkansas offers a window in the harsh realities of guerrilla warfare and the difficulties that faced U.S. soldiers in attempting to suppress it.

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"Grant is beating his head against a wall": Lt. Col Walter Taylor on the Overland Campaign

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"Grant is beating his head against a wall": Lt. Col Walter Taylor on the Overland Campaign

Lieutenant Colonel Walter Taylor served as General Robert E. Lee’s aide-de-camp throughout the Civil War. In the context of the critical 1864 Overland Campaign, Taylor’s writings offer an invaluable window into morale and thoughts of the Confederate high command throughout the summer. They likewise reveal Confederates’ ultimate faith in Robert E. Lee and disdain for Ulysses S. Grant.

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The Industrial Confederacy: The Augusta Powder Works

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The Industrial Confederacy: The Augusta Powder Works

The Augusta Powder Works operated until April 1865 when the Confederacy surrendered and the Civil War ended. During operation the works manufactured about 7,000 pounds of gunpowder a day for a total of 2,750,000 pounds produced during the war. The Confederate Powder Works was the only permanent, industrial complex constructed by the Confederate States of America.

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“The ‘Milk and Water’ Policy…Is To Be Abandoned”: The Battle of Lewisburg, the Yankee, and Hard War in Western Virginia

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“The ‘Milk and Water’ Policy…Is To Be Abandoned”: The Battle of Lewisburg, the Yankee, and Hard War in Western Virginia

In late May 1862, United States soldiers of the 44th Ohio Infantry occupied the abandoned offices of the Greenbrier Weekly Era in Lewisburg, western Virginia. Having recently emerged victorious in the Battle of Lewisburg and perhaps faced with the boredom of occupation, the soldiers set about publishing a newspaper they christened the Yankee. Though the Federals only managed to print a single issue before evacuating the town, the Yankee’s four pages reveal the hardening attitudes of Federal soldiers and the arrival of “hard war” in 1862 western Virginia.

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Retreat from Antietam: The Battle of Shepherdstown, September 19-20, 1862

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Retreat from Antietam: The Battle of Shepherdstown, September 19-20, 1862

Following Lee’s retreat from Antietam proved deadly for the Union 5th Corps at the Battle of Shepherdstown. One of West Virginia’s largest Civil War battles, it was largely inconsequential in terms of stalling Lee’s retreat. However, it was an unforgettable event for the men who fought it.

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Private Uriah "Duck" Alley: The Story of West Virginia's Last Civil War Veteran

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Private Uriah "Duck" Alley: The Story of West Virginia's Last Civil War Veteran

In May 1944, four men stood together for a photograph in the small town of Cameron, West Virginia. On the far left stood Donald Solomon Redd, a veteran of World War II. On his right stood Charles Everett Anderson, a WWI veteran, and Robert Calvin Yoho, who had fought in the Spanish American War. And on the far right side of the remarkable photograph stood 95-year-old Uriah Talmage Alley, affectionately known to many as “Uncle Duck.” Uriah Alley was West Virginia’s last Civil War veteran. The photograph ran in the May 22, 1944 issue of Life magazine, and as the four generational photograph of American veterans suggests, Uriah Alley’s life proved quite a story…

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Historic Site Review: Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site

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Historic Site Review: Perryville Battlefield State Historic Site

While Perryville gets buried under more “famous” 1862 battles such as Antietam and Fredericksburg, it was the largest battle to occur in Kentucky and it was a key part of the fight to control the border states. About one-fifth of the combatants became casualties, making Perryville one of the bloodier battles of the war when looking at that ratio. It is a well-preserved and well-interpreted site and is well worth a visit.

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The Guerilla: A Confederate Occupation Newspaper

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The Guerilla: A Confederate Occupation Newspaper

In September, 1862, the Confederacy invaded the Kanawha Valley of western Virginia. The Confederate army of some 5,000—including many Virginians who hailed from the western region of their state—fought a series of engagements with their Union foes, culminating in the capture of Charleston.

The fall of Charleston provided an opportunity for pro-Confederate sentiments to reemerge in the public sphere. Within two weeks of the Rebel army’s appearance, the pro-Confederate newspaper The Guerilla began circulating the streets of the town. Published daily by “Associate Printers” for the duration of the short-lived Confederate occupation, the two extant copies of the Guerilla shed light on the nature of the Civil War in West Virginia and the short-lived Confederate occupation of the Kanawha River Valley…

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The Civil War's Bloodiest Battles West of the Mississippi River

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The Civil War's Bloodiest Battles West of the Mississippi River

What were the bloodiest battles of the Civil War west of the Mississippi River? The largest? Who took the tactical offensive more often in the Trans-Mississippi Theater? By cobbling together an array of data, these questions and more are answered, shedding light on the Civil War from Texas to New Mexico and Louisiana to Missouri…

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"The Printing Press Cannot Remain Idle": The Ohio Twenty-Second, A Civil War Soldier Newspaper

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"The Printing Press Cannot Remain Idle": The Ohio Twenty-Second, A Civil War Soldier Newspaper

In their inaugural and only issue, dated July 12, 1861, the erstwhile printers of The Ohio Twenty-Second made their purpose and politics clear. “Our motto is: ‘Death to traitors and protection to all loyal citizens.’ It has been well said that ‘the pen is mightier than the sword.’ While we find the latter indispensable in these perilous times, we will unite with it the power of the former, and go forth to battle for ‘the Constitution, the Union, and the Enforcement of the Laws.”

For the men of the Twenty-Second Ohio Infantry, and indeed for many Union soldiers throughout the Civil War, the war could be waged by musket and pen alike, and soldier newspapers offered an avenue for Union soldiers to keep abreast with the wider war effort, opine on national politics, interact with the local civilian population, document their war deeds, and foster a sense of community and esprit among their ranks. The Ohio Twenty-Second offers a brief window into the patriotism, politics, and daily life of Union soldier in the opening months of the Civil War.

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“Where were they not on that gory field?”: The Chesapeake Artillery and the Battle of Sharpsburg

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“Where were they not on that gory field?”: The Chesapeake Artillery and the Battle of Sharpsburg

Many accounts by Civil War veterans, both postwar and contemporary, contain errors, omissions, and outright fabrications driven by dynamics that range from simple memory lapses to protecting or enlarging reputations.  One such case involves the participation of the Chesapeake Artillery (4th Maryland Light Artillery, CSA) in the battle of Sharpsburg, called Antietam by the Federals.  Numerous postwar and even contemporary accounts, including the battery’s most oft-cited contemporary unit history as well as that of at least one modern historian, place the Chesapeake on the field during the battle of September 17, 1862.  However, a careful examination of the contemporary historical record clearly indicates that the company was miles away from the fighting that day.

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The Invisible Toll: Mental Trauma and 'Total War'

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The Invisible Toll: Mental Trauma and 'Total War'

Central to the concept of total war is the full mobilization of resources and a more intense experience of warfare.  While the technologies and material goods of warfare have changed drastically over time, the most basic resource of warfare has changed very little—the men (and now women) who fight. As a battle of minds, warfare is constantly requiring full mobilization of a soldier’s own personal resources, thus reflecting elements of total war within the singular unit of the soldier. 

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Flying Dutchmen: The XI Corps at Chancellorsville

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Flying Dutchmen: The XI Corps at Chancellorsville

In the aftermath of defeat at Chancellorsville, the XI Corps received the bulk of the blame.  They had run, had crumbled under Jackson’s attack without resistance.  They were labeled cowards and forevermore known as the “Flying Dutchmen.”  The nickname was earned within a short period of time on the battlefield but the series of events that caused the XI Corps’ flight was put into action long before that moment, even before the armies knew they would meet in the Wilderness west of Fredericksburg.

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War Front and Home Front, Father and Son: A Family’s Contribution to the Civil War (Part I)

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War Front and Home Front, Father and Son: A Family’s Contribution to the Civil War (Part I)

Surrounded by the capitol city that has grown up around it, Ten Broeck Mansion was built in 1797-8 outside Albany, NY and remained a private home until it was presented to the Albany County Historical Association in 1948.  Although its early history remains a strong focus—to this day it retains the name of its builder and first owner, General Abraham Ten Broeck—the mansion witnessed another upheaval of American History, the Civil War.  At the time, the family of Thomas Worth Olcott owned and resided in the house.  He and his son, Dudley, both offered their service to the cause of the United States, although in entirely different ways.

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Diary Disclosures: David Hunter Strother on Civil War Leaders

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Diary Disclosures: David Hunter Strother on Civil War Leaders

Forty-five years old at the start of the Civil War, David Hunter Strother had built his career through pen and pencil. A renowned artist, known via his pen-name "Porte Crayon," Strother traveled throughout the nation in the antebellum years, sharing sketches and stories of his travels via popular magazines of the day. Yet as the nation collapsed in 1861, Strother, who hailed from western Virginia, decided to put his artistic talents to use for the Union army. In the war's early years, Strother served as a topographer for Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley and western Virginia; he eventually earned a commission as a Union officer. Besides Strother's daily work of scouting terrain and sketching maps, the observant Virginian also kept a meticulous, detailed diary which would eventually span dozens of journals. In today's post, I want to share David Hunter Strother's experiences and opinions of various important Civil War figures with you. All of these diary entries date from September, 1861-February, 1862; these diary entries were not published in Cecil Eby's Virginia Yankee. While I have edited lightly for clarity, I have largely left Strother's words and occasional misspellings as they were. After each entry, I have offered a small note with my thoughts and biographical information.

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'A Most Dangerous Precedent:' Charting the Progress of Freedom in the Civil War

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'A Most Dangerous Precedent:' Charting the Progress of Freedom in the Civil War

 Yet here we are, as Maury and her peers were, confronted with a people demanding recognition even without the protection or support of the law.  In this moment, freedom existed alongside slavery, making it all the more difficult to reckon with both for contemporaries and for historians. 

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Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story? David Ireland and the 137th New York

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Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story? David Ireland and the 137th New York

We all know the story of Joshua Chamberlain holding the left of the Union line at Gettysburg. But, did you know that a similar action occurred on the right of the Union line as well? Guest author Justin Voithofer gives us a look at David Ireland's 137th New York Infantry at Culp's Hill.

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The "Derangement" and Death of Private Ludwig Salzwedel: A Suicide and Cover-Up in the Civil War

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The "Derangement" and Death of Private Ludwig Salzwedel: A Suicide and Cover-Up in the Civil War

As the hot Kansas sun rose over the camp of the Ninth Wisconsin Infantry on June 17, 1862, the German immigrants who formed the bulk of the regiment were abuzz with the terrible news of last evening’s events. Rumors ran rife that a soldier in Company F killed himself during the night. And indeed, fifty-one year old Private Ludwig Salzwedel, a German immigrant to La Crosse, Wisconsin and the father of a family of five, had committed suicide that night.

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The Great Locomotive Chase: Part IV, The Medal of Honor

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The Great Locomotive Chase: Part IV, The Medal of Honor

While the Andrews Raid was a failure that resulted in the deaths of many of the participants, the Raiders went down in history in an additional way. Six of the raiders were the first men to ever receive the Medal of Honor.

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