The winter storms sweeping the Midwest and South in January 2025 may seem unusual today, but similar weather plagued Union and Confederate soldiers during the Civil War. As depicted in 20th- and 21st-century movies and TV shows, nothing happened each winter during the war (given the absence of snowy landscapes in visual Civil War-related entertainment).
But soldiers suffered in the cold and storms, and civilian photographers and artists worked at least some during the winters. The Library of Congress, for example, has many wartime photographs taken in winter, but most depict scenes with snow noticeably lacking.
Here are some surviving images of wretched wintertime weather, camps, and campaigning:
In latter January 1863, Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside marched the Army of the Potomac to outflank Fredericksburg’s Confederate defenders. The Yankees started out on dry roads. Then the wind shifted to the east, heavy rain fell, the roads dissolved into goo, and the Army bogged down. Burnside gave up on what came to be called the “Mud March.” (Library of Congress)A forlorn and bundled-up-against-the-cold Union picket stands guard amidst a frigid landscape. The pine tree’s tilting top suggests that the soldier has placed a tree trunk between his back and the prevailing wind. (LOC)Peering from the window of a roughly assembled cabin, a soldier watches a comrade who sits on a log while (perhaps) reading a letter from home. This sketch depicts different styles of winter quarters. (LOC)A fairly rare winter photograph captures the 2nd Maine Infantry Regiment formed up next to its quarters at Camp Jameson near Washington, D.C. Although the Library of Congress cites no specific date for this photo, winter 1861-1862 is the timeframe. The 2nd Maine was camped opposite Fredericksburg, Virginia during the next winter. (LOC)Union cavalry commanded by Gen. Alfred Pleasonton advances from Orleans to Waterloo in Virginia during a November 6, 1862 snowstorm. (LOC)On January 25, 1863 a Union infantryman and his dog traipse through deep snow at a regimental camp near Stonemans Switch, a stop on the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad in Stafford County, Virginia. (LOC)Apparently assigned to an artillery battery (note the cannon), a Union soldier stands watch in a wind-swept winter camp in this art published in Harpers Weekly on January 30, 1864. The artist “captured” the wind’s direction by drawing the coat of the soldier flying in front of him. (Harpers Weekly)
