Showing results for "Medal of Honor"
Visiting Pamplin Park on the Road to Appomattox
For anyone following Lee’s retreat and Grant’s pursuit this week, be sure to start your run at Pamplin Park, where Federal troops first broke the Confederate line. While the anniversary of the breakthrough was April 2, it’s worth a stop at Pamplin to get a true understanding of the story. With the anniversary a couple […]
Read more...Cavalry Action at Painesville: 150 Years Ago
The little known engagement at the small community of Painesville illustrates well the chaotic and confused fighting of the Appomattox Campaign. During the six-day campaign, battles and skirmishes occurred every day. It was a complex campaign, with many moving parts, as columns from each army used various roads, and at different points, encountered each other. […]
Read more...Breakthrough at Petersburg: First Man Over the Works
Charlie Gould seemed destined for adventure in his life. The young lad scarcely made it safe through his toddler years before his heroic deeds in front of Petersburg at the end of the war caused many to declare him the first Union soldier to reach the Confederate fortifications. While just two years old, he and […]
Read more...Question of the Week: March 30, 2015
Last week at Pamplin Historical Park we poured a small base to support a new monument hewn from Vermont granite. It will commemorate the six men from the Green Mountain State who received the Medal of Honor for their actions on April 2, 1865 at Petersburg. Looking at the blank concrete pad that will support […]
Read more...Hatcher’s Run 150: Crossing Rowanty Creek
The men of the Fifth Corps received a surprise assignment in early February 1865 that broke up the monotony of winter camp life during the Petersburg Campaign. “We had orders to march, leaving our tents ‘in statu quo,’ taking only overcoats, arms, and haversacks,” wrote a Pennsylvania private. Officers hastily rode through the camps reminding the […]
Read more...Franklin 150th: “I never saw the dead lay near so thick.”
It was a near-run thing—John M. Schofield’s Federals steadily marching down the Columbia Pike towards Franklin through the night of Nov. 29 while sitting close to their camp fires were the Confederates of John B. Hood. The two former West Point roommates, Schofield and Hood, were now pitted against each other as they battled through […]
Read more...Cushing’s Daring Exploit
On this, the 150th Anniversary of the sinking of the CSS Albemarle, it is worth quoting Lieutenant William B. Cushing’s report in full: I have the honor to report that the rebel ironclad Albemarle is at the bottom of the Roanoke River. On the night of the 27th, having prepared my steam launch, I proceeded […]
Read more...Civil War Echoes: Douglas MacArthur and the Return to the Philippines
70 years ago today, General Douglas MacArthur waded ashore on Leyte, fulfilling his famous pledge to return to the Philippines. The photo of him at that moment (shown here, center, with his staff) is one of the iconic images of World War II in the Pacific. It is also an echo of the Civil War. […]
Read more...Already Looking Toward Next Weekend?
As one weekend wraps up and we stare at the conventional work week that unfolds in front of us, it is human nature to wonder about the upcoming weekend and start to think of plans. For some this is the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. If that describes you, then you want […]
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