Showing results for "Chancellorsville"
ECW’s July 2017 Newsletter
The July 2017 ECW newsletter came out yesterday. If you haven’t seen it yet, you can check it out here. In this month’s issue, we have our usual News & Notes section and a list of our upcoming presentations. But also of note: Editor-in-Chief Chris Mackowski takes a walk on the Chancellorsville battlefield and finds […]
Read more...Last Road North
“I thought my men were invincible.” – Gen. Robert E. Lee Last Road North: A Guide to the Gettysburg Campaign Savas Beatie, 2016 192 pp; 150 images, 17 maps ISBN: 978-1-61121-243-3 Click here to order * * * About the Book: A string of battlefield victories through 1862 had culminated in the […]
Read more...Lost Opportunities in the Army of the Potomac—A Pair of Examples
Army management is a complicated skill in which the personality and temperament of commanders influence the inner workings and culture of the organization. The Union had no army which was as political, and influenced by outside politics, as its primary eastern theater force, the Army of the Potomac. Political infighting and dissent is well known […]
Read more...Foote on Lee
In an interview that appeared in the Summer 1999 issue of The Paris Review, Shelby Foote offered a few thoughts about the battle of Gettysburg, which he’d famously written about in “The Stars in Their Courses: The Gettysburg Campaign” (part of his mammoth three-volume Civil War narrative). “The single greatest mistake of the war by […]
Read more...Malvern Hill: A Victory With The Look And Feel Of Defeat
ECW welcomes back guest author Rob Wilson “I have supped full with horrors. Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts Cannot once start me.” — William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 5, Line 13-15 The Army of the Potomac emerged the clear winner at Malvern Hill, the last of the Seven Days Battles fought around the Confederate […]
Read more...Searching for Leonidas Torrence: Iverson’s Brigade and the Fight at Oak Ridge
The weather is warm. Occasional cloud cover offers relief but the sun feels good. It is the first day of summer, and I’m exactly where I should be on such a day: Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. I’m traveling over the First Day’s fields with a former student of mine, Eric, who recently graduated from Shepherd University. We […]
Read more...My Favorite Historical Person: Captain Sewell Gray
“Sabbath and a lovelier day never overtook a soldier,” wrote Capt. Sewell Gray on the day he died. It was Sunday, May 3, 1863, and Gray, a 22-year-old captain with the 6th Maine Infantry, was among 4,700 soldiers ordered to storm Marye’s Heights during the battle of Second Fredericksburg—a position previously thought impregnable. Gray tried […]
Read more...My Favorite Historical Person: Who’s On The Blog Header?
A logo is supposed to “brand” whatever it represents. A logo is supposed to tell something about that item, company, or institution at first glance. While some might consider it a stretch to say a two week blog series needs an official logo, the header adorning the top of every post in the series has […]
Read more...“Remembered With Special Honor”: Benjamin Davis at Brandy Station
Today marks the 154th Anniversary of the Battle of Brandy Station. One of the more interesting and I think forgotten figures of the engagement is Col. Benjamin Franklin “Grimes” Davis. Unlike many of his comrades, Davis was a Southerner. George Sanford, who served with him in the 1st U.S. Cavalry later claimed he was a […]
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