Showing results for "Appomattox"
No NPS? No Problem!—Civil War Trust Sites in Dinwiddie County, Virginia
Day Three in a series coinciding with the federal government shutdown Dinwiddie County is a Civil War preservationist’s dream. Forty-three named engagements took place within its 507 square miles, a direct testament to the tenacious campaign that gripped the neighboring city of Petersburg during the last ten months of the war. The National Park Service and Pamplin […]
Read more...Autumn Guard
They’re nearly ubiquitous across the north: Civil War soldiers standing vigil in the town square or the city cemetery. I came across this one, with the autumn amber splayed across the sky behind him, in Allegany, NY, the small college town where I teach.
Read more...Bennett Place
On April 26, 1865 the surrender finally happened. On a 325-acre farm owned by the Bennitt (or Bennett as it is more commonly written and referred to) family. Confederate General Joseph Johnston surrendered the remnants of the Army of Tennessee and all Confederates still serving on the Eastern Seaboard. In total over 89,000 Confederate soldiers […]
Read more...My Life as a Black Civil War Living Historian—part five
part five in a series When Kevin and I joined the 54th Mass. Co. B, the 3rd USCT, and the 37th USCT in the 150th Anniversary of DC Emancipation Day on April 16, 2012, it was another very hot day! We parked about half of a mile from the start of the parade and about […]
Read more...Wilmington: The Last Open Port on the Confederate Coast
“Though the popular clamor centers upon Charleston, I consider Wilmington a more important point,”[i] stated Gustavus V. Fox to Acting Rear Admiral Samuel Phillip Lee in the fall of 1862. Wilmington, N.C. arose along the banks of the Cape Fear River, expanding rapidly during its early colonial years to become a center for trade and […]
Read more...“Sally had a baby, and the baby had red hair”—part two
Today, we bring you the second part of Lance Herdegen’s two-part piece about the music of the Iron Brigade, which was not only one of the most famous fighting units in the Army of the Potomac but whose members also happened to have a particular ear for music. “Any veteran memory of the long marching […]
Read more...The Season of Battles: Perspectives on the 1863 Campaigns
This year marks the 150th Anniversaries of some of the Civil War’s most iconic engagements. The sesquicentennial of Chancellorsville and Stonewall Jackson’s death has just passed, while the Vicksburg and Gettysburg commemorations are in the future, followed by Chickamauga. Yet focusing on any one event over others obscures some of the key historical currents that […]
Read more...Herdegen’s Rock-Solid Study of the Iron Brigade
I first met the Iron Brigade, like so many Americans, as they marched onto the field on the first day of Gettysburg, their black hats announcing their appearance at the nick of time. Michael Shaara’s The Killer Angels (and the subsequent film Gettysburg) makes much of the Iron Brigade’s timely appearance, in part to add […]
Read more...Grant’s Last Battle
“If I succeed in telling my story so that others can see as I do what I attempt to show, I will be satisfied. The reader must also be satisfied, for he knows from the beginning what to expect.” — Ulysses S. Grant Grant’s Last Battle: The Story Behind The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. […]
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