Showing results for "Chancellorsville"
From Lee’s Side of Mine Run
The story of Mine Run is generally remembered thus: The Army of the Potomac found themselves facing a strongly fortified Confederate position that was so formidable, George Gordon Meade declined to attack and, instead, retreated back to the far side of the river for the winter. As a broad-brush overview, that’s pretty much true. The […]
Read more...Literature
“The real war will never get in the books.” — Walt Whitman, Specimen Days * * * Chris Mackowski: “Gods and Generals: A Conversation with Jeff Shaara“—Web Exclusive Stephen Davis: “The Delicious If: MacKinlay Kantor’s If the South Had Won the Civil War and Alternative History“—Web Exclusive * * * ECW […]
Read more...Revisiting “Battlefield Travesty” in Advance of a Clean-Up
A few months ago, I shared the unfortunate story of a Civil War site on the edge of the Chancellorsville battlefield that had fallen victim to vandalism and neglect. I’m pleased to report that local students, in partnership with local preservationists, are stepping up to keep it clean! Anderson Ridge sits on the far eastern […]
Read more...Railroads – “The Seventh Have Come!”: The 7th New York, 8th Massachusetts, and the Rescue of Washington
Emerging Civil War welcomes back guest author Nathan Marzoli Washington was in trouble in the spring of 1861. Secessionist fever had broken into conflict with the attack on Fort Sumter, prompting President Lincoln to issue a call three days later for 75,000 volunteers to help put down the rebellion. Lincoln needed some of these citizen soldiers in […]
Read more...John Henry Myer of Myer’s Hill
We told you in September about a major acquisition the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust was making on the Spotyslvania Court House battlefield: Myer’s Hill, scene of action on May 14, 1864. We’re pleased today to welcome guest historian John F. Cummings III to tell us more about the hill’s namesake, John Henry Myer. John Henry […]
Read more...Railroads – The Virginia Central Railroad: A Target For Union Raids
The Virginia Central Railroad was chartered as the Louisa Railroad in 1836 by the Virginia Board of Public Works. The name was changed to the Virginia Central Railroad in 1850. It ran from westward from Richmond and ended in Gordonsville, where it met the Orange & Alexandria Railroad. No Confederate railroad was targeted more, and […]
Read more...Disaster in the Defenses of Washington: The June 9, 1863 Explosion at Fort Lyon
Emerging Civil War welcomes back guest author Nathan Marzoli Lewis Bissell, a soldier in the 2nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery, had spent the better part of a year stationed in the numerous forts and batteries that ringed the nation’s capital. He had grown accustomed to the monotonous routine there, and probably expected June 9 to be another hot, […]
Read more...ECW Weekender: A Day in the Life of a Soldier
Here’s a phenomenal ECW Weekender opportunity from the Friends of the Wilderness Battlefield. Hear first-person portrayals of the lives of Union and Confederate soldiers and surgeons. Take a walking tour of the Wilderness Tavern and the grounds of Ellwood. Also, listen to a presentation by Don Pfanz, author of Where Valor Sleeps: A History of the Fredericksburg […]
Read more...Chief Joseph: If not for Howard, “there would have been no war”
My favorite description of Oliver Otis Howard comes from historian Frank O’Reilly, who has called him “pious but vapid.” After the twin disasters that befell Howard’s Eleventh Corps at Chancellorsville and then, two months later, at Gettysburg, it’s always been a bit of a wonder to me that Howard managed to keep his job. I […]
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