March 30, 2022

Chasing Bushwhackers: The 3rd Missouri Cavalry and a "Scout to Hot Spring County," Arkansas

March 30, 2022/ Zac Cowsert

On February 8, 1864, blue-clad troopers of the 3rd Missouri Cavalry rode southwest out of Little Rock, Arkansas on a “scout to Hot Spring County…for the purpose,” explained Private Alexander W.M. Petty, “of driving out a company of bushwhackers reported to be committing all kinds of depredations there upon the persons and property of the loyal citizens.” Over the next week, the Federals journeyed over 200 miles, clashed repeatedly with Rebel guerrillas, suffered casualties, and took enemy prisoners. Their scout through Central Arkansas offers a window in the harsh realities of guerrilla warfare and the difficulties that faced U.S. soldiers in attempting to suppress it.

April 30, 2021

“The ‘Milk and Water’ Policy…Is To Be Abandoned”: The Battle of Lewisburg, the Yankee, and Hard War in Western Virginia

April 30, 2021/ Zac Cowsert

In late May 1862, United States soldiers of the 44th Ohio Infantry occupied the abandoned offices of the Greenbrier Weekly Era in Lewisburg, western Virginia. Having recently emerged victorious in the Battle of Lewisburg and perhaps faced with the boredom of occupation, the soldiers set about publishing a newspaper they christened the Yankee. Though the Federals only managed to print a single issue before evacuating the town, the Yankee’s four pages reveal the hardening attitudes of Federal soldiers and the arrival of “hard war” in 1862 western Virginia.

November 24, 2020

Private Uriah "Duck" Alley: The Story of West Virginia's Last Civil War Veteran

November 24, 2020/ Zac Cowsert

In May 1944, four men stood together for a photograph in the small town of Cameron, West Virginia. On the far left stood Donald Solomon Redd, a veteran of World War II. On his right stood Charles Everett Anderson, a WWI veteran, and Robert Calvin Yoho, who had fought in the Spanish American War. And on the far right side of the remarkable photograph stood 95-year-old Uriah Talmage Alley, affectionately known to many as “Uncle Duck.” Uriah Alley was West Virginia’s last Civil War veteran. The photograph ran in the May 22, 1944 issue of Life magazine, and as the four generational photograph of American veterans suggests, Uriah Alley’s life proved quite a story…

July 13, 2019

Editorial: Nathan Bedford Forrest Day: A Failure of Morality, History, and Politics

July 13, 2019/ Zac Cowsert

Today is Nathan Bedford Forrest Day in Tennessee.

Like many Southern commanders, he enjoys a prominent place in Civil War memory. And however regrettable, the celebration and veneration of Confederate commanders isn’t particularly unusual even today, circa 2019. After all, Tennessee also recognizes Robert E. Lee Day and Confederate Decoration Day.

Yet we cannot divorce military commanders or their abilities from the causes for which they fought, at least not when it comes to deciding who gets a pedestal and who gets a proclamation. Confederate generals chose to renounce their allegiance to the United States to join in a rebellion whose raison d’etre was slavery. They fought for an immoral, terrible cause, the world is a better place because they lost, and they are not worthy of veneration. Why are we still celebrating them?

May 20, 2019

The Civil War's Bloodiest Battles West of the Mississippi River

May 20, 2019/ Zac Cowsert

What were the bloodiest battles of the Civil War west of the Mississippi River? The largest? Who took the tactical offensive more often in the Trans-Mississippi Theater? By cobbling together an array of data, these questions and more are answered, shedding light on the Civil War from Texas to New Mexico and Louisiana to Missouri…

April 08, 2019

"The Printing Press Cannot Remain Idle": The Ohio Twenty-Second, A Civil War Soldier Newspaper

April 08, 2019/ Zac Cowsert

In their inaugural and only issue, dated July 12, 1861, the erstwhile printers of The Ohio Twenty-Second made their purpose and politics clear. “Our motto is: ‘Death to traitors and protection to all loyal citizens.’ It has been well said that ‘the pen is mightier than the sword.’ While we find the latter indispensable in these perilous times, we will unite with it the power of the former, and go forth to battle for ‘the Constitution, the Union, and the Enforcement of the Laws.”

For the men of the Twenty-Second Ohio Infantry, and indeed for many Union soldiers throughout the Civil War, the war could be waged by musket and pen alike, and soldier newspapers offered an avenue for Union soldiers to keep abreast with the wider war effort, opine on national politics, interact with the local civilian population, document their war deeds, and foster a sense of community and esprit among their ranks. The Ohio Twenty-Second offers a brief window into the patriotism, politics, and daily life of Union soldier in the opening months of the Civil War.

December 29, 2016

Diary Disclosures: David Hunter Strother on Civil War Leaders

December 22, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

Forty-five years old at the start of the Civil War, David Hunter Strother had built his career through pen and pencil. A renowned artist, known via his pen-name "Porte Crayon," Strother traveled throughout the nation in the antebellum years, sharing sketches and stories of his travels via popular magazines of the day. Yet as the nation collapsed in 1861, Strother, who hailed from western Virginia, decided to put his artistic talents to use for the Union army. In the war's early years, Strother served as a topographer for Union forces in the Shenandoah Valley and western Virginia; he eventually earned a commission as a Union officer. Besides Strother's daily work of scouting terrain and sketching maps, the observant Virginian also kept a meticulous, detailed diary which would eventually span dozens of journals. In today's post, I want to share David Hunter Strother's experiences and opinions of various important Civil War figures with you. All of these diary entries date from September, 1861-February, 1862; these diary entries were not published in Cecil Eby's Virginia Yankee. While I have edited lightly for clarity, I have largely left Strother's words and occasional misspellings as they were. After each entry, I have offered a small note with my thoughts and biographical information.

November 29, 2016

Roundtable: Our Favorite Civil War Regiments

November 29, 2016/ Civil Discourse

All of our bloggers possess extensive experience studying the Civil War and, more specifically, spending time visiting and interpreting both the war's battlefields and its participants. We've all become familiar with countless regiments, but from the many we've encountered, a few have stuck out. Here are some of our authors favorite regiments.

October 12, 2016

The "Derangement" and Death of Private Ludwig Salzwedel: A Suicide and Cover-Up in the Civil War

October 12, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

As the hot Kansas sun rose over the camp of the Ninth Wisconsin Infantry on June 17, 1862, the German immigrants who formed the bulk of the regiment were abuzz with the terrible news of last evening’s events. Rumors ran rife that a soldier in Company F killed himself during the night. And indeed, fifty-one year old Private Ludwig Salzwedel, a German immigrant to La Crosse, Wisconsin and the father of a family of five, had committed suicide that night.

June 20, 2016

Should Indian Territory Be Considered a Border State?

June 20, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

Should we consider Indian Territory a border state?

March 07, 2016

"A Very Spicy Little Sheet": The Knapsack, A Soldiers' Newspaper and the Politics of War

March 07, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

"A Very Spicy Little Sheet": <i>The Knapsack</i>, A Soldiers' Newspaper and the Politics of War

A Union officer once remarked, “Does not a newspaper follow a Yankee march everywhere?” In the fall of 1863, the soldiers of the Fifth West Virginia Infantry found themselves stationed at Gauley Bridge in their newly-minted home state. It proved to be a relatively peaceful posting and, apparently true to Yankee form, the men promptly set about establishing a regimental newspaper. Forming the rather grandly named Fifth Virginia Publishing Association, the Association soon began issuing copies of the four-page Knapsack every Thursday morning at five cents a copy. Although only published for a few months, the paper illuminates much about soldier life and the politics of war.

January 11, 2016

A Beginner's Guide to Researching Your Civil War Ancestor

January 11, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

For Americans, history is a personal matter. Whatever we do or don't learn in the classroom, read in books, see in films...Americans stillexperience and understand the past personally. I suspect many public historians are familiar with Roy Rosenzweig and David Thelen’s work Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life. The product of a 1994 survey, their book helps confirm and quantify the very personal ways in which everyday Americans experience the past...namely via their families. People feel most connected to the past when gathering with the families, and their most frequent “past-related” activity is looking at photographs with family and friends. Americans place greater trust in family stories than in college professors, high school teachers, or nonfiction books (personal family accounts were second only to museums). And of course, many Americans explore history through their own genealogy. Nothing helps bring history to life more than a personal connection; a realization that your family, your ancestor, lived and participated in the events of another age.

November 30, 2015

Righteous or Riotous? The 2nd Ohio Cavalry and The Crisis

November 30, 2015/ Zac Cowsert

As the snow fell from a wintry sky on March 5, 1863, over a hundred men gathered on the fields of Camp Chase, outside Columbus, Ohio, ostensibly for the purposes of attending church. For a “church party,” however, they were oddly equipped, armed with “clubs, hatchets, and axes.” Once the men—soldiers of the 2nd Ohio Cavalry—had assembled at their “appointed rendezvous,” they formed up into a line and made their way onto Columbus. The soldiers had been planning this foray for some time, knowing that Sunday church offered them the perfect excuse to enter town and commence their mischief.

October 01, 2015

A Challenge Issued: The Hartwood Church Raid

October 01, 2015/ Zac Cowsert

Four hundred cavalrymen splashed across the icy waters of the Rappahannock River in central Virginia, moving north into enemy territory. The Confederate cavaliers, undeterred by the bitter cold and snowfall nearly eighteen inches deep, consisted of some of the Old Dominion’s finest: portions of the First, Second and Third Virginia Cavalry. At the gray-clad column’s head was twenty-eight year-old Fitzhugh Lee, nephew to Robert E. Lee and already a grim veteran of war’s horrors. On this day, February 24, 1863, Brigadier General Fitz Lee led his men across the Rappahannock in reconnaissance, seeking to determine what movements, if any, the Union Army of the Potomac was undertaking around Fredericksburg. The mission’s directive had come from Robert E. Lee himself.

August 17, 2015

"Wrap the World In Fire," Part III: Confederate Foreign Policy with Great Britain

August 17, 2015/ Zac Cowsert

"No you dare not make war on cotton. No power on earth dares to make war upon it. Cotton is king!" -South Carolina Senator James Hammond

To a certain extent, the Confederacy's foreign policy can be summed up by the bold words of James Hammond above. As my previous posts have examined examined possible reasons for British intervention in the Civil War and Union efforts to prevent such an intervention, it is time to turn our eyes South and explore Confederate foreign policy with Great Britain. The Confederacy built much of its policy around "King Cotton," and the result was a foreign policy more disastrous than many could imagine.

August 03, 2015

"Wrap the World in Fire," Part I: The Possibility of British Intervention in the American Civil War

August 03, 2015/ Zac Cowsert

“If any European Power provokes a war, we shall not shrink from it. A contest between Great Britain and the United States would wrap the world in fire.” United States Secretary of State William Seward uttered these bold words in the summer of 1861, while his nation tore apart at the seams. Yet despite the secession of eleven Southern states, Seward pondered the possibility of war with Great Britain, the world's foremost power. Why? The answer lies in the high-stakes game of diplomacy that was played by both the Union and Confederacy with Great Britain during the American Civil War. For the Union, foreign intervention in the conflict was a constant threat, one that might ensure Southern independence. Conversely, the Confederacy constantly sought and expected foreign recognition and intervention, seeking support and validation for their secession.

July 23, 2015

Roundtable: The Civil War's Most Influential Event

July 23, 2015/ Civil Discourse

In Civil Discourse's first ever roundtable question, we asked five of our writers a classic, yet undeniably important, question: what event most influenced the outcome of the Civil War? Our authors diverse answers (and non-answers!) may surprise you!

July 20, 2015

Calls to Arms: "The" Confederate Flag in American Culture

July 20, 2015/ Becca Capobianco

When asked why the American Civil War still holds such power over the American imagination, author Shelby Foote once observed, “because it’s the big one. It measures what we are, good and bad. If you look at American history as the life span of a man, the Civil War represents the great trauma of our adolescence.” More recently, at the 150th anniversary of the surrender at Appomattox, historian David Blight reflected, “The Civil War is a place we go to ask who we are and what are we becoming…it is our oracle.” The debates that tore the nation apart for four bloody years are eternal questions of the American condition, Blight explained. It is no small wonder then that the symbols of those conflicts remain contested as well, suspended in our national consciousness without a singular definition that holds true over time.

July 13, 2015

Surrendering to "Genl Intoxication"

July 13, 2015/ Zac Cowsert

In studying the Civil War, we often remark about the youth (sometimes the extreme youth) of the men who fought it. Yet while these men were engaged in a serious and deadly endeavor, they did not cease to be young men...capable of all the mishaps, shenanigans, and vices to which people of a young age can be suspecible. This is, of course, reflected in our own lives as well. We’ve all had our college parties or midnight soirees or one glass of wine too many. Young soldiers most certainly did, too. These are stories, both light-hearted and somber, of men surrendering to “Genl Intoxication.”

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