July 25, 2016

Why Some Southern College Campuses Cannot Escape their Confederate Past: The University of Mississippi

July 25, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

Ole Miss has been in the news several times in the last couple of years, dealing with its Civil War and Civil Rights legacy. In 2010, the university made headlines when they changed their school mascot away from one that highlighted its Confederate heritage. In 2014, an Ole Miss fraternity was shut down after students placed a noose on the statue of James Meredith, the first black student to enroll in the all-white school. Most recently, the university joined the Confederate flag debate when the students and faculty chose to remove the state flag, which includes Confederate symbols, from the campus.

July 15, 2016

"Find Your Park:" The Centennial at Richmond National Battlefield Park

July 15, 2016/ Civil Discourse

July 12, 2016

An Anecdote of Suicide (?)

July 12, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

Recently at the Society of Civil War Historians conference I was asked if any Civil War soldiers committed “suicide” by purposely placing themselves in harm’s way. Besides the question of whether the deaths of Confederate generals Hill and Garnett were such suicides, I recently found this interesting anecdote in Gregory A. Coco’s The Civil War Infantryman.

June 20, 2016

Should Indian Territory Be Considered a Border State?

June 20, 2016/ Zac Cowsert

Should we consider Indian Territory a border state?

June 13, 2016

"In behalf of humanity:" Richard Etheridge, the U.S. Lifesaving Service, and Reconstruction

June 13, 2016/ Rodanthe, NC/ Becca Capobianco

Within one hundred miles of Ft. Monroe, the catalyst for military emancipation under the command of Benjamin Butler, military operations along the coast of Virginia bled into North Carolina’s Outer Banks and had lasting implications for its seemingly small population. Within this militarily and geographically dynamic area, Richard Etheridge would make a name for himself both as an advocate for Civil Rights and leader of the freedman’s population along the coast.

June 06, 2016

"Still on Parade:" Civil War Veterans and Civic Expression in Memorial Day Parades

June 06, 2016/ Rebekah Oakes

In terms of civic expressions of patriotism, few ceremonies are more quintessential than the Memorial Day Parade. Although the holiday honors those who fell in the service of the nation, veterans have always had a pivotal role in public expressions and observances. Veterans of the Civil War continued to participate in Memorial Day Parades well into the twentieth century, but as the years waned on, their role in these exercises began to change. By the 1930s, Civil War veterans were largely viewed by the public as curiosities or living memorials, their experience a lesson that Americans could draw upon for modern issues.

June 03, 2016

"Find Your Park": The Centennial at Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park

June 03, 2016/ Civil Discourse

The National Park Service is turning 100! All year long the NPS has promoted the "Find Your Park" movement to encourage people to visit and connect with the wide variety of parks under the NPS. We are encouraging our readers to find their favorite parks by promoting the centennial events of some of the Civil War parks. Be sure to visit and check out some of these events and celebrate the NPS Centennial! For more on the Centennial and "Find Your Park" program visit findyourpark.com. Click here to see the Centennial events at Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park!

May 31, 2016

Heading to Chattanooga! The 2016 Society of Civil War Historians Conference

May 31, 2016/ Civil Discourse

The Society of Civil War Historians hosts their biennial conference in historic Chattanooga, Tennessee this week, and starting Thursday (June 2), Civil War historians from around the country will converge on Chattanooga to "talk shop," if you will. This includes Civil Discourse's Katie Thompson, Zac Cowsert, and Chuck Welsko, and we hope to bring you all with us as we poke around Chickamauga, take ourselves to the cutting edge of scholarship, present our own research, and generally have a damn good time in Tennessee.

May 30, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part VIII: Final Reflections

May 30, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

With all the research that has been done on the Civil War, at times it seems as if the individual is lost in the seas of voices, stories, and statistics. Armies are huge entities, regiments move like blocks on a map, and the individual experience is lost. I found that when looking at a cemetery or even during Memorial Day events, the whole scope of death and devastation was apparent as one took in the rows of uniform graves, but there was no deeper connection to the lives and deaths of the men sleeping below our feet.

May 23, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part VII: Beyond the Civil War

May 23, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

The National Cemetery at Fredericksburg contains more than just Civil War burials. Yes, the vast majority of soldiers buried there fought between 1861 and 1865, but veterans of the Spanish-American War, World War I, and World War II are also buried within the cemetery.

May 16, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part VI: Nobody was Untouched by the Civil War

May 16, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

Every grave in the national cemetery represents a story of service and struggle, but they also represent the impact of loss on a wide scale. A soldier is one person, but think of the web of connections each had in their lives. Every grave also represents loss for a mother, a father, sisters, brothers, sons, daughters, wives, extended family, and friends.

May 09, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part V: A Brother's War

May 09, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

The Civil War is often called a war of brother against brother. Imagery of American fighting American and family fighting family during the war arouse sentiment of sadness and horror at the thought of families ripped apart by war. While there are instances of family members fighting on opposite sides of the conflict, more often family members were fighting side-by-side for the same army. Recruitment within towns and counties meant brothers, fathers, sons, uncles, cousins, and close friends often ended up in the same regiments, or fought in different units at the same time. As a consequence, many families faced multiple tragedies during the war.

May 02, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part IV: The United States Colored Troops

May 02, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

For five men buried in the National Cemetery, the Civil War was the opportunity for a completely new future. African-American men were not allowed to enlist until the second half of the war (black troops would see their first action in Virginia at Spotsylvania in 1864) but by the end of the war there were 166 black regiments in US service consisting of 180,000 troops. For these Colored Troops and the rest of the enslaved population, the Civil War was the road to emancipation.

April 25, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part III: Beyond the Field of Battle

April 25, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

When one thinks of battle casualties, combat deaths come first to mind. Many more men were wounded than killed instantly; those that did not die within a short time on the battlefield were carried to field hospitals where overworked, undertrained, and undersupplied doctors tried to keep up with the stream of men coming off the field.

April 18, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part II: The Toll of Battle

April 18, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

Battle and violence are essential elements of war, and as a result many men become casualties. These deaths were often sudden, gruesome, and disturbing and many occurred with little note taken of them. Each grave in the cemetery obviously represents a death, and each deserves attention. However, there are a few extraordinary stories that demonstrate both the courage of soldiers and the horrible nature of war.

April 11, 2016

Secrets of a Cemetery, Part I: Beginning in Reflection

April 11, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

We as historians study the dead, but how many times do we stand at a grave, and not the grave of a famous person but an ordinary individual, and make a connection to their story?

April 04, 2016

Bloody Field, Peaceful Field

April 04, 2016/ Kathleen Thompson

Walk the field at Spotsylvania's Bloody Angle and you are struck by the peaceful beauty of the area. Today, not a shadow of the violence, pain, and intensity remains on the fields where so many fell almost 150 years ago. But should battlefields be a place of peace? Should fields which once soaked up the blood of countless men become beautiful, or does such a transformation detract from telling the story of their sacrifice and suffering?

March 22, 2016

Roundtable: Most Influential Books

March 22, 2016/ Civil Discourse

It's been a quiet week at the blog, as spring break and the recent National Council on Public History's annual conference in Baltimore have taken our time. Still, we've found the time to put together our third roundtable question, where we ask our authors:

What Civil War book has most influenced you? Why?

Our answers vary from the personal to the professional, but we hope the offer insight into the works that have shaped us as scholars, storytellers, and historians.

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.

February 29, 2016

"In Their Own Country:" The Curious Case of the 8th Virginia, Antietam, and Home

February 29, 2016/ Civil Discourse

September 17th, 1862 would captivate the nation; indeed, the fighting along Antietam Creek in rural Maryland may have been the most important day of the American Civil War. Yet one regiment of the Union Army was instead focused on what was happening on a small river in western Virginia.

Blog Posts

Civil Discourse