The Friday afternoon drizzle that started midway through Pennsylvania turned to a steady rainfall by the time I hit Maryland. Across the Mason-Dixon line and across the Potomac, the rain continued to fall. Autumn should have been in full blaze around me, but the rain dampened the colors the same way it dampened my spirits ( Read more... )

Oft-overlooked, in the history books and by battlefielders, is the North Anna battlefield-scene of one of the biggest Civil War battles that never happened ( Read more... )

My high school history teacher was notoriously passionate about the Civil War. He’d stand at the front of the room amidst a cloud of chalk dust, the blackboard behind him covered with names like “McClellan” and “Gettysburg” scrawled in his excitable chalk-script. He was the first true Civil War buff I’d ever known ( Read more... )

Back home in northwestern Pennsylvania, the mountains have begun to calico, but here in the Shenandoah Valley, everything still overflows with green. The early autumn sun bathes it all in a soft glow. The corn is high. The harvest is ready. It’s as verdant as I have ever seen it ( Read more... )

Sgt. John Ingraham is the only soldier known to still be buried on the battlefield. Before the war, Ingraham worked as a farm hand for the Reed family, which owned a little farm along Chickamauga Creek. Orphaned at an early age, Ingraham was raised by the Reeds along with the family’s three sons.

Read on, Macduff, at Emerging Civil War.

“Running roughly east to west, Horseshoe Ridge rises and falls in a series of steep peaks and troughs,” says historian Lee White. “Forest-packed ravines and valleys cut into the ridge, and several spurs jut out into the woods and fields ( Read more... )

On the afternoon of September 20, Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood went down with a gunshot wound to the leg while rallying his troops. Let me throw out something that will be intentionally provocative: Was the shot that took out Hood the gunshot that led to the downfall of the Confederacy?

Read on, Macduff, at Emerging Civil War.

“Snodgrass is arguably the most famous family name on the Chickamauga battlefield,” says historian Lee White. “George Snodgrass was 53 years old at the time of the battle and lived with his third wife, Elizabeth, and seven of his children. One son, Charles, served in the Confederate army along with several other local men; however, like many other ( Read more... )

During the morning’s confusion, Rosecrans tried to shuffle troops across the battlefield to the areas he thought needed them most. As a result, he ordered the division of Brig. Gen. Thomas Woods to fill a hole in his line that didn’t exist. In doing so, he inadvertently created a hole instead-at exactly the place and time that Lt. Gen. James ( Read more... )

The monument to the 2nd Ohio Infantry took its design in honor of the XIV Corps, which adopted an acorn as their symbol following the campaign for Chattanooga. The acorn was chosen by Gen. George Thomas because his men stood like oaks at Chickamauga. The symbol appears on a number of XIV Corps monuments.

Read on, Macduff, at Emerging Civil War.