Download or read book The Civil War Papers of Lt Colonel Newton T Colby New York Infantry written by Newton T. Colby and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2003-01-01 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When I woke the battle had begun ... the shells of the enemy flew over us here tearing great limbs off the trees and screaming horribly ... then a shell struck into the ranks near where I was, killing and wounding five or six--I saw them fall and heard their screams. But on we went and I know not who they were or what became of them--Lt. Col. Newton T. Colby, September 21, 1862. Lt. Col. Colby served with the 23rd New York, the 107th New York at Antietam, Chancellorsville and Harper's Ferry, and later in the Veteran Reserve Corps as superintendent of Old Capital Prison. This is a compilation of Colby's letters to family, friends and other military personnel, newspaper articles that detail the fighting in which Colby and his fellow soldiers were involved, and accounts of the fighting and daily life from other soldiers. Colby was not a well known name, but he crossed paths with many prominent figures of the Civil War, witnessed history being made, and was recognized as an excellent soldier by his peers and commanding officers.
Download or read book When Hell Came to Sharpsburg written by Steven Cowie and published by Savas Beatie. This book was released on 2022-08-11 with total page 553 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover a forgotten chapter of American history with Steven Cowie's riveting account of the Battle of Antietam. The Battle of Antietam, fought in and around Sharpsburg, Maryland, on September 17, 1862, was the bloodiest day in American history. Despite the large number of books and articles on the subject, the battle’s horrendous toll on area civilians is rarely discussed. When Hell Came to Sharpsburg: The Battle of Antietam and Its Impact on the Civilians Who Called It Home by Steven Cowie rectifies this oversight. By the time the battle ended about dusk that day, more than 23,000 men had been killed, wounded, or captured in just a dozen hours of combat—a grim statistic that tells only part of the story. The epicenter of that deadly day was the small community of Sharpsburg. Families lived, worked, and worshipped there. It was their home. And the horrific fighting turned their lives upside down. When Hell Came to Sharpsburg investigates how the battle and opposing armies wreaked emotional, physical, and financial havoc on the people of Sharpsburg. For proper context, the author explores the savage struggle and its gory aftermath and explains how soldiers stripped the community of resources and spread diseases. Cowie carefully and meticulously follows the fortunes of individual families like the Mummas, Roulettes, Millers, and many others—ordinary folk thrust into harrowing circumstances—and their struggle to recover from their unexpected and often devastating losses. Cowie’s comprehensive study is grounded in years of careful research. He unearthed a trove of previously unused archival accounts and examined scores of primary sources such as letters, diaries, regimental histories, and official reports. Packed with explanatory footnotes, original maps, and photographs, Cowie’s richly detailed book is a must-read for those seeking new information on the battle and the perspective of the citizens who suffered because of it. Antietam’s impact on the local community was an American tragedy, and it is told here completely for the first time.
Download or read book States at War Volume 2 written by Richard F. Miller and published by University Press of New England. This book was released on 2014-08-05 with total page 505 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While many Civil War reference books exist, there is no single compendium that contains important details about the combatant states (and territories) that Civil War researchers can readily access for their work. People looking for information about the organizations, activities, economies, demographics, and prominent personalities of Civil War states and state governments must assemble data from a variety of sources, with many key sources remaining unavailable online. This volume provides a crucial reference book for Civil War scholars and historians, professional or amateur, seeking information about New York during the war. Its principal sources include the Official Records, state adjutant general reports, legislative journals, state and federal legislation, executive speeches and proclamations on the federal and state levels, and the general and special orders issued by the military authorities of both governments, North and South. Designed and organized for easy use, this book can be read in two ways: by individual state, with each chapter offering a stand-alone history of an individual state's war years; or across states, comparing reactions to the same event or solutions to the same problems.
Download or read book Rufus written by Phoebe Sheldon and published by Off the Common Books. This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rufus, A Boy’s Extraordinary Experiences in the Civil War Based on the incredible Civil War letters of Rufus Harnden, this book follows a perceptive and well-spoken seventeen-year-old from New York State through three exciting years in the Union Army. He fights at Antietam and then Chancellorsville before being wounded and sent to the hospital and on to more adventures behind the front lines. Thebook includes historical details about the Battle of Chancellorsville that have never been published before. It also includes extensive footnotes that provide the reader context for Rufus’s very personal war story. “These letters are a window into our country’s defining struggle.” American Singer/Songwriter James Taylor
Download or read book Across the Divide written by Steven J. Ramold and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2013-04-22 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Ramold disputes the old argument that citizen-soldiers in the Union Army differed little from civilians. He shows how a chasm of mutual distrust grew between soldiers and civilians during four years of fighting that led many Democratic soldiers to…build the groundwork for the postwar Republican Party. Filled with gripping anecdotes, this book makes for fascinating reading." —Scott Reynolds Nelson, College of William & Mary Union soldiers left home in 1861 with expectations that the conflict would be short, the purpose of the war was clear, and public support back home was universal. As the war continued, however, Union soldiers noticed growing disparities between their own expectations and those of their families at home with growing concern and alarm. Instead of support for the war, an extensive and oft-violent anti-war movement emerged. In this first study of the gulf between Union soldiers and northern civilians, Steven J. Ramold reveals the wide array of factors that prevented the Union Army and the civilians on whose behalf they were fighting from becoming a united front during the Civil War. In Across the Divide, Ramold illustrates how the divided spheres of Civil War experience created social and political conflict far removed from the better-known battlefields of the war. Steven J. Ramold, Associate Professor of American History at Eastern Michigan University, is the author of two previous books, Slaves, Sailors, Citizens: African Americans in the Union Navy and Baring the Iron Hand: Discipline in the Union Army. He and his wife reside in Ypsilanti, Michigan.
Download or read book The Tale Untwisted written by Gene M. Thorp and published by Savas Publishing. This book was released on 2023-01-03 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The discovery of Robert E. Lee’s Special Orders No. 191 outside of Frederick, Maryland, on September 13, 1862, is one of the most important and hotly disputed events of the American Civil War. For more than 150 years, historians have debated if George McClellan, commander of the Union Army of the Potomac, dawdled after receiving a copy of the orders before warily advancing to challenge Lee’s forces atop South Mountain. In The Tale Untwisted, authors Gene Thorp and Alexander Rossino document in exhaustive fashion how “Little Mac” in fact moved with uncharacteristic energy to counter the Confederate threat and take advantage of Lee’s divided forces, seizing the initiative and striking a blow in the process that wrecked Lee’s plans and sent his army reeling back toward Virginia. This study is a beautifully woven tour de force of primary research that may well be the final word on the debate over the fate and impact of the Lost Orders on the history of the 1862 Maryland Campaign.
Download or read book Conflict of Command written by George C. Rable and published by LSU Press. This book was released on 2023-08-30 with total page 441 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fraught relationship between Abraham Lincoln and George McClellan is well known, so much so that many scholars rarely question the standard narrative casting the two as foils, with the Great Emancipator inevitably coming out on top over his supposedly feckless commander. In Conflict of Command, acclaimed Civil War historian George C. Rable rethinks that stance, providing a new understanding of the interaction between the president and his leading wartime general by reinterpreting the political aspects of their partnership. Rable pays considerable attention to Lincoln’s cabinet, Congress, and newspaper editorials, revealing the role each played in shaping the dealings between the two men. While he surveys McClellan’s military campaigns as commander of the Army of the Potomac, Rable focuses on the political fallout of the fighting rather than the tactical details. This broadly conceived approach highlights the army officers and enlisted men who emerged as citizen-soldiers and political actors. Most accounts of the Lincoln-McClellan feud solely examine one of the two individuals, and the vast majority adopt a steadfast pro-Lincoln position. Taking a more neutral view, Rable deftly shows how the relationship between the two developed in a political context and ultimately failed spectacularly, profoundly altering the course of the Civil War itself.
Download or read book Banners South written by Edmund J. Raus and published by Kent State University Press. This book was released on 2005 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines and documents the effects of the Civil War upon the citizens of Cortland County, New York, especially those who served in the 23rd New York Infantry, 1861-1863.
Download or read book Calamity at Frederick written by Alexander B. Rossino and published by Savas Beatie. This book was released on 2023-10-31 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The loss of Robert E. Lee’s Special Orders No. 191 is one of the Civil War’s enduring mysteries. In this meticulous study, Alexander Rossino presents a bold new interpretation of the evidence surrounding the orders’ creation, distribution, and loss outside Frederick, Maryland, in September 1862. Rossino makes extensive use of primary sources to explore these subjects and other important questions related to the orders, including why General Lee thought his army could operate north of the Potomac until winter; why Lee found it necessary to seize the Federal garrison at Harpers Ferry; what Lee hoped to accomplish after capturing Harpers Ferry; where Corporal Barton Mitchell of the 27th Indiana found the Lost Orders; and if D. H. Hill or someone else was to blame for losing the orders. The result is a well-documented reassessment that sheds new light while challenging long-held assumptions. Calamity at Frederick is the Confederate companion to The Tale Untwisted by Gene M. Thorp and Alexander Rossino, which told the story from the Union perspective.
Download or read book Inglorious Passages written by Brian Steel Wills and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2017-11-30 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who died in the Civil War, two-thirds, by some estimates, were felled by disease; untold others were lost to accidents, murder, suicide, sunstroke, and drowning. Meanwhile thousands of civilians in both the north and south perished—in factories, while caught up in battles near their homes, and in other circumstances associated with wartime production and supply. These “inglorious passages,” no less than the deaths of soldiers in combat, devastated the armies in the field and families and communities at home. Inglorious Passages for the first time gives these noncombat deaths due consideration. In letters, diaries, obituaries, and other accounts, eminent Civil War historian Brian Steel Wills finds the powerful and poignant stories of fatal accidents and encounters and collateral civilian deaths that occurred in the factories and fields of the Union and the Confederacy from 1861 to 1865. Wills retrieves these stories from obscurity and the cold calculations of statistics to reveal the grave toll these losses exacted on soldiers and civilians, families and society. In its intimate details and its broad scope, his book demonstrates that for those who served and those who supported them, noncombat fatalities were as significant as battle deaths in impressing the full force of the American Civil War on the people called upon to live through it. With the publication of Inglorious Passages, those who paid the supreme sacrifice, regardless of situation or circumstance, will at last be included in the final tabulation of the nation’s bloodiest conflict.
Download or read book Their Maryland written by Alexander B. Rossino and published by Savas Beatie. This book was released on 2021-11-02 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Engagingly written and persuasively argued, this daringly revisionist book is an essential addition to the Antietam bibliography.” —Brian Matthew Jordan, Pulitzer Prize finalist and author of Marching Home What if the histories previously written about Robert E. Lee’s 1862 Maryland Campaign, the first major Confederate operation north of the Potomac River, missed key sources, proceeded from mistaken readings of the evidence, or were influenced by Lost Cause ideology? As Alexander B. Rossino, author of the acclaimed Six Days in September, demonstrates in Their Maryland: The Army of Northern Virginia from the Potomac Crossing to Sharpsburg in September 1862, these types of distortions indeed continue to shape modern understanding of the campaign. Rossino reassesses the history of the Confederate operation in seven comprehensive chapters, each tackling a specific major issue. He addresses many important questions: Did supply problems in Virginia force Lee north to press the advantage he’d won after the Battle of Second Manassas? What did Rebel troops believe about the strength of secessionist sentiment in Maryland, and why? Did the entire Army of Northern Virginia really camp at Best’s Farm near Frederick, Maryland? Did D.H. Hill lose Special Orders No. 191, or is there more to the story? How did Maryland civilians respond to the Rebel army in their midst, and what part did women play? Finally, why did Robert E. Lee choose to fight at Sharpsburg, and how personally was he involved in directing the fighting? Rossino makes extensive use of primary sources to explore these and other questions. In doing so, he reveals that many long-held assumptions about the Confederate experience in Maryland do not hold up under close scrutiny. The result is a well-documented reassessment that sheds new light on old subjects and reinvigorates the debate on several fronts. “The reader will come away with a greater understanding of this crucial campaign and battle.” —James M. McPherson, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times–bestselling author of Battle Cry of Freedom
Download or read book The Great Task Remaining written by William Marvel and published by HMH. This book was released on 2010-06-22 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focusing on the dramatic events of 1863, this is “a well-researched and well-written study that will be a fine addition to Civil War collections” (Booklist). The Great Task Remaining is a striking, often poignant portrait of people in conflict—not only in battles between North and South, but within and among themselves as the cost of the ongoing carnage sometimes seemed too much to bear. As 1863 unfolds, we see draft riots in New York, the disaster at Chancellorsville, the battle of Gettysburg, and the end of the siege of Vicksburg. Then, astonishingly, the Confederacy springs vigorously back to life after the Union summer triumphs, setting the stage for Lincoln’s now famous speech on the Pennsylvania battlefield. Without abandoning the underlying sympathy for Lincoln, William Marvel makes a convincing argument for the Gettysburg Address as being less of a paean to liberty than an appeal to stay the course in the face of rampant antiwar sentiment. This book offers a provocative history of a dramatic year—a year that saw victory and defeat, doubt and riot—as well as a compelling story of a people who clung to the promise of a much-longed-for end. “By 1863 Northern citizens and soldiers were increasingly and openly wondering whether preserving the union and ending slavery were worth the cost of Mr. Lincoln’s war. Disillusion and war-weariness had set in: the war’s only fruits seemed to be moral and political degradation, dangerous constitutional precedents, tens of thousands dead and maimed. The Battle of Chickamauga appeared to have restored the stalemate. Marvel particularly conveys the looming crisis of the impending expiration of the three-year enlistments that were the Union army’s norm. That, combined with the increasing reluctance of Northern men to volunteer or send their sons, could have ended the war by default. Romance and adventure or misery and peril—which emotions would prevail? As Marvel conclusively demonstrates, the coin remained in the air as 1863 came to an end.” —Publishers Weekly
Download or read book Prince of Quacks written by Timothy B. Riordan and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-07 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a biography of the controversial and flamboyant nineteenth century doctor Francis Tumblety. The doctor's exploits include arrests for complicity in the Lincoln assassination, selling abortion drugs, killing patients, indecent assault, and scrutiny as a possible suspect in the "Jack the Ripper" murders. Tumblety's sheen of respectability appeared crafted to cover his homosexuality and his provocative fields of practice.
Download or read book Lincoln s Banner Regiment written by George R. Farr and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2023-07-04 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the 107th New York Volunteer Infantry arrived in Washington, D.C. in August 1862, President Lincoln personally honored them with a regimental banner. It was kept by Secretary of State William Seward and never saw a battlefield--the 107th Volunteers saw many. This book presents a day-to-day chronicle of the regiment's actions during the Civil War, from Antietam to Chancellorsville to Gettysburg to their deadliest fight at New Hope Church. At the Siege of Atlanta, where citizens dug furnished caves to escape the shelling, the 107th took fire from determined rebel snipers and were among the first troops to enter the city.
Download or read book Lesser Civil Wars written by Marsha R. Robinson and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2012-12-05 with total page 195 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lesser Civil Wars: Civilians Defining War and the Memory of War is an edited volume that surveys three hundred years of the Memory of war and the Will to war in the greater Ohio River Valley and Great Lakes region. Military theorists from von Clausewitz, to Dingiswayo and Chandragupta, calculated the Will of their own soldiers and of the enemy’s soldiers. Sometimes the Will is assigned an erroneously low strength, as Abraham Lincoln learned quickly at the onset of the United States Civil War. In this volume, we examine the civilian production of the national Will to fight future wars through the least civil war – each individual’s war to remember or to forget – and no armistice or accord brings this internal battle to an end. This is not a book about the atrocities committed during war. This is a book about the very nature of the Will-Memory-Will cycle, where the Memory of war continues for generations until a new war requires the resurrection of the Will. As these essays show, sometimes it only takes a few individuals to prosecute these Memory wars with rules of engagement that do not necessarily include civil behavior. By focusing on microhistories from a specific region and by bracketing the US Civil War with an essay about a century prior to it and essays about the century following it, we are able to demonstrate the power and energy of the incubating stage of Memory in the Will-Memory-Will cycle. In the greater Ohio River Valley and Great Lakes region, ordinary civilians controlled and incubated the memories of the Iroquois Wars, the French and Indian/Sevens’ Years War (1756–1763), the American Revolution (1776–1783) and the War of 1812, and they converted Memory into the Will to fight the US Civil War and the Vietnam War. In these chapters, we present micro-wars between civilians over control of the Will of a nation. They are, indeed, lesser civil wars.
Download or read book Lincoln s Darkest Year written by William Marvel and published by HMH. This book was released on 2008-07-16 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A portrait of a pivotal chapter in the Civil War, “featuring scheming politicians, bumbling generals, and an increasingly disheartened Northern public” (Brooks Simpson, author of Ulysses S. Grant: Triumph Over Adversity, 1822–1865). In Mr. Lincoln Goes to War, award-winning historian William Marvel focused on President Abraham Lincoln’s first year in office. In Lincoln’s Darkest Year, he paints a picture of 1862—again relying on recently unearthed primary sources and little-known accounts to offer newfound detail of this tumultuous period. Marvel highlights not just the actions but also the deeper motivations of major figures, including Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, Jefferson Davis, George B. McClellan, Stonewall Jackson, and, most notably, Lincoln himself. As the action darts from the White House to the battlefields and back, the author sheds new light on the hardships endured by everyday citizens and the substantial and sustained public opposition to the war. Combining fluid prose and scholarship with the skills of an investigative historical detective, Marvel unearths the true story of our nation’s greatest crisis.
Download or read book Mourning Lincoln written by Martha Hodes and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2015-02-24 with total page 407 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A historian examines how everyday people reacted to the president’s assassination in this “highly original, lucidly written book” (James M. McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom). The news of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination on April 15, 1865, just days after Confederate surrender, astounded a war-weary nation. Massive crowds turned out for services and ceremonies. Countless expressions of grief and dismay were printed in newspapers and preached in sermons. Public responses to the assassination have been well chronicled, but this book is the first to delve into the personal and intimate responses of everyday people—northerners and southerners, soldiers and civilians, black people and white, men and women, rich and poor. Exploring diaries, letters, and other personal writings penned during the spring and summer of 1865, historian Martha Hodes captures the full range of reactions to the president’s death—far more diverse than public expressions would suggest. She tells a story of shock, glee, sorrow, anger, blame, and fear. “’Tis the saddest day in our history,” wrote a mournful man. It was “an electric shock to my soul,” wrote a woman who had escaped from slavery. “Glorious News!” a Lincoln enemy exulted, while for the black soldiers of the Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts, it was all “too overwhelming, too lamentable, too distressing” to absorb. Longlisted for the National Book Award, Mourning Lincoln brings to life a key moment of national uncertainty and confusion, when competing visions of America’s future proved irreconcilable and hopes for racial justice in the aftermath of the Civil War slipped from the nation’s grasp. Hodes masterfully explores the tragedy of Lincoln’s assassination in human terms—terms that continue to stagger and rivet us today.
