Published: 7/22/24Reporting on the Defeated SouthBy: Gary W. GallagherCategory: The Front Line Travel accounts from the immediate aftermath of the Civil War illuminate social, economic, and political conditions in the former Confederacy. Among the best are John Richard Dennett’s The South As...
Published: 7/15/24An Emotional Welcome HomeBy: Susan Bradford EppesCategory: The Front Line Ten days after Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses S. Grant on April 9, 1865, 19-year-old Susan Bradford recorded the reaction she and her family...
Published: 7/10/24The Power of a New YearBy: Terry JohnstonCategory: Editorial On New Year’s Eve 1862, 24-year-old William Thompson Lusk, a captain in the 79th New York Infantry, wrote to his sister about the year gone by—and the one to come....
Published: 7/1/24The Forgotten Men: Veterans of the Indian WarsBy: Cecily ZanderCategory: The Front Line The confluence of Civil War memory and the historical legacy of the postbellum Indian wars has not received substantial attention from historians. But in the American West the two inevitably...
Published: 6/24/24Second Thoughts of a “Self-Reliant” WomanBy: Mary Putnam Jacobi Category: The Front Line By the summer of 1865, Mary Putnam, 22, had blazed an impressive trail in life. The daughter of a successful American publisher-father (George) and English mother (Victoria), Mary grew up...
Published: 6/17/24The Civil War’s EpidemicsBy: Jonathan S. JonesCategory: Civil War Medicine It’s well-known that the Civil War was the United States’ deadliest conflict. Between 750,000 and 1 million Americans died, shockingly high figures that still drive interest in the conflict more...
Published: 6/10/24Extra Voices: Civil War HomecomingsBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: The Front Line In the Voices section of our Spring 2024 issue we highlighted quotes by Union and Confederate soldiers and civilians about the homecomings that occurred at the end of the...
Published: 6/3/24McClellan’s Culture of CommandBy: Gary W. GallagherCategory: Featured George B. McClellan profoundly affected the course of the Civil War. His inexplicable retreat following a major victory at Malvern Hill in July 1862 undoubtedly lengthened the conflict and, to...
Published: 5/20/24Remembering a Pennsylvanian Who Fell at the Battle of WauhatchieBy: John BanksCategory: Road Trips Earthmovers and developers long ago carved up the Wauhatchie battlefield where Lieutenant Edward Ratchford Geary of Independent Battery E, Pennsylvania Light Artillery (known as Knap’s Battery) took a bullet in...
Published: 5/13/24A Hospital Steward’s StoryBy: James Kendall HosmerCategory: Featured During the Siege of Port Hudson in 1863—part of the Union military’s attempt to seize control of the Mississippi River—James Kendall Hosmer, a soldier in the 52nd Massachusetts Infantry,...
Published: 4/29/24What Is Public History?By: Rich CondonCategory: Public History What is public history? What makes it “public?” How is it different from the history concentration in a school catalog? What sets public historians apart from academics? These are all...
Published: 4/25/24“The Impending Crisis”By: The Civil War MonitorCategory: Q&A On April 27, 2024, the American Civil War Museum (ACWM) is launching a major new exhibition at its Tredegar location in Richmond, Virginia. Entitled The Impending Crisis: How Slavery...
Published: 4/22/24War Poems of “Howard Glyndon”By: Laura C. Redden Category: The Front Line In 1864, 25-year-old Maryland native Laura Catherine Redden published her first book of poetry, Idyls of Battle, and Poems of the Rebellion. Redden, who had lost her hearing at age...
Published: 4/15/24The Myth of the Civil War SniperBy: Scott HippensteelCategory: Science of War What do Union generals John Reynolds, William Sanders, Stephen Weed, and John Sedgwick have in common? According to traditional historiography, each man was killed by a sharpshooter who targeted him,...
Published: 4/8/24Extra Voices: Losing ComradesBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: The Front Line In the Voices section of our Winter 2023 issue we highlighted quotes by Union and Confederate soldiers about the loss of a comrade. Unfortunately, we didn’t have room to include all that we found. Below are those that just missed the cut.
Published: 4/1/24Lincoln’s Imagined WestBy: Cecily ZanderCategory: War in the West In the midst of World War II, T.S. Eliot finished a series of poems that were collected in 1943 as Four Quartets. A prominent theme in the last poem, “Little Gidding,” is time and the place of humanity in history. In the penultimate stanza Eliot attests that “to make an end is to make a beginning.
Published: 2/16/24Jefferson Davis’ Inaugural AddressBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: The Front Line At 1 p.m. on February 18, 1861, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as president of the Confederate States of America at Montgomery, Alabama. Davis, 52, who had served as U.S. secretary...
Published: 1/8/24Extra Voices: Doldrums of WarBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: The Front Line In the Voices section of our Fall 2023 issue we highlighted quotes by Union and Confederate soldiers about the long stretches of inactivity and boredom they regularly faced. Unfortunately, we didn’t have room to include all that we found. Below are those that just missed the cut.
Published: 6/29/19The Seven Days BattlesBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: Photo Essays Between June 25 and July 1, 1862, George B. McClellan’s Army of the Potomac and Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia battled on the outskirts of Richmond. The fate...
Published: 7/3/17Gettysburg in ArtBy: The Civil War MonitorCategory: Photo Essays Americans have long been fascinated by the Battle of Gettysburg, the epic struggle fought between the forces of generals Robert E. Lee and George G. Meade over three days in...