Features
“Grant, Your Cause is Ruin”
Outnumbered and outgunned during the siege of Petersburg, the men of Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia were nonetheless supremely confident in their ability to deal Ulysses S. Grant’s opposing army a decisive blow—and perhaps win the war as well.
By M. Keith Harris
Antietam: Painting the Bloodiest Day
Professional artist turned Union soldier James Hope’s dramatic portraits of the Battle of Antietam serve as a fitting memorial to what remains the bloodiest single-day battle in American history.
The Lost Boys
Although they faced serious punishment or being labeled as shirkers (or worse), soldiers on both sides regularly took temporary and unauthorized leaves from their armies—and often for good reason.
By Kathryn S. Meier
Wonder, Delight, Astonishment & The Art of Deception
From famous names to moonlighting soldiers, practitioners of magic had a (sleight of) hand in lifting civilian and military spirits during the war—particularly in the South.
By Edward T. Cotham Jr.
Departments
Editorial: James Hope’s Antietam
Salvo: Facts, Figures & Items of Interest
Travels: A Visit to Harpers Ferry
Voices: War & Whiskey
Figures: The Soldier’s Ration
Primer: The (Other) Things They Carried
Preservation: Civil War in the Classroom
Disunion: White House on the Pamunkey
In Focus: Batter Up!
Casualties of War: P.T. Barnum’s Menagerie
Battlefield Echoes: The Mud March and the Tyrrany of Bad Weather
Books & Authors:
Essential Reading on the Maryland Campaign of 1862
By Brian Matthew Jordan
Musings of a Civil War Bibliophile: The Varieties of Primary
Civil War Evidence
By Robert K. Krick
Parting Shot: A Close Call