Odds are there isn’t a Civil War buff living who hasn’t seen a copy of this remarkable pencil sketch (above) by special artist Edwin Forbes, which Forbes labeled as “William J. Jackson, Sergt. Maj. 12th N.Y. Vol.—Sketched at Stoneman’s Switch, near Fredricksburg [sic], Va. Jan. 27th, 1863.” The young noncom has gazed back at us across the years from countless publications and exhibits. Rendered with camera-like honesty, it is arguably among the best drawings of a common soldier done during the Civil War. Writing about his work in general, Forbes assured viewers, “fidelity to fact is… the first thing to be aimed at.”

In fact, once Forbes completed his drawing of Jackson, the sketch went virtually unseen for more than 80 years. The drawing was among several hundred illustrations Forbes made while covering the Army of the Potomac for Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper from the spring of 1862 to the fall of 1864. Approximately 150 of Forbes’ wartime sketches were engraved and printed in the illustrated newspaper during that period, although his drawing of Jackson was not among them.

After the war, Forbes retained most of his original illustrations. Many he reworked into more polished drawings; some into oil paintings. He fashioned scores of them into award-winning etchings. Many appeared in his books, Life Studies of the Great Army (1876) and Thirty Years After: An Artist’s Story of the Great War (1890). Again, the poignant sketch of the beardless sergeant major from the 12th New York Infantry was not included.

Following Forbes’ death in March 1895, his wife, Ida, maintained his portfolio of original artwork, where the Jackson sketch was catalogued, “Study of an Infantry Soldier — The Sergeant Major.” She eventually sold the entire collection for $25,000 to financier J.P. Morgan in January 1901. Eighteen years later, on the heels of World War I, Morgan’s estate donated the collection to the Library of Congress, its current home. The sketch of William Jackson remained out of the public eye for another quarter-century until it resurfaced during World War II, thanks to the efforts of a U.S. Army private.

Private Lincoln Kirstein, however, was not your ordinary ground-pounder. Born into wealth, the Harvard educated Kirstein was well-connected socially, channeling his “energy, intellect, and organizational skills to serve the art world.” By age 36, when he was inducted into the Army in early 1943, Kirstein had already published several books, co-founded The Harvard Society for Contemporary Art, and later, The School of American Ballet in New York City with renown Russian choreographer George Balanchine.

Following his basic training at Fort Dix, N.J., Kirstein was posted at Fort Belvoir, Va., charged with writing training manuals. “I am an old man,” he confided to a friend, “and find the going very hard.” To fill his idle hours, he conceived an idea to collect and document American solider-art. “[M]uch of their work is interesting,” Kirstein wrote, “and some of it is beautiful.” He soon expanded his survey to include “U.S. battle art through time.” His plans included a “large-scale exhibit and a book.”

Aided by some influential friends, including Pulitzer Prize–winning poet and then Librarian of Congress Archibald MacLeish, Kirstein gathered material from various sources, including the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and, of course, the Library of Congress. Thanks to his efforts, Forbes’ sketch of “Sergt. Maj. William J. Jackson” emerged from obscurity.

The efforts culminated in the exhibition of American Battle Art at the Library of Congress staged from July 4 through November 1, 1944. Three years later, the Library of Congress issued the book that Kirstein had envisioned. Titled An Album of American Battle Art, 1755-1918, the heavily illustrated volume “took its origin” largely from the wartime exhibit. Forbes’ portrait of William J. Jackson appeared in print for the first time, captioned “a solemn lad with his arm resting on his rifle…toughened by campaigning.”​

A Perilous Start

Jackson may have been “toughened” early in life. The son of Irish immigrants, he was born in New York City’s Greenwich Village on June 8, 1841, the first of four boys. His father, also named William, worked as a mason. The family grew in time, and moved from tenement to tenement, though always remained in proximity to Washington Square. The surrounding web of narrow streets flanked by a tumble of brick and framed dwellings and small businesses was an Irish enclave in the city’s 9th Ward facing the Hudson River.

It was a tough neighborhood. “Boys were primitive in those days,” wrote one of Jackson’s contemporaries. “They were like the old time warring clans. Every avenue was arrayed against the other.” Tensions bubbled within the city’s growing Irish immigrant population where clashes were common.

One notorious encounter erupted within a stone’s throw of Jackson’s home when he was 12. On July 4, 1853, streets echoed “the popping, fizzing, whirring and banging sounds” of fireworks as crowds of green-clad Irish revelers celebrated Independence Day. They ended up battling one another. “At one time several hundred men were…hurling stones and other missiles…” trumpeted The New York Herald next day. Platoons of policemen from nearby precincts aided by two fire companies “succeeded in subduing the riot…” Nearly 40 Irishmen were arrested, reported the Herald, “all of whom bore the strong evidences of an impression made on their heads by a contact against the policemen’s clubs.”

Battles of another kind rocked William’s world when civil war erupted on April 12, 1861. The 19-year-old left his parents and his job as a clerk a week later, on April 19, to enlist in the 12th Regiment New York State Militia, Company F. A recruiting office was just blocks from his home.

Tendered for immediate service by its commander, Colonel Daniel Butterfield, the regiment also included in its ranks the future Maj. Gen. Francis C. Barlow when it sailed from New York on April 21, bound for Washington, D.C. Though fully armed, the unit lacked enough uniforms to go around. Raw recruits like Jackson wore “their ordinary clothing with military belts and equipment,” giving them, by one account, a “guerrilla like,” appearance. Appearances changed when a new Chasseur uniform was issued to the regiment at Camp Anderson in Washington early in May 1861. The militiamen were also mustered into Federal service for three months while there, and received a “severe course of drilling.” Barlow was mustered in as a first lieutenant in Company F.

One of their Camp Anderson instructors also distinguished himself later in the war. Emory Upton, fresh from graduation at West Point, would achieve the rank of Brevet Maj. Gen., and eventually become superintendent of U.S. Military Academy. Upton found that tutoring the 12th New Yorkers was tiresome. “I do not complain,” he wrote, “when I think how much harder the poor privates have to work.”

Their crash course in soldiering quickly paid off. Before dawn May 24, the 12th New York led Union forces over Long Bridge to occupy Alexandria, Va., and fortify Arlington Heights in the wake of that state’s secession from the Union the day before. Jackson was among the first Union infantrymen to set foot on Rebel soil.

Jackson continued his trek through enemy country when the regiment joined Maj. Gen. Robert Patterson’s army at Martinsburg, Va., on July 7, 1861. The men patrolled and picketed environs of the Lower Shenandoah Valley until their expiration of service on August 2, when the unit returned to New York. Following a march down Broadway and Fifth Avenues on Monday August 5, the regiment formally mustered out at Washington Square, near Jackson’s home.

Quick Return to the Fray

Jackson’s homecoming was brief. He reenlisted October 1, 1861, and mustered into Federal service for three years, a member of Co. F, 12th New York Volunteer Infantry. Dubbed the “Onondaga” Regiment, its ranks had originally been filled with short term volunteers from near Syracuse and Elmira, N.Y., in May 1861. After the Union debacle at First Bull Run in July 1861, the regiment recruited around the state including in New York City where Jackson signed on. Perhaps showing potential from his recent militia service, William was immediately appointed sergeant.

Recruits ferried over the Hudson River from Manhattan to Jersey City, N.J., and boarded trains for the trip south to join the regiment then on duty in defenses outside Washington, D.C. Recalled another New York volunteer who made the trip about the time Jackson did, “the cars were crowded and the ride was slow, cold and tedious.”

From Washington, the novice soldiers crossed Chain Bridge over the Potomac River into Virginia. Union Army engineers had fortified the landscape to defend the Capital. “Every mile is a fort,” marveled Private Van Rensselaer Evringham, Co. I, 12th New York. “There is thousands of acres here that have been cut down & left on the ground to prevent the Rebels coming by surprise…it would take 50 years to bring everything back to its former state.”

The 12th New York, given the moniker “the durty dozen,” according to Evringham, joined scores of other raw regiments manning fortifications throughout the fall and winter 1861–62, while they trained for combat ahead. Jackson’s Co. F, with four other companies from the 12th garrisoned Fort Ramsay, located on the crest of Upton’s Hill, about a half mile east of Falls Church, Va. They also furnished a daily guard “to protect the guns in Fort Buffalo” nearby. The regiment’s remaining companies manned Fort Craig, and Fort Tillinghast. They occasionally traded shots with Rebel forces, “but to little effect,” wrote a New York diarist.

On March 21, 1862, Jackson and tent-mates were ordered off Upton’s Hill to Alexandria, Va. Next morning, boarding the transport John A. Warner to the strains of Dixie, they steamed down the Potomac River to Chesapeake Bay. In a letter to his parents, Private Homer Case, of Co. I, confided: “We did not know where we was a going.”

After two days aboard ship, Jackson and “the durty dozen” landed at Hampton, Va., embarked on Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan’s offensive to take the Confederate capital at Richmond. Hard marching through steaming pine thickets and swampy bottom lands on narrow, crowded, often rain-mired roads marked the campaign. Private Sid Anderson, Co. H, quipped of “mud clear up to the seat of our unmentionables.” While Private Evringham claimed, “Virginnie is 2/3 woods or swamps.”

Under Brig. Gen. Fitz John Porter’s command during the fruitless Union thrust up the Peninsula, the 12th New York saw action at the Siege of Yorktown, the battles of Gaines’s Mill and Malvern Hill, and numerous skirmishes in between. Afterward, the New Yorkers languished at Harrison’s Landing until mid-August when they trudged to Newport News. From here they traveled by steamer to Aquia Creek; then by railroad to Falmouth, and on by foot to join Maj. Gen. John Pope’s ill-fated Army of Virginia near Manassas, Va. “We marched thirteen days…with little rest,” wrote Private Robert Tilney, Co. F., “part of the time on half rations…”

At the Second Battle of Bull Run, the Onondagans engaged in bloody afternoon assaults on August 30, against Confederate Gen. Stonewall Jackson’s position astride the railroad cut. “We poured volley after volley into the concealed enemy,” recalled one New Yorker. Rebel return fire shredded the Union foot soldiers, “woefully thinning” their ranks. Nearly a third of the 12th New York became casualties.

Facing Lee’s army at Sharpsburg on September 17, Sergeant Jackson likely had mixed emotions while he and his regiment stood in reserve with Porter’s 5th Corps, mere spectators to the bloody Battle of Antietam. The Sharpsburg area remained Jackson’s home through the end of October 1862, when the regiment advanced via Snicker’s Gap and Warrenton, to the Rappahannock River where the Army of the Potomac arrayed opposite Fredericksburg. The boyish-looking sergeant would earn three more stripes during the ensuing battle.

Jackson’s regiment with Brig. Gen. Charles Griffin’s division occupied Stafford Heights when the Battle of Fredericksburg opened on December 13. They crossed the lower pontoon bridge in early afternoon, struggling through debris in Fredericksburg amid what one New Yorker described as “a shower of aimless bullets.” The regiment advanced to a shallow fold in the ground about 500 yards from Rebels posted at the stone wall on Marye’s Heights. “[T]his position,” reported brigade commander Colonel T.B.D. Stockton, “was much exposed to the cross-fire of the enemy’s guns…”

Stockton’s Brigade charged the stone wall just before sundown. The 12th New York missed the bugle signal to advance in the din of battle, though soon recovered, sweeping forward. They met a maelstrom of shot and shell “on both front and side,” wrote Stockton. The New Yorkers piled into the tangled mass of bluecoats already stalled at the foot of Marye’s Heights and went no farther. Ordered to hold their exposed position under enemy fire throughout the night Stockton’s men were bait for Rebel sharpshooters and artillery until relieved about 10 p.m. December 14. It was “all a person’s life is worth to go to or come from there,” wrote a newspaperman. Young Jackson suffered a gunshot wound to his left leg below the knee that day.

When Union Maj. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside ordered his battered army back to its old camps north of the Rappahannock on December 16, Jackson returned as a sergeant major. He had been promoted the day before, likely to fill a vacancy caused by the battle.

Jackson saw little combat after the Battle of Fredericksburg. The 5th Corps wintered in a small metropolis of timber and canvas huts near Stoneman’s Switch, a supply depot along the railroad several miles north of Fredericksburg, where the 12th New York engaged in an “uneventful round of camp and picket duty.” It’s uncertain whether Jackson’s injured leg kept him from chores, or prevented him from joining Burnside’s inglorious “Mud March” in pitiless wind and rain storms January 20–24.

By January 27, however, the 21-year-old Jackson, with bayonetted rifle, his greatcoat tightly gathered at the waist, was able to stand still long enough for special artist Edwin Forbes to capture him on paper. The artist clearly shows that Jackson placed his weight on his right foot. No evidence has surfaced to indicate Jackson and Forbes knew each other, or ever met again after the drawing was completed, though Forbes remained in the area depicting numerous scenes around the Stoneman’s Switch camps that winter.

In late April 1863, the 12th New York was reduced to battalion-size when five “two-year companies” were mustered out of the army. Jackson and the remaining companies with the 5th Corps followed Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker to Chancellorsville, Va., in early May. During the battle there, the New Yorkers were employed “making rifle-pits and abatis” on the fringe of the fighting. “[I]n this position,” recalled a private in Company D, “we saw the fires in the woods which the artillery had kindled, and heard the cries of the wounded.”

Expiration of service further reduced ranks of the regiment after the Battle of Chancellorsville. Jackson and other “three-year” men were then consolidated in a two-company provost guard. The contingent moved with 5th Corps headquarters when the Army of the Potomac pursued Lee’s Rebels toward Pennsylvania. “Our troops had been on the march for many days,” wrote the Company D soldier, “bivouacking at night in the open air, and were dirty and travel-stained with the heat and sun of late June.” This ordeal ended abruptly for Jackson on June 30. On the eve of the Battle of Gettysburg, at a camp near Frederick, Md., Sgt. Maj. Jackson was granted an early discharge from the army “by reason of being rendered supernumerary…” (surplus due to the consolidation).

​​Battle With Postwar Bureaucracy

Jackson returned to New York City and married in 1865. Employed as a clerk/salesman, he and his wife, Maria, set up housekeeping in Brooklyn. Over time, they were blessed with three daughters. Elizabeth, their first child, born in 1866, suffered from an unspecified disability and likely remained homebound until her death in April 1891. Margaret, born in 1869, worked as a file clerk, remained single, and passed away in 1920. Ellen, or Nelly, Jackson, who was born in 1871, was also employed as a clerk, and unmarried. She lived well into the 20th Century, passing away in October 1945.

Outside his family and job, William Jackson had enrolled in the Old Guard Association of the Twelfth Regiment N.G.S.N.Y., and in “The Lafayette Fusileers,” antecedents of the units he served with during the war. The rigors of his army service eventually took a toll on Jackson’s health later in life.

At age 51, Jackson filed his first claim for an Invalid Pension in June 1892. The former sergeant major supplied a laundry list of disabilities on his application form: “[A]lmost constant superficial pain in right chest & some in legs…pain & violent beating in heart…weakness – can’t lift anything.” His “gunshot wound of left leg” was cited. In sum he was “Physically unable to earn a support by manual labor.” Military medical records also show Jackson had been treated for “Gonorrhoia” [sic] on November 13, 1861. (Perhaps the result from a visit to one of the hundreds of brothels around Washington, D.C., while his regiment was on garrisoned duty.)

Jackson’s claim was rejected, “on the ground of no pensionable disability…under Act of June 27, 1890.” It wasn’t until President Theodore Roosevelt had signed an Executive Order for Old Age Pensions declaring all veterans over the age of 62 to be eligible for a pension that Jackson was finally granted $6 per month beginning May 10, 1904.

The reward would be short-lived. On April 11, 1905, following Maria’s death that January, William J. Jackson died. He and his wife rest with their three daughters under a single headstone at Cedar Grove Cemetery in Flushing, N.Y.
​
​George Skoch, a longtime contributor, writes from Fairview Park, Ohio.

When 21-year-old Arthur McKinstry left Chautauqua County, N.Y., in early June 1861 to join the Excelsior Brigade being raised by then-Colonel Daniel Sickles, he was better prepared to write than fight. Upon reaching the unit’s camp of instruction on Staten Island, Arthur wrote to his mother revealing that his Uncle Willard had given him “a portable ink stand and all sorts of stationery and writing materials,” to take along, “in order…I might keep him posted as to our movements.”

His uncle had an ulterior motive, however. Willard, and Arthur’s uncle Winthrop, owned and operated the Fredonia Censor, a local weekly newspaper. They intended to publish Arthur’s letters. What better way to enlighten and attract new readers?

Rick Barram, a retired history teacher, brings Arthur’s Censor letters—preserved at the Darwin R. Barker Historical Museum in Fredonia, N.Y.—“into the light,” and also includes a second collection of letters—from Mississippi State University—that Arthur wrote to his mother and other relatives. Dear Uncles presents these letters “in their entirety…,” Barram notes, “to understand the full scope of Arthur’s experiences.”

Arthur’s letters became a staple of the Censor’s war coverage, appearing in a column headed Dear Uncles.

Nearly six dozen additional “letters, reports, and letters not written by Arthur” also appear in Dear Uncles. They pop up as sidebars throughout the book. Barram titles these supplements “Other Voices,” intended “to provide context and otherwise illuminate Arthur’s writings and experiences.”

Arthur was uniquely prepared for his role as correspondent. “Articulate and well read,” at age 15 he entered the U.S. Naval Academy in the fall of 1854. He quickly squandered his time there, however. Amassing demerits for misconduct, and ranking near the bottom of his class academically, Arthur was judged “unfit” and dismissed.

Perhaps as atonement for his failures at Annapolis, Arthur was early to answer the call to arms when Civil War flared. Mustered into the 3rd Regiment of the Excelsior Brigade, later designated the 72nd New York Infantry, the regiment patrolled the Lower Potomac River by the fall of 1861.

Arthur’s letters mirror the youngster’s experiences in the first flush of soldiering. He frequently recounts the relentless grind of drilling and picket duty. He often comments on the weather, and more often about the food. “[T]he average of our men do not get enough to satisfy hunger…,” he writes facetiously. “On the whole, we do not fare quite as well as State prison convicts…”

Arthur occasionally spices his writing with his opinions about camp mates and officers. “Our regiment is a choice one,” he claims, “but over on the right of camp are the ‘roughs’ from the city. They are a rascally set and we keep a constant guard which effectually prevents thefts.”

Even Dan Sickles, now a brigadier, fails to escape a double-edged assessment. He “displayed great energy and patriotism in the raising and equipment of the brigade,” writes Arthur. “He has governed it however in a civilian manner…evidently incompetent to personally maneuver the brigade.”

Arthur grew to relish his journalist role. “I find that it is a very nice thing to be the correspondent of the Censor for I notice that the officers had rather have a good word there rather than a bad one,” he wrote. “Take it all together I am about as well off as a private can be.”

His writing would benefit his comrades from time to time. At their urging “to state the facts,” Arthur exposed a sutler who “practices a system of extortion upon the soldiers of the Brigade.”

Little more than a month later, Arthur was able to report, “We have a new sutler here and he is more reasonable than the old.”

Arthur was a keen observer. Little escaped his notice. He could be prescient, writing in December 1861: “I really think, from the present appearance of things, that this war will eventually prove the death blow of Slavery.”

He also wrote with prescience to the Censor on May 4, 1862, beginning his letter, “My time is extremely short…” Hours later, Arthur’s pen was stilled forever when he was killed at the Battle of Williamsburg, “shot through the leg and groin.”  

Arthur was pleased when an officer called him a “writing man.” But even Arthur cautioned his readers, “It would be tedious to tell of all the shifts we soldiers make…” This can be a cautionary tale for readers of Dear Uncles.

There is much here that will appeal to readers; at times perhaps too much. For example, by alternating between verbatim letters Arthur wrote to his uncles, with letters he wrote to his mother and others, typically at or near the same time, his comments are often repeated and duplicated.

To this mix Barram embeds two categories of notes throughout the text. These are meant to define or explain “foreign words” and other references that Arthur is prone to use. Such notes appear repeatedly, and impart a choppiness to the flow of narrative.

In the final chapter, and a concise epilogue, Barram provides a brief history of the Excelsior Brigade with interesting information about “the fate of Arthur’s mates.” Numerous photographs, maps, and illustrations further enhance the text.

Dear Uncles offers a bounty of information particularly to students of the Excelsior Brigade. The book also provides a unique glimpse of the often-overlooked actions along the Lower Potomac River early in the war.

“[R]eaders of the Fredonia Censor,” writes Barram, “were able to follow the adventures of their Chautauqua County boys thanks to Arthur McKinstry and his uncles.” Readers of Dear Uncles are now able to follow Arthur McKinstry’s tales thanks to the efforts of Rick Barram.

Dear Uncles

The Civil War Letters of Arthur McKinstry, A Soldier in the Excelsior Brigade

Edited by Rick Barram, Excelsior, 2023

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About mid-morning on a “Warm and Plesent” Christmas Eve in 1862, Union Colonel William H. Graves peered through field glasses at what looked to be “three brigades” of Confederate cavalry or mounted infantry maneuvering through fields and scattered timber just east of Middleburg, Tenn. The 26-year-old Graves commanded the 12th Michigan Infantry garrison there. Only 115 officers and men comprised his ranks in town. The balance of his command occupied small guard posts along the Mississippi Central Railroad, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s main avenue of supplies for his first offensive against the Rebel bastion at Vicksburg, Miss.

Young Graves knew the odds were heavily stacked against him when he spied an enemy horseman approach under a flag of truce. “I met the bearer a short distance in front of my block-house,” he recalled.

“Who is in command?” demanded the enemy rider, a cavalry staff officer.

“I am,” Graves replied. In a holiday spirit, perhaps, Graves had been “playing ball” with some of his men earlier that morning and wore a plain fatigue coat without any sign of rank. His pants were carelessly tucked into his boots.

The Confederate surveyed Graves “from head to foot” and then demanded “an unconditional and immediate surrender in the name of Colonel Griffith commanding [the] Texas brigade.”

“I did not like the manner of the bearer of the flag,” Graves recalled. “He appeared pompous and overbearing…” Graves replied that he “would surrender when whipped, and that while he was getting a meal we would try and get a mouthful.”

“That is what you say, is it?” replied the flag-bearer.

“That is what I say,” returned Graves.

At this, the gray-clad rider abruptly wheeled his mount and spurred back to his lines. Graves hurried over to a crude breastwork his men had fashioned of thick wood planks. The gritty colonel had scarcely joined his men inside the rough timber strongpoint when bullets began to fly.

The 12th Michigan had already faced its share of adversity before coming to Middleburg early in November 1862. Mustered into United States service nearly a thousand strong on March 5, 1862, the regiment was assigned to the Army of the Tennessee at Pittsburg Landing, Tenn., part of Everett Peabody’s 1st Brigade in Brig. Gen. Benjamin M. Prentiss’ 6th Division. The Wolverines’ campsite was among the first targets hit during the massive Confederate assault that opened the Battle of Shiloh on April 6. “[W]e were drove back,” a Michigan private lamented, “they took all of our clothing.” Later that day, the 12th was in the vortex of combat in the Hornets’ Nest “amid the most dreadful carnage.”

After the battle, minus the fresh clothing and camp equipment that had fallen into enemy hands, the regiment suffered through days of wet, chilly weather. Diarrhea and dysentery swept its ranks. When the Federal army under Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck began to advance on Corinth, Miss., in late April, the 12th’s regimental surgeon reported that “just over three hundred men were able to go forward.”

The regiment also had suffered under the frightful leadership of Colonel Francis Quinn. A political appointee lacking military and social skills, Quinn abused subordinates and enlisted men alike. The regiment’s quartermaster, a Quinn selection bent on personal gain, also neglected the soldiers’ welfare. In a July 1, 1862, report about the regiment, corps commander Maj. Gen. John A. McClernand wrote, “They are undisciplined, disorganized, and deficient in numbers.”

When word of the regiment’s plight reached the Michigan state capital, Governor Austin Blair fired a sharp telegram to Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton. Blair condemned Quinn as “the worst colonel I ever saw [who] has made more trouble than all the rest put together.” The specter of court-martial compelled Quinn and others of his staff to resign. Command of the 12th Michigan then passed to Lt. Col. William H. Graves.

The battle-tested Graves had served as captain in the 1st Michigan Infantry (a three-month unit) and had been wounded July 21, 1861, while on the firing line at First Bull Run. Described as “kind yet firm, sympathetic and brave,” Graves quickly revived the 12th Michigan. He led the regiment to Bolivar, Tenn., arriving by July 18, 1862.

The seat of Hardeman County, Bolivar perched on a bluff where the Mississippi Central Railroad spanned the Hatchie River. The once-picturesque town was now a fortified supply hub and hive of military activity for the Union advance in western Tennessee.

Bolivar was also home to a bustling “contraband” camp, with hundreds of freedmen employed to erect fortifications around the cantonment. “[T]heir faces were the only pleasant ones we saw when we entered the town,” recalled Samuel H. Eells, the 12th Michigan’s hospital steward. “[T]hey come into the camp every day bringing corn-cakes, pies, buttermilk, eggs and etc.” Eells’ conduct with the former slaves would take a disturbing turn in weeks to come.

The importance of Bolivar to Grant’s advance in western Tennessee and northern Mississippi made the town a prime target. A mix of Confederate regular and partisan forces preyed on the tenuous rail network. “Every foot of the railroad had to be vigilantly watched to prevent it from being torn up,” noted a Federal soldier. “One man with a crow-bar…could remove a rail…and cause a disastrous wreck…” Within days of the 12th’s arrival at Bolivar, mounted gray raiders struck the depot at Hickory Valley, only 10 miles south of town, leaving it “a smouldering ruin.”

Graves shifted his men from one hot spot to another as guerrilla activities dictated. Even shuttling to new locations via the very railroads they guarded became risky. On September 24, “a bunch of the 12th Michigan…were frightfully crushed and mangled…” when the rails suddenly parted for an undetermined reason and the flatcar they were riding “was torn to splinters.”

Soon after the accident, the regiment was on the move again. Toting three-day rations, the Wolverines trudged southeast with Maj. Gen. Stephen Hurlbut’s division at daylight on October 4. They moved to the sound of “heavy firing” from the fighting at Corinth. “Marched all day went for miles,” wrote Private Clark Koon of Company G, “[and] had a squrmish with the Rebles Advance killing thre and taking 40 prisioner [sic].”

The Michiganders covered more than 20 miles that day as General Hurlbut struck units of Confederate Maj. Gen. Earl Van Dorn’s Army of West Tennessee near Pocahontas, Tenn. Van Dorn was on the run after the Confederate retreat at Corinth when the Federals confronted his troops at Davis’ Bridge over the Hatchie River.

Koon recalled the next morning’s contest at the crossing:

“[W]e got down to the river…while the rebles wer throwing their shells over us When Gen Hulburt came up to Col Graves and sayed who will volenteer to cross the Brig for their is non will go Col Graves sayed his 12 Mich would if the Dr L. [Dear Lord] stands before them and over we went while the Enemy was pouring their Grape & Canister over us but we Gained the hights and in less then a [h]our the field was ours.”

The 12th Michigan was praised for its “prompt, fearless, and energetic conduct” at Davis’ Bridge, but there were 570 Union casualties and Van Dorn had managed to escape.

On the heels of the Union victories at Corinth and Davis’ Bridge, Grant drove deeper south. By November 4, bluecoats occupied key transport centers at La Grange and Grand Junction, Tenn. That same day, the 12th Michigan occupied Middleburg, Tenn.

A Methodist Church, a brick hotel, and a two-story “brick store, owned…by a near relative of President James K. Polk” formed the heart of Middleburg. A post office, “a number of log stores, a small woolen mill…blacksmith shops, several saloons,” and various dwellings extended the town along the main road. Beyond the settlement, a lattice of woodlots and farmland covered rolling countryside. Cotton was the main crop in the region. Bales were loaded on railcars from a sturdy wooden platform close to town.

Graves made it clear to his men that they would be staying at Middleburg for a while. They were responsible for guarding the rails seven miles north to Bolivar and three miles south to the town of Hickory Valley—an occupation that produced mixed feelings. A bitter townsman recalled, “Soldiers stacked their arms about the log school house…while the pupils were inside reciting.” Another chronicler bemoaned the 12th “as devilish a lot as ever came South.” Eells, however, helped out by tending to civilian patients, noting, “The doctors here are a poor set…”

Eells, though, resorted to some extreme medical practices while in Middleburg. In an upper room of the Methodist Church serving as regimental hospital, the medical staff routinely kept a cadaver “or two.” The corpses were obtained from Bolivar’s contraband camp, where Eells revealed, “they are dying at the rate of three or four a day.” In a letter home on November 25, Eells admitted he was “going into dissection pretty strong” to enhance his surgical skills.

Meanwhile, the bulk of Grant’s army pressed into northern Mississippi. By December 3, Grant established his main supply depot at Holly Springs, 20 miles south of the border. Each southward step Grant took increased the risk to Middleburg and other posts on his railborne lifeline.

Graves received a blunt directive from his district commander, Brig. Gen. Jeremiah C. Sullivan, on December 3: “[G]uerrilla bands are moving with intention of burning railroad stations, tanks, and bridges…attack will be sudden but must be repelled.” Possibly in response to this dictate, Graves had loopholes cut in the walls of the hotel and store. Barricades went up at windows and doors. And the cotton-loading platform beside the railroad was converted to a rude fortification. Planks were “taken from the top,” an officer recalled, “and put around the sides.” The double timbers were then cut to accommodate the regiment’s Austrian rifle-muskets, and a “small log house formerly used for a grocery” became a strongpoint.

In mid-December, Federal works at Middleburg and elsewhere were put to the test when Rebel forces launched concerted efforts to stop Grant.

Confederate Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton, responsible for defending Vicksburg, first blocked Grant’s progress just below Oxford, Miss. He then launched three mounted brigades—3,500 men—under Van Dorn 30 miles behind the Federals. The architect of the raid, Lt. Col. John S. Griffith, commanded the 1st Texas Brigade; Colonel William H. “Red” Jackson led a small brigade of Tennesseans; and Colonel Robert “Black Bob” McCulloch had a regiment each from Missouri and Mississippi.

Van Dorn surprised and obliterated Grant’s main supply base at Holly Springs on December 20. After reducing $1.5 million worth of Yankee goods to cinders, the raiders galloped north that night. The next day, they cut telegraph wires, ripped up rails, and attacked isolated Union outposts. Many of the Rebels were garbed in captured blue overcoats. “The men rode…in high glee,” recalled one raider.

When December 22 dawned, Van Dorn’s jubilant horsemen were across the Tennessee state line. Skirting the Yankee strongpoint at Grand Junction, Van Dorn harassed enemy posts at La Grange, Moscow, and Somerville. The next evening, the Confederates bivouacked along Clear Creek, five miles northwest of Bolivar. “It was said,” wrote a Tennessee cavalryman, “we would repeat the Holly Springs business at Bolivar…and there spend a jolly Christmas.”

At Middleburg on December 22, Graves sent a note to Colonel John W. Sprague, in temporary command at Bolivar, warning “that a large force of rebels are marching on this way.” He also put the 12th Michigan on alert. Enemy cavalry was prowling. Despite the warning, Koon penciled in his diary the next day that “John Ploof ”—from Koon’s Company G–—was “taken pris and Perrowled.”

On Christmas Eve, Koon and Companies D, E, G, and K of the 12th “got reddy for the Reb again at 5 A.M.” They stockpiled water and extra munitions in their crude wooden redoubt. When tensions eased somewhat, Graves joined his men in a game of baseball, and Lt. Col. Dwight May of his staff left for Bolivar to attend a “military commission.”

About two miles from town, May saw horsemen approaching, clad in blue overcoats. Alerted by the “suspicious movements” of the riders, and the “peculiar gait” of their mounts, May reined his horse to use his field glasses for a closer look. That drew gunshots from the strangers and shouts for him to halt. May promptly reversed course and galloped back to Middleburg.

May had run smack into an advance party of Van Dorn’s troopers from Bolivar, donned in uniforms they had pilfered from Holly Springs. After discovering that Bolivar had been reinforced overnight by Union Colonel Benjamin H. Grierson’s brigade of cavalry and was now too well-fortified for direct assault, Van Dorn instead feigned an attack before sunrise and passed through the western outskirts of town. He had also dispatched a strong column under Colonel Griffith to strike directly at Middleburg.

May, on a fresher horse, reached Middleburg well ahead of Griffith’s advance riders and sounded the alarm. Michigan riflemen scrambled to their prepared positions while the quartermaster “sent his teams and such stores as could be thrown on the wagons out of the way.” Grabbing his field glasses, Graves hurried to a nearby rise for a better look. “[T]he Rebles have come at last,” Koon scribbled in his diary.

Graves trained his glasses on the sparse December landscape east of Middleburg, when “the enemy appeared in line of battle as infantry.” He soon spotted the enemy envoy approaching on horseback with white flag in hand, “thinking, I suppose, they had a sure thing on us.” As soon as their brief, fruitless meeting ended, Graves “double-quicked it to the block-house.”

During the parley, a long line of Texans with skirmishers out front had worked their way up the gentle slope from bottomland east of the Mississippi Central tracks. They moved steadily over bare fields and through groves of evergreens and leafless oak trees to the top of the rise. A broad “open space intervened” in the face of Union strongpoints. It was “the prettiest line of battle in action I saw in the whole war,” wrote a Rebel observer. They opened fire as they came forward.

“The enemy advanced until I fired a musket,” Graves wrote, a reference to the signal upon which his men were to fire. What “seemed a living sheet of flame” to one Texan suddenly erupted from the well-concealed Union defenses. A “leaden hail” poured from the cotton platform breastwork beside the railroad embankment while rifle fire erupted from the fortified buildings in Middleburg, which overlooked the tracks. “Our men sunk away like stubble before a fire,” recalled a Texan.

After that first volley, “the enemy broke up in confusion,” recalled Graves, “and sought log buildings and ditches.” The shaken Rebels regrouped and began trading shots with the stubborn bluecoats. Noted a Union correspondent: “[T]he enemy tried several times to draw us out of our fortifications.”

Confederate storming parties scurried over the no man’s land in the face of destructive fire from troops ensconced in what one Southerner termed their “miniature forts.” Graves’ men repulsed each sortie in turn. “[W]e was whare thay couldent get at us,” a defender recalled, “[T]hay said that the yankeys craled in a hoal.”

At least one civilian was caught in the crossfire. William W. Casselberry, overseer on a local plantation, was in the store when the fighting suddenly erupted. With seven children at home, including a 1-year-old, the Christmas Eve morning sojourn to town may have been for gifts. During a lull in the battle, he was peering through a window when a gunshot shattered a pane. Glass shards flew in all directions, slightly wounding Casselberry. He spent the rest of the battle crouched in a hallway.

Gunshots also took a mounting toll on attackers. “[W]e were pushed forward,” grumbled one Lone Star Confederate, “without even knowing where or how the enemy was situated, or what their strength.” Another Confederate labeled the Middleburg assaults “useless and reckless.” One Unionist claimed several attackers “came in to surrender themselves as prisoners.”

The fusillade echoed in Middleburg for two hours before Van Dorn arrived from Bolivar with Jackson’s and McCulloch’s brigades. Fourteen hundred Yankee horse soldiers led by the aggressive Grierson were barking at their heels.

Without artillery to blast the feisty garrison out of Middleburg, Van Dorn decided it was time Griffith disengaged. “After losing many valuable lives, to no purpose,” a disgruntled Rebel wrote, “we proceeded on our retreat at a break-neck pace, the enemy’s cavalry moving to intercept us.”

Van Dorn intended to rejoin Pemberton’s army near Grenada, Miss. That night his command sped southward through Van Buren and camped a few miles below Saulsbury, near the Mississippi border and more than a dozen miles from Middleburg.

When darkness halted his pursuit of Van Dorn, the tenacious Grierson bivouacked at Saulsbury. From here, the colonel sent a dispatch to Grant: “I am camped within 2½ miles of the enemy. I…will follow them to their den.” Back in Middleburg an uneasy peace settled over town.

Graves reported losses from the Middleburg clash totaling six wounded, “1 since dead, and prisoners, 13.” The death, though, might have been accidental. In a letter home just days after the battle, Private James Ewing, Company G, revealed, “one of the Boys shot himself and dide.”

The 12th had lost sundry “camp equipage, &c…” including, “a valuable horse…[and] my overcoat, dress-coat, &c.” Graves reported. “But so far as I am concerned they are welcome to all…The enemy finally left us ‘monarchs of all we surveyed.’”

A reliable count of Confederate casualties wasn’t possible. Some of their dead were buried elsewhere, and they “carried off quite a number of their wounded.” Graves, though, was “satisfied in my own mind that the rebels loss, in killed, wounded, and prisoners, exceeds 100 men….Their loss would have been much greater had it not been for some half a dozen houses that afforded them shelter.”

Grant praised “the gallant Twelfth Michigan” for its “heroic defense” of Middleburg against “an enemy many times their number.” The regiment, Grant boasted, was “entitled to inscribe….Middleburg, with the names of other battle-fields made victorious by their valor and discipline.”

And Mr. Casselberry? The story goes, “It was long after the last gun had been fired before he could be persuaded to get his mule and go home….[F]or days afterward, he was nervous whenever he looked out a window.” One may also imagine that for years to come the Casselberry children (eventually numbering 11) were regaled with chilling tales of their dad’s experiences during the fight before Christmas.

George Skoch, who writes from Fairview Park, Ohio, is co-author of the book Mine Run: A Campaign of Lost Opportunities–October 21, 1863–May 1, 1864.

The late afternoon stillness of April 25, 1863, was shattered when scores of Confederate horsemen suddenly charged from the shadows of Greenland Gap in northwest Virginia. Framed by sheer 800-foot sand stone cliffs patrolled by turkey vultures and ravens, the gap was only wide enough for a narrow, rutted road and a boulder-laden tributary of Patterson Creek. Pine, spruce, hemlock and mountain laurel choked the rocky path. Confined by these surroundings, the gray riders galloped forward in a long, slender column.

Ahead of the cavalrymen, a few dozen blue-coated defenders scrambled for cover inside a cluster of sturdy log buildings that commanded the road through the gap. Some of the Union riflemen remained outside and leveled their muskets at the enemy over hastily constructed stone breastworks. When the Rebel riders approached to within 75 yards, Federal muskets flashed. A curtain of bullets left several men and horses dead or writhing on the ground. In about 15 minutes, recalled the Union commander, the enemy rallied and made another attack.

For decades before the Civil War, Greenland Gap had been an important route for settlers through the eastern slopes of the Allegheny Mountains and into the rugged highlands of what is now West Virginia. Located in Hardy (now Grant) County, the gap took its name from the nearby village of Greenland, Va., a community dominated by Protestant separatists known as Brethren and nestled on a secluded crossroads at the western mouth of the pass. From Greenland a road led northward to the important Union transportation and supply hub at New Creek, Va., on the north branch of the Potomac River. Westward from Greenland, the road offered access to other key Union bases at Oakland, Md., and Rowlesburg, Va. The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, the major east–west line that linked the Northern states and was vital to the Federal war effort, passed through each of these centers.

Greenland Gap had begun drawing attention from Confederate and Union military planners earlier in April. The nearly mile-long rock-ribbed gash through New Creek Mountain factored into Confederate Brig. Gen. William E. “Grumble” Jones’ plans for a raid through the region. Jones’ incursion would be part of a two-pronged thrust into western Virginia designed by fellow cavalry commander Brig. Gen. John D. Imboden, who would lead the other arm of the expedition. Their goals were to destroy portions of the B&O; collect cattle, horses and provisions; disrupt the Union-sympathizing Restored Government of Virginia then meeting in Wheeling; and generally harass Federal forces wherever they found them. Confederate General Robert E. Lee had approved the foray and assisted in the planning. He advised the commanders on April 7, “Your movement must be expeditious and bold.” Lee also told his two subordinates to be cautious. “The utmost secrecy must be observed,” he wrote to Jones.

Despite Lee’s admonition about stealth, the Confederates weren’t  able to fully mask their preparations, and Union scouts soon informed Federal authorities that something was afoot in the enemy camps. Union Maj. Gen. Robert C. Schenck, commanding the Middle Department, informed General-in-Chief Henry W. Halleck on the afternoon of April 21 that “many circumstances now tend to indicate that the rebels are preparing to make some movement in force in Western Virginia.”

Union authorities quickly took measures to protect military and railroad installations in the area. To safeguard Greenland Gap, Captain Martin Wallace, with Lieutenant Julius E. Fletcher and 52 men of Company G, 23rd Illinois Infantry, were dispatched to outpost the crossroads at Greenland. Wallace and his detail were proud members of Colonel James A. Mulligan’s tough “Irish Brigade,” as the men of the 23rd called themselves. They marched from their camp at New Creek on the evening of April 21, 1863, slogging through rain and mud all night as they moved toward Greenland Gap.

Earlier that same day Jones launched his raid 70 miles to the southwest. He left his camps at Lacey Spring, near Harrisonburg, Va., with about 2,700 troops of all arms. “Unfavorable weather and the condition of the roads made the first three days to Moorefield exceedingly arduous,” Jones wrote afterward. He had planned to ford the south branch of the Potomac at the village. The rain-swollen river there was impassable, however, and Jones was forced to detour 25 miles farther upstream to the ford at Petersburg (not to be mistaken with the city of Petersburg in southern Virginia). The raging water at Moorefield also forced Jones to leave his foot soldiers and cannons behind. The 2nd Maryland Infantry and Baltimore Light Artillery returned to Harrisonburg.

The conditions at Petersburg were not much better when Jones arrived on April 24. With the timely aid of some courageous citizens who were familiar with the crossing, most of Jones’ command struggled across to the opposite bank. One trooper and several horses drowned in the swift current. More than 200 other men and horses unable or unwilling to cross were left behind. The Confederate force that finally emerged on shore at Petersburg consisted of the 6th, 7th, 11th and 12th Virginia Cavalry regiments; 34th and 35th Virginia Cavalry battalions; and 1st Maryland Cavalry Battalion—approximately 2,000 officers and men. “We were all of course as wet as rats,” recalled Captain Charles T. O’Ferrall of the 12th Virginia.

The force included a small pioneer corps made up of men from each regiment and battalion commanded by Lieutenant William G. Williamson, Confederate States Engineers. Williamson also guided a mule train laden with iron tools and kegs of black powder. The implements and explosives were intended for use against bridges along the B&O.

By day’s end Jones’ command had advanced a few miles north of Petersburg, where the men were issued five days’ rations of hardtack and bedded down for the night. The feisty general was eager to proceed with his mission the next day. According to information he had received, the pass at Greenland was unoccupied.

From the time he had arrived at Greenland Gap early on April 22,  Captain Wallace had been preparing to defend it. He started by converting the Brethren church building into a makeshift fort. Stoutly built of logs and two stories high, the church was perched on a gentle slope about 50 yards south of the road near the mouth of the gap. Only the upper floor of the church had windows. At ground level the doors had been constructed of thick oak and girded with iron bars. “I had had the windows well barricaded,” recalled Wallace, and “the chinking knocked out between the logs” for loopholes. Wallace also preassigned his riflemen to positions in the church and ordered them to be ready to repel any attack.

Wallace earmarked two log houses nearby for strongholds. One cabin to the left sat between the church and the road; the other lay about 50 yards north of the road. Together the three structures formed a triangle and would pose a formidable obstacle to any enemy force attempting to exit the gap. Wallace strengthened his position by erecting stone breastworks near the buildings. Midway through the gap, where the road crossed a small bridge spanning the creek, the captain posted a sergeant and three privates to alert the camp if the enemy approached.

About noon on Saturday, April 25, a citizen reported that a large enemy force numbering several thousand was within a short distance and advancing upon New Creek. Wallace immediately dispatched several mounted scouts to assess the situation. The inexperienced civilian, however, had evidently exaggerated. The next several hours passed uneventfully for Wallace and his wary bluecoats.

About 4 p.m. Union Captain Jacob Smith with 34 men of Company A, 14th West Virginia Volunteer Infantry, arrived from New Creek with orders to relieve Wallace. The Illinoisans were instructed to rejoin their regiment at Grafton, Va.

Suddenly the tranquility of the afternoon exploded in wild shouts and gunfire. Wallace had barely finished reading the orders releasing him from duty at Greenland Gap when some of his pickets rushed out of the gorge with enemy troops close on their heels, advancing in force. Wallace ordered Smith to occupy the two log cabins with his men. Wallace then directed his own riflemen to take their positions in the church and advised them to be cool and deliberate. A few Federal soldiers caught outdoors during the pandemonium took shelter behind the stone breastworks as the Rebels appeared.

Earlier that afternoon, Jones’ Confederate cavalcade had ridden to within three or four miles of the eastern entrance to Greenland Gap before learning that Federal troops held the pass. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Marshall of the 7th Virginia Cavalry, in the van of Jones’ column, led a party of scouts far enough into the defile to observe “certainly one and perhaps two companies” of the enemy. Jones feared a detour around the gap would take too long and might endanger the entire raid. “So I deemed it proper to attempt carrying the place by assault,” he later said.

Colonel Richard Dulaney led the attack of the 7th Virginia. The mounted gray column forged ahead and easily overwhelmed the Union pickets at the bridge. Federals soldiers who evaded capture sounded the alarm. Their cries saved the Union garrison from complete surprise. When the Rebel horsemen surged from the shade of the gap, they plunged into a gantlet of enemy rifle fire.

Colonel Dulaney was unhorsed and ended up sprawled on the dirt road with one of his arms bleeding severely. Twenty yards from the church, the attack wavered. More than half the troopers reined in their mounts and retreated to the safety of the gap. Momentum from their rush propelled the front ranks of the Virginians, about 200 strong, past the garrisoned church and cabins to the wooded ravines beyond. “This put us in rear of the enemy and cut off their retreat,” recalled trooper T.J. Young.

Wallace was not giving any thought to retreat. Enemy horsemen who  had been funneled back into Greenland Gap regrouped within 15 minutes of their initial onslaught and hurled themselves at Wallace’s roadblock once again. This attack met with the same result. In the melee, Private Alexander Buck of Company E rode recklessly up to the church and fired all the loads of his pistol through the crevices of a barricaded widow. His horse was shot twice, bayoneted and killed, but the daredevil trooper survived the encounter unscathed. Three of his comrades were killed, 10 others were wounded and nearly two dozen horses were killed or wounded.

During this second clash, the men of the 7th Virginia who had first charged past the Union positions now sealed the other routes leading to and from Greenland. Rebel sharpshooters dismounted and worked their way into the thick growth on slopes to the west and south of the church and cabins. From there, they banged away with carbines and pistols at the enemy. Meanwhile Company B of the 1st Maryland Cavalry fanned out on the New Creek road to guard against any surprise from that direction.

Behind the 7th Virginia, other men of Major Ridgely Brown’s 1st Maryland dismounted and infiltrated the forested slopes and ravines to the north and south of the road. The Marylanders soon added their firepower to the Confederate barrage.

To bolster his fusillade, Jones called up the mounted riflemen of Lt. Col. Vincent Addison “Clawhammer” Witcher’s 34th Battalion of Virginia Cavalry. A contingent of Witcher’s men under Captain John Chapman moved on foot to the lofty heights north of the Union stronghold. From this higher vantage point, the mountaineer marksmen—to whom, Jones said, “the rifle is as familiar as is the hammer…to the blacksmith”—pointed their Enfield and Mississippi rifles at loopholes in the walls of the church and cabins. Some of Witcher’s men also secured the stone works erected by the enemy.

Even these fearsome gunmen did little more than annoy the Federals behind thick timber walls. One Confederate observed how difficult it was “to inflict serious loss upon them.” It was rare that they “put through the cracks and crevices of the log structure a chance ball that did fatal work.”

As daylight faded and the mass of his raiding column began to stack up  well into the gorge, Jones must have longed for one of his cannons to blast aside the stubborn Yankees. Instead, he pinned his hopes on a white flag to end the impasse. A Union sergeant who had been captured at the picket post was given a look at the size and strength of Jones’ command. The hapless noncom, pale banner in hand, then met Wallace at the church to deliver Jones’ demand for an immediate surrender. The Rebels have “a force of thousands,” the sergeant warned his captain.

Wallace was defiant: “Go back with the rag; I don’t care if he has a million; I will not surrender until compelled.” The small arms fire resumed, only to cease in 10 minutes when the white flag came out again. This time Wallace received a written message from Jones. “He had force enough to take me beyond a doubt,” Wallace admitted later, “and unless I surrendered within fifteen minutes he would not be responsible for the consequences.” A messenger from the 14th West Virginia also reached Wallace at this time. Captain Smith wanted to know what his infantry men in the cabins should do. Wallace replied in kind to each message. He would fight on.

During the lull in action while the second flag of truce came forward, two companies of the 1st Maryland on the heights south of the church mistook the flag to mean the Yanks had surrendered, and rushed the building. “I repeatedly ordered them to fall back,” reported Wallace. “They did not, and I ordered my men to fire, which dispersed them.” Two Southerners were killed and one wounded in the encounter. Afterward the firefight crackled at long range for a considerable time.

Jones’ frustration mounted along with his casualty list. The general displayed yet another flag of truce. The bearer announced that Jones would “bring his cannon to bear upon the church” if Wallace did not surrender. “Tell him he has got none,” Wallace replied, adding, “if he has, bring them on. We are Mulligan’s men, and we will fight to the last crust and cartridge.”

The Rebel envoy requested time for the Southerners to remove their wounded. Wallace granted a 30-minute truce. While Jones removed his casualties from the acre-wide clearing around the church and cabins, Wallace dispatched a squad of bluecoats who gathered up enemy carbines, revolvers and sabers from the ground. When the cease-fire ended, Confederate gunshots echoed through the gap once again. The firing was light at first, then commenced briskly as night settled over the battlefield. Wallace, meanwhile, ordered his men to withhold their fire to conserve ammunition for the Rebel attack that was sure to come.

Jones assembled his dismounted storming parties in the road through the gap under cover of darkness. Gunfire from their comrades in the surrounding hills muffled the sounds of their preparations. Companies A and C of Brown’s 1st Maryland headed the assault force. Arrayed four abreast, they were followed by 170 men of Lt. Col. Elijah “Lige” White’s 35th Virginia Cavalry Battalion, better known as the “Commanches.” Brown’s and White’s soldiers toted carbines and revolvers. In the rear of the column, Lieutenant Williamson led a detail of pioneers armed with axes, torches and bundles of straw. Some thought was given to using the black powder that Williamson possessed to blow up the church; however, the idea “was abandoned as being possibly as dangerous to our people as to the enemy,” recalled Lieutenant George Booth.

Between 8:30 and 9 P.M., Jones’ shock troops made a break for the church.  The men plunged through the icy waters of a Patterson Creek tributary up to their knees. “Our garments became stiffly frozen as quickly as we emerged from the stream,” Booth remembered. The assault force passed along the base of the mountain, where the rugged path brought them within range of the church. There the Confederates were in the open, revealed by the brightness of the moon. The two Maryland companies obliqued to the left and ascended the slope at a brisk pace to the rear of the church. White forged straight ahead with his Virginians and then let out the call for a charge.

Jets of flame erupted along the walls of the church from dozens of Federal rifles. White’s men faced a galling fire. Union lead from the church raked the Southerners in front while deadly rounds from the cabins tore into their right flank. The Federal barrage was incessant. A Confederate officer later recalled that the Yankees fired coolly and rapidly.

The Rebels absorbed these wicked blasts and continued to scramble forward until they reached the church. Several soldiers with axes rained blows on the thick oak doors. “We could not get in, but many of the men got close enough…to get below the line of fire,” Captain Frank Bond of the 1st Maryland reported later. Their immunity from gunshots was short-lived. Lieutenant Booth, who followed Captain Bond to the church, recalled, “I placed my back to the walls…when a blow on my shoulder forced me forward and half around, and a blaze of fire passed my face as I realized the enemy were now on the ground floor and were thrusting their guns between the logs of the wall.” From windows on the top floor, daring bluecoats hurled rocks and pieces of iron onto the swarm of Rebels below.

Enveloped by smoke and darkness outside, Confederate soldiers found themselves caught in the crossfire between friendly units attacking from opposite sides of the church. Bullets from Witcher’s men, who continued to snipe from behind rocks on the surrounding hills, “scattered…promiscuously all about the house,” said one Rebel. The close-quarters firing, a Southern officer later complained, “was far more fatal to [us]…than to the enemy.”

Into this hail of shot charged Lieutenant Williamson with his pioneers, wielding their axes and firebrands. The pioneers battered on doors and any windows they could reach with renewed effort. “They then were up to the building,” wrote Wallace, “and resting the muzzles of their carbines upon the logs, from which the chinking had been removed.” Barricades at the doors and windows began to give way under the relentless Rebel hammering. At one corner of the building flames began to crackle and spread.

In the midst of the chaos, Confederate Private Thomas E. Tippett of Company A, 35th Virginia Cavalry Battalion, scaled the chimney of the church with a bundle of straw and set fire to the roof. Elsewhere an anonymous cry warned that a keg of gunpowder had been placed beneath the church and was about to be detonated. “The powder business,” recalled one cavalry veteran, “very nearly caused a stampede among the Confederates.” The rumor proved false, “and the assault renewed with unabated vigor.”

Inside the smoke-filled church, Wallace prepared for the end. “The blazing roof was now falling in,” he recalled, and an outer wall was in flames. The specter had been raised that their refuge might be blasted to splinters with a keg of gunpowder. The Union commander finally displayed a flag of truce.

Obscured by darkness, the confusion of the moment or both, the flag was ignored. Wallace ordered his men to fix bayonets. “If they will not give us quarter,” he cried, “we will die like men.” Again Wallace asked for quarter. This time his plea was answered. Confederate Sgt. Maj. Edward Johnson of the 1st Maryland lunged through the battered doorway, pistol in hand, and confronted the Union captain. “The firing ceased,” wrote Wallace, “and I surrendered.” As they evacuated the doomed building, Wallace and his men tossed their weapons into the growing flames “to save them from the enemy.”

Scattered shots continued to come from a squad of West Virginians led by a Captain Scott, who refused to abandon the cabins. But with Wallace disarmed and the church wrapped in flames, White focused his attack against those Federals and soon forced their surrender.

The appearance of the Union survivors in the open sparked an immediate impulse for revenge among many of the Southerners. As one Virginian recalled, “the stubborn resistance of the Federals greatly enraged the Confederates, who had suffered much the greater loss.” Though casualty records vary, Confederate losses amounted to about nine killed and 30 wounded, in addition to many horses. The Union toll was two dead and six wounded. Eighty-three Federals who had surrendered suddenly found themselves at the mercy of their captors.

Confederate Captain Frank Bond tried to intervene. “It was all I could do to protect the prisoners,” he remembered. Ultimately Jones himself halted the disturbance. He was anxious to free himself from the torment of Greenland Gap. The quarrelsome brigadier spoke up: “They fought like brave men and did their duty. They shall receive honorable treatment.”

The Union prisoners were soon started under guard for Richmond. Meanwhile, Jones prepared his own forces for departure. Those too badly injured to be moved were left in the care of Dr. Wilber McKnew, surgeon of the 1st Maryland. Confederate and Union dead were buried side by side.

By 11 p.m., Jones started his horse soldiers on the final leg of their passage through Greenland Gap. The Rebel brigade marched in darkness without stopping and quickly emerged at the western entrance. A short distance farther to the west, the column breached the Alleghenies on a narrow, twisted road that followed the contours of the mountain uphill to the village of Mount Storm, Va. There, close to the Maryland border, Jones finally rested his weary men and horses until early afternoon on April 26, when they spurred deeper behind enemy lines.

An uneasy peace settled over Greenland Gap in the wake of the fiery clash. The air was still thick with the smell of death when Union Brig. Gen. Benjamin F. Kelley arrived on April 28. He listened to accounts of the spirited struggle and inspected the wreckage of the Brethren meetinghouse. “I counted today 18 dead horses within musket range,” he wrote in his report to General Schenck. “The affair at this place on Saturday was one of the most gallant since the opening of the war.” He implored Schenck “to apply to the Secretary of War to have every officer, non-commissioned officer, and private engaged in the fight presented with a medal in recognition of the gallantry displayed.” Schenck did forward the request to Halleck, but there is no evidence that anything came of it.

The Union defenders were imprisoned around Richmond. Wallace was exchanged and returned to his regiment at New Creek within two months. By October 1863, all of the men who defended Greenland Gap had been exchanged and returned to duty.

Jones had concluded his raid and returned to his base near Harrisonburg by May 26, when he penned a report to General Lee: “In thirty days we marched nearly 700 miles through a rough and sterile country…killed from 25 to 30 of the enemy, wounded probably three times as many, captured nearly 700 prisoners.” Two trains of cars, 16 railroad bridges and one tunnel were burned. A large number of boats and 150,000 barrels of oil were also put to the torch, and “about 1,000 cattle, and probably 1,200 horses,” were driven home with the raiders.

For their efforts, Jones boasted, his men and officers “would have won the admiration of the most approved Cossack.” In an earlier report to Lee, however, Jones had also lamented the action at Greenland Gap: “We experienced an unfortunate detention of four hours here, depriving us of important captures afterward.” He and his men would see further action at places like Rowlesburg, Morgantown and Fairmont, but suffered the lion’s share of their casualties at Greenland Gap.

Four decades after the Civil War ended, military historian John Bigelow Jr., in his classic The Campaign of Chancellorsville, chronicled the Jones-Imboden Raid and paid tribute to the bloody little struggle in the rugged foothills of the Allegheny Mountains: “The defence of Greenland Gap stands out as the finest thing of the whole operation, and seems really deserving of the much-abused characterization of heroic.”

And the local Brethren community? It never fully recovered from the calamity. Soon after the loss of the Brethren church, a blockhouse was erected by Federal soldiers near the site to defend the gap against Confederate guerrillas who continued to patrol the region until the war ended. It was not until 1866 that a new church was constructed at Cosner Gap, about five miles southwest of Greenland Gap. This time it was built entirely of brick.

Historian and cartographer George Skoch writes from Fairview Park, Ohio. For additional reading, see: A History of the Laurel Brigade, by William N. McDonald; and A Maryland Boy in Lee’s Army: Personal Reminiscences of a Maryland Soldier in the War Between the States, by George W. Booth.

Originally published in the January 2007 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here.  

by Bradley M. Gottfried, Savas Beatie, 2007, $39.95

It has been claimed that people generally remember about 10 percent of what they hear; about 20 percent of what they read, and about 30 percent of what they see. If these statistics are indeed correct, then the folks who take a good look at The Maps of Gettysburg are in for a memorable experience.

In this, his sixth book bearing upon the monumental three-day struggle over the rolling topography of south central Pennsylvania,Gettysburg author-historian Bradley M. Gottfried undertakes a task seemingly as monumental as the battle itself.Using 144 fullpage original maps, Gottfried sets out to depict the entire Gettysburg campaign,down to the regimental level in most cases. Divided into 31 “action-sections,”his maps illustrate the march to Gettysburg,the retreat and pursuit from Gettysburg, and “virtually every significant event in between.”

Gottfried provides a page of informed narrative adjacent to each map. His text is derived from a bibliography listing more than 300 sources composed of firsthand accounts,battle reports and quality secondary scholarship. Gottfried follows what he terms “a generally accepted interpretation” of the campaign and battle,in which he strives to balance Union and Confederate viewpoints.

While researching his earlier books about the battle of Gettysburg, Gottfried detected a lack “of easy-to-read complete maps on the campaign.” He found it was difficult to track the daily movements of the opposing armies and individual units. Gottfried acknowledges the importance of other map-oriented reference works, for example: John Bachelder’s History of the Battle of Gettysburg, John Imhof’s Gettysburg–Day Two:A Study in Maps, and Jefferey Hall’s The Stand of the U.S. Army at Gettysburg. But Gottfried recognized that each has its limitations.

The Maps of Gettysburg is Gottfried’s attempt to broaden this landscape and fill in the gaps. He provides what some readers may come to consider a one-stop resource for detailed maps to diagram one of the most pivotal campaigns of the war. On the other hand,Gottfried freely admits that his atlas “is not the last word or definitive treatment of the campaign, battle, or any part thereof— nor did I intend it to be.”

Besides writing the text,Gottfried shouldered the daunting task of creating all of the maps himself while he overcame the obstacle of being a fledgling in the world of computer graphics. What he called his “long hours after midnight with a drawing program”were well spent.Gottfried does acknowledge that mistakes will inevitably find their way into a book of this scope, but he freely accepts full responsibility for The Maps of Gettysburg.

Gottfried is very familiar with the Gettysburg battlefield, “having walked nearly every yard of it many times over the years.”He is also well aware that the topic of Gettysburg can stir heated debate and “spark rancorous discourse and a challenge to a duel with pistols at dawn.” In The Maps of Gettysburg Gottfried allows us to walk beside him. But watch your step…and keep that itchy trigger finger under control.

One hundred and twenty-three battle maps comprise the heart of Gottfried’s atlas.These diagrams cover the three days of action on various parts of the battlefield. Six maps, for example, trace “The Fight for McPherson Ridge”on July 1; 11 maps illustrate the July 2-3 combat on Culp’s Hill, and seven maps blanket “The Pickett-Pettigrew–Trimble Charge” on the final day of battle. Gottfried recognizes lesser-known actions as well, devoting three maps each to “The Brickyard Fight” and “South Cavalry Field,” among others.

Originally published in the March 2008 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

by Justin S. Murphy, Rampart Press, 2008, $24.95

Contrary to what you have been told not to do all your life, I implore you: Yes, please do judge this book by its cover.

Justin Murphy’s Cleburne: A Graphic Novel delivers on everything you’d expect from the graphic novel genre, and then some. Murphy, who doubles as author and penciler (artists Al Milgrom did the inking, J. Brown added the colors and Steve Chorney created the cover), cleverly weaves his tale around Confederate General Patrick Ronayne Cleburne’s revolutionary plan, late in the war, to enlist African Americans to fight for the South in exchange for freedom.

An Irish immigrant with previous military experience in the British Army, the hard-fighting Cleburne rapidly rose from private to lead a division in the Army of Tennessee. Murphy begins his account in the wake of Confederate defeats around Chattanooga, Tenn., in late 1863, when Cleburne read his proposal at a meeting of senior commanders on January 2, 1864.

Word of Cleburne’s controversial document quickly spread and many Southern military and civilian leaders were shocked by Cleburne’s proposal. Some branded him a traitor.

Murphy effectively mixes an artist’s eye for detail with an historian’s sensibility for fidelity in presenting this imaginative story. The full-color artwork is crisp and vibrant. Several especially eye-catching illustrations spread across two pages.

Murphy peppers his graphic novel with other historic characters such as Jefferson Davis and Generals Joseph E. Johnston and John Bell Hood. Readers may take exception to how some of them are depicted. Murphy’s characterizations of General W.H.T. Walker and Hood, for example, are extreme, though their behavior remains within the realm of possibility.

The author and his team have done a fine job of accurately portraying the clothing, equipment, architecture and other trappings of the mid– 19th century South. The military details—everything from the battlefield litter of paper cartridges and cartridge box tins to Hood’s artificial leg— are impressive, too.

Perhaps the most powerful images in the book are the scenes of combat. The lengthy sequence of panels used to depict Cleburne’s fatal assault during the Battle of Franklin are particularly evocative. The reader is thrust into the vortex of Cleburne’s ill-fated charge with grim, gory and realistic detail.

Murphy incorporates several sidebars to propel his narrative. Notable among these are Cleburne’s friendship with Ned, a freedman who strives to be reunited with his wife and child who have been sold away from him. And there is Susan Tarleton, with whom Cleburne shared a real-life romance and eventually made his fiancée.

“The author,” writes historian Thomas Y. Cartwright in his foreword, “freely acknowledges that some of the characters, such as Ned, and some of the conversations involving the historical figures, are fictional. As long as the reader realizes this, the possibilities for this graphic novel are unlimited.”

The sturdy, glossy stock and high-end production make this colorful, 208-page book well worth its cover price. It is a model by which any future graphic novels in this category may be judged.

Originally published in the May 2009 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

by David W. Bulla, Purdue University Press, 2008, $39.95

David W. Bulla’s new book is good but seems to be aimed primarily at academics. While commanding the District of Indiana in the spring of 1863, Milo Smith Hascall issued General Order No. 9 proclaiming that all newspaper editors and public speakers who encouraged resistance to the draft or any other war measure would be treated as traitors.

Bulla delivers a thorough investigation of the origins and impact of Hascall’s actions from a legal, political, military and social perspective. He finds that Hascall “was merely echoing the views of the Lincoln administration,” even though Lincoln never signed an executive order that allowed censorship.

Ultimately, Lincoln set a precedent for presidents to “decide when press suppression and intimidation can take place.” That, Bulla writes, was “an unfortunate…legacy for the sixteenth president.”

Originally published in the July 2009 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

by John Stauffer, Twelve, 2008, $30

You’ll be hard-pressed to find a list of preeminent “self-made men” in American history that doesn’t include either Abraham Lincoln or Frederick Douglass. Until recently, however, few books about the relationship between the two 19th-century icons have been written. Giants, by Harvard University professor and Civil War historian John Stauffer, thankfully is one of the first.

Starting with the deprived upbringing that both men endured, Stauffer traces the similar though starkly separate paths they followed to prominence. Douglass, who escaped slavery at the age of 20, was self-taught just like Lincoln and read many of the same books as the future president. As Stauffer is quick to note, “They learned how to use words as weapons.”

Their paths converged during the Civil War. Douglass was a frequent critic of Lincoln, but was also a guest at the White House three times. By their first meeting in August 1863, Douglass had decried the administration’s initial lack of response to news that black soldiers in the Union Army were being treated unfairly. Douglass called the president “a man of action rather than words.” Lincoln, however, eventually “recognized that he needed Douglass to help him destroy the Confederacy and preserve the Union.”

The two men rarely saw eye to eye. The shrewd, pragmatic Lincoln was far too conservative for Douglass and his relentless crusade to abolish slavery. But despite the gulf that separated them, the two ultimately became friends. “In placing their lives side by side,” Stauffer reflects, “we gain a fuller picture of each man’s career and character, and a better understanding of how friends, mentors, lovers, and rivals shaped them.”

Stauffer’s engrossing narrative is balanced and reader-friendly. His extensive and richly detailed endnotes are another great bonus to this book.

Originally published in the September 2009 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

In Lincoln President-Elect: Abraham Lincoln and the Great Secession Winter of 1860-1861, Harold Holzer examines the four eventful months between Lincoln’s election and inauguration when, as one earlier biographer noted, “The difficulties of Mr. Lincoln’s position…have been but little understood.”

Lincoln’s actions—or, as some historians have characterized it, his inaction—during this crucial period have been interpreted as the “vulnerable soft spot” in Lincoln’s “otherwise sterling reputation.” The president-elect came to be viewed as too silent on the crucial issues of slavery and states’ rights, too indecisive in selecting members of his cabinet and too indifferent about the looming crisis of civil war. Meanwhile, public scrutiny of the soon-to-be chief executive was in – tense. Skeptics in and out of politics feared that Lincoln was not really equipped to be president.

Holzer takes exception to that view of Lincoln, and with fascinating detail documents the president-elect’s emergence from untested prairie politician to shrewd national leader. “Under Lincoln’s patient stewardship,” Holzer writes, “ex-Whigs and ex-Democrats, Northerners and border state men, progressives and conservatives ultimately came together to serve the Union—and the new president.”

Holzer’s finely tuned narrative, to mirror his own description of Lincoln’s first inaugural address, will “appeal both to ordinary and sophisticated audiences.” Extensive, informative endnotes and an epilogue, as well as the entire text of Lincoln’s 1861 inaugural address, including his own “editorial alterations,” round out this expansive study.

Lincoln and the Decision for War: The Northern Response to Secession, by Russell McClintock, reexamines the period between Lincoln’s election and the opening shots of the Civil War. McClintock transports the reader into the realm of antebellum American brinksmanship. His goal is to “provide a broad analysis of the Northern response to secession.”

Party politics is at the heart of this story, which features key decisionmakers such as William Seward, Stephen Douglas and of course Lincoln. Lesser statesmen, grassroots operatives and also the newspapers have a voice in the narrative as well. “[T]he words and actions of trusted party leaders,” McClintock notes, “swayed popular opinion profoundy.”

Divided chronologically, the book follows events from November 1860 to May 1861. Despite what the title implies, however, the 16th president (by the author’s own admission) “seems to drop out of the picture” in the early chapters. Lincoln gradually reappears as he is unavoidably thrust into the role of a final arbiter who must choose between the olive branch and the sword. McClintock’s lengthy and detailed notes conclude this satisfying account.

Open to any page of Abraham Lincoln: Great American Historians on Our Sixteenth President and be drawn into the Great Emancipator’s own rhetoric. Editors Brian Lamb and Susan Swain have gathered a “collection of Lincoln essays…drawn from C-SPAN’s programming archives.” Here are 55 snapshots of Lincoln from an equal number of respected writers and scholars, including such leading lights as Doris Kearns Good win, Shelby Foote, James Mc Pherson and Harold Holzer. Each brings his own unique perspective to a seemingly inexhaustible subject.

The format throughout is conversational and relaxed, although the images of Lincoln that emerge from the narrative are not always sanitized or glossy. Pulitzer Prize–winning author Mark Neely Jr., for example, reminds us that Lincoln “always took the high road, and he never neglected the low road. He knew all the tricks of the trade, and when he needed them he would use them.” In another essay, Irving Bartlett comments on the persistent rumor that South Carolina politico John C. Calhoun had actually fathered Lincoln.

This intriguing little volume is supplemented with a variety of color photographs and maps. To round things out, a timeline of events in Lincoln’s life as well as a short biography of each essayist are included, along with a complete index and the full texts to eight of Lincoln’s most memorable speeches.

Originally published in the April 2009 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here.

John Surratt, John Wilkes Booth’s most elusive accomplice, was serving as a courier and agent for the Confederate government when he also became an intermediary for Booth in December 1864. The son of co-conspirator Mary Surratt, who was hanged for her role in the plot to assassinate Lincoln, young Surratt was on a mission in Elmira, N.Y., on the night the Lincolns attended Ford’s Theatre. Young John, who was also implicated in the assassination plot, subsequently became the most wanted man in America. He fled first to Canada, then overseas.

Jampoler plows through largely uncharted waters to reveal the story of the peripatetic Surratt’s many escapades before his capture in Egypt in 1866. He was extradited back to the United States and stood trial for 53 days before being acquitted.

Jampoler recounts all this and much more in great detail. The waters get a bit muddy, however, when he delves perhaps too deeply into side issues that are only marginally relevant to Surratt’s story. Overall, however, this is a fine, in-depth examination of John Surratt, a shadowy figure who heretofore has escaped close scrutiny.

Chasing Lincoln’s Killer, meanwhile, is targeted at younger readers. Despite that, it is a thorough and captivating account of Lincoln’s assassination and the hunt for John Wilkes Booth, based on Swanson’s best-selling 2006 book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer.

Swanson, who admits that his own fascination with Lincoln dates back to his boyhood years, pairs his mastery of the subject with a sensitivity for the influence that his words might have on impressionable young minds. In pre – paring this edition, he wisely consulted school-age readers. They reportedly advised him, “Keep in all the blood and gore but not so much that our parents flip out.”

Augmented with more than 70 photographs and other period illustrations, Chasing Lincoln’s Killer should please, as well as educate, children and parents alike.

Originally published in the June 2009 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here. 

by Ferenc Morton Szasz, Southern Illinois University Press

In his new book Abraham Lincoln and Robert Burns: Connected Lives and Legends, Ferenc Morton Szasz  reveals how the president was influenced by the writings of Robert Burns, Scotland’s renowned 18th-century poet. In the early 19th century, many Americans, like Lincoln, “considered American and Scottish social goals as virtually interchangeable” and were ardent fans of Burns. Among the earliest samples of Lincoln’s handwriting are simple poems he wrote as a child. Lincoln memorized Burns’ works, and could even quote passages as an adult. In 1865 he referred to the poet as a “transcending genius.”

Szasz admits he has linked “two life stories that most people would not connect in a month of Sundays.” But both men rose from poverty, labored in fields and small businesses, fought depression and struggled through relationships with strong-willed women. Each excelled de spite many challenges, and “each…evolved into myth.”

Szasz also notes that both men “changed the world through the power of his words….One was a poet whose message was laced with politics, and the other a politician whose message was laced with poetry.”

Originally published in the October 2009 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here. 

Readers are likely to share Tagg’s amazement at the “unsurpassed venom” of the criticism Lincoln endured—even though, according to Tagg, there was much to criticize. Tagg assesses his presidency within the social and political context of mid–19th century America. It was a time, for example, when “the rabid press routinely destroyed the reputations of public men,” when the stature of the presidency, “stained by feeble performances from a string of the poorest Presidents in the nation’s history,” had plunged over decades.

Lincoln adapted to his role and asserted his authority. But considering the barrage of abuse he endured, Tagg says, “The depth of Lincoln’s travail is much of what ennobles him.”

Barry Schwartz’s Abraham Lincoln in the Post-Heroic Era: History and Memory in Late Twentieth-Century America (University of Chicago Press) reveals how the iconic president’s place in Americans’ memory has evolved from roughly 1930 to the present. Each generation has alternately embraced Lincoln as “Savior of the Union” or the “Great Emancipator.” The transformation has often been dramatic. “Lincoln has always been a lamp illuminating the ideals of the American people,”

Schwartz writes, “as well as a mirror reflecting their interests.” Schwartz believes that during the Great Depression and World War II, Lincoln’s prestige reached its peak. In the course of those years, his memory was “invoked countless times as a reminder of America’s strength and wisdom.” Successive generations emphasized Lincoln in whatever role the particular needs of the era demanded.

As times changed, Lincoln’s prestige has changed with them. In the second half of the 20th century, for instance, Americans tended to analyze leaders rather than idolize them. While today “Lincoln remains one of the few historical leaders still respected by the vast majority of American Historians,” according to Schwartz this overall view fails to reflect his “diminishing place in the imagination of ordinary people.”

Charles Flood’s 1864: Lincoln at the Gates of History (Simon & Schuster) draws parallels in Lincoln’s personal and public lives, focusing on what was perhaps the most pivotal year of the Civil War. Lincoln faced an avalanche of challenges in 1864. The outcome of the war as well as his chances for reelection were in doubt in that tumultuous period. “The cry of widows and or phans,” John Hay wrote, “was al – ways in his ears.” Even before the unprecedented bloodshed that would commence during the military campaigns that spring, Lincoln lamented in February 1864, “This war is eating my life out.”

Flood’s chronicle brings into focus a very human Lincoln: at times a frail man, at times a majestic leader.

Originally published in the December 2009 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here. 

by Neil Hagan and Stephen Hyslop, National Geographic, 2009, $40

Recalling confederate military operations around Richmond during the Peninsula and Seven Days’ campaigns, Rebel General Richard Taylor lamented in his memoir how little he and other Southern leaders knew about the distinctive topography of the battlegrounds upon which they fought. “[W]e were profoundly ignorant of the country,” Taylor confessed, “[and] were without maps, sketches, or proper guides.” The result, he asserted, “was nothing but a series of blunders, one after another, and all huge.”

In fact, both sides suffered from similar deficiencies, particularly early in the conflict. When the war began, “few maps existed of the…land – scape where most of the fighting was likely to take place.” By 1865, however, one historian noted, “where the armies had campaigned, there was hardly an acre left unmapped.”

Atlas of the Civil War: A Comprehensive Guide to the Tactics and Terrain of Battle reveals the story of that transformation. This beautifully illustrated volume embodies the outstanding cartography and high quality presentation that we have come to expect from National Geographic publications.

Numbers tell the tale. The large format of the atlas makes it easy to read and view a wide-ranging assortment of “88 rare archival maps” and “34 brand-new National Geographic maps.” It is further enhanced with 320 photographs, paintings, and battle sketches.

Contemporary bird’s-eye maps “inspired by the view from hot air balloons” are another unique feature of this book. In addition, the editors include 18 “compelling stories of soldiers and civilians” in sidebars throughout the text, along with illustrated timelines that chart the conflict month by month. Eleven orders of battle for significant engagements supplement the neighboring maps. This atlas is a visual treat that will inform and entertain both avid and apprentice students of the war.

Scores of colorful maps by prominent wartime cartographers such as the Confederacy’s Jedediah Hotchkiss and the Union’s Robert Knox Sneden are featured alongside fine works by lesser-known military and commercial mapmakers. “[G]ifted mapmakers contributed substantially to the war as it was being waged,” the editors write, “and their surviving maps provide an extraordinary cartographic record that contributes greatly to our understanding of the American Civil War today.”

Arranged in five chronological sections, the atlas covers significant battles and campaigns of the war. Most maps include number-keys that correspond with a concise running narrative. While this atlas is a must-have for anyone interested in the war, it is not without blemishes. For instance, number-keys are missing from maps depicting the “route of the Burnside Expedition” along the coast of North Carolina (P. 63) and the “Map of Cedar Mountain and Vicinity” (P. 93). These minor flaws do not detract from the volume’s overall quality and usefulness.

From the laboriously handcrafted charts of 19th-century draftsmen to the latest computer-generated maps prepared by National Geographic cartographers, Atlas of the Civil War is a welcome addition to the expanding library of books that document the maps and mapmakers of the nation’s defining conflict.

Originally published in the March 2010 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

by Russell S. Bonds, Westholme Publishing

Not long after the end of the war, Northern journalists head ed south to report on conditions in the former Confederacy. For many, war-ravaged Atlanta was a key destination—the city’s core had been left a smoldering wreck after its capture by William Sherman’s army in the summer of 1864. The Yankee scribes created a vivid chronicle of life amid the rubble. As one wrote in November 1865, Sherman’s mark “was still written too plainly…in gaping windows and roofless houses, heaps of ruins on the principal corners and traces of unsparing destruction everywhere.”

What brought the “Gate City’s” inhabitants to this plight is the subject of Russell Bonds’ War Like the Thunderbolt: The Battle and Burning of Atlanta. He highlights the battles along Atlanta’s perimeter—Peachtree Creek, Bald Hill, Ezra Church and Jonesboro—and the death throes of the city, once a hub of Southern commerce, manufacture and transportation. But rather than making it a tactical study or campaign analysis, Bonds strives to create a panorama of events from firsthand accounts. While he cites one historian’s claim that “more Americans have formed perceptions about the Civil War from watching Gone With the Wind than from reading all the books written by historians,” he also notes “there has been little serious consideration of the city’s ordeal—the five-week artillery bombardment, the expulsion of its civilian population, and the devastating fire that follow – ed.” Bonds admirably fills these gaps.

Atlanta became a railroad center and industrial stronghold in the first half of the 19th century—and the war would fuel its growth, spawning factories, arsenals, warehouses and hospitals. Its population soared to nearly triple its prewar total. “This place,” Georgia Governor Joseph Brown said of Atlanta in the summer of 1864, “is to the Confederacy almost as important as the heart is to the human body.”

Russell Bonds gives an often chilling report of how the city’s “heart” was surgically removed. Any one who reads his account will surely agree that “War is hell.”

Originally published in the August 2010 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here. 

by John Locke Scripps and Abraham Lincoln, edited by David W. Bradford, Boston Hill Press, 2010

THE DUST JACKET BLURBS FOR Vote Lincoln! suggest you’re about to read a supermarket tabloid. This is an “authorized biography,” you’re told, “the most influential campaign book in American history.” In truth, this is a much more modest endeavor, a 3,500-word autobiographical sketch Lincoln reluctantly wrote shortly after capturing the Republican nomination for president. Party leaders were anxious to publish a campaign biography to promote their candidate, who was not yet widely known outside Illinois.

Newspaperman John Locke Scripps had elicited the account from Lincoln and fashioned a “32-page pamphlet of dense small print” titled Life of Abraham Lincoln. When it first appeared in July 1860, 1 million copies were printed.

This revised edition is a valuable addition to the canon about our 16th president, but it is also quite uneven. Footnotes and illustrations that were lacking in the 1860 edition do enhance the material, as does a variety of sidebars that shed light on the era. As editor David Bradford notes, “Forgotten allusions, highly condensed passages, and Victorian-era rhetoric now obscure the original 1860 text.” But he may have gone too far with “clarifying annotations.” In one case, for example, 14 annotations pepper four short paragraphs of narrative.

Lincoln’s original handwritten document—wonderfully free of hyperbole— remains the principal source for information about his early life. To Bradford’s credit, he includes a contemporary transcription of it made in 1860 by John Nicolay—then a clerk in the future president’s law office.

Boston Hill Press first published this book in 2009, and Bradford made “further refinements”—including more commentary—for a second edition published last year. In retrospect, less may have been more.

Originally published in the September 2011 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

by Rick Liblong, Arbutus Press, 2011, $17.95

Michigan and the Civil War: A Great and Bloody Sacrifice

by Jack Dempsey, The History Press, 2011, $21.99

TWO NEW BOOKS CELEBRATE, IN mostly commendable fashion, Michigan’s contributions to the Civil War. Rick Liblong’s Answering the Call to Duty is the more narrowly focused of the two, though it is not so much a conventional narrative as a collection of snippets loosely fashioned into eight chapters.

Liblong’s book provides no particular chronology. The first three chapters, for example, touch on a variety of topics about rural Michigan, Lapeer County and the author’s hometown of Almont. To his credit, Liblong flavors his text with quotes from contemporary letters and journals, though casual students of the war (and reenactors in particular) may cast a sour glance at some of his commentary, such as this description of soldier headgear: “Most of the men wore a slouch hat or ‘kepi,’ which was black, wide brimmed and looked like a mini-stovepipe hat [that] was falling forward.”

Vignettes about soldiers from his hometown and neighboring communities form the lion’s share of this book. One notable was Private Norvell Churchill (spelled at times as Norville and Norval) from Berlin Township. Churchill was credited with rescuing future star George A. Custer, a fellow Wolverine, from possible capture or death during a clash with Confederate cavalry at Hunterstown, Pa., during the Gettysburg Campaign.

Alas, readers may scratch their heads over some of the author’s skewed history. For instance, in a list of Virginia battles in which the 1st Michigan Cavalry fought in “early 1863” are Harrisonburg (actually fought in April 1862) and Second Bull Run, Thoroughfare Gap and Cedar Mountain (August 1862).

The book includes two appendices genealogists and researchers should find useful.

Jack Dempsey’s Michigan and the Civil War, on the other hand, will appeal to those seeking a wider-ranging and concise account presented in a more conventional format. Among the topics Dempsey tackles are the state’s rapid response to Abraham Lincoln’s call to arms in April 1861, its role in some of the war’s memorable battles and some of its many intriguing personalities.

Each of the book’s 14 chapters provides a unique Wolverine State connection to the war, some more obvious than others. Subjects in a chapter titled “Special Forces,” for example, include the Michigan Cavalry Brigade; youthful Brig. Gen. Elon Farnsworth (who was born in Green Oak, Mich., though none of the four regiments in his brigade was from Michigan); and Hiram Berdan, namesake of the famed Berdan’s Sharpshooters. That unit, Dempsey admits, originated “from many states including Michigan.” Berdan himself was born in New York, though he lived in Plymouth, Mich., from the age of 6.

The author is Michigan’s former assistant attorney general, which may explain why the longest chapter is titled “The War Politicians.” Dempsey evaluates several statesmen, including Zachariah Chandler, a transplant from New Hampshire who served as Detroit’s mayor and later rose to prominence in the Republican Party—and the U.S. Senate, where he was a vocal member of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War. Michigan’s wartime political leaders, Dempsey writes, were pro-Union, pro-“hard war” and decidedly anti-slavery. “They were looked at as radicals,” Dempsey notes, “and…did not shrink from the title.”

The book covers a wide spectrum of related topics. Dempsey touches on the participation of women, the service of black units and POW experiences. One chapter, “War on Water,” looks at the USS Michigan, “the lone navy ship” on the Great Lakes. Dempsey’s narrative is succinct, punctuated with quotes from contemporary and modern sources. Illustrations are abundant, though not a single map appears, which would have enhanced chapters emphasizing combat.

Tighter editing might have caught flaws such as references to “Philip A. Sheridan” (instead of “H” for Henry) which appear in both the text and index, and a passage about “sewing confusion” behind Union lines. But these are minor distractions to an otherwise entertaining read.

Originally published in the November 2011 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here. 

edited by Harold Holzer, Craig L. Symonds and Frank J. Williams, Fordham University Press

In this intriguing new anthology, 10 prominent scholars ponder the “public, judicial and memorial reaction” to Abraham Lincoln’s assassination on April 14, 1865. In attempting to “explore the legal, cultural, political and even emotional consequences” that surrounded Lincoln’s untimely death, this collection of essays delivers on what it sets out to do—and then some.

Most of the selections are deferential to Lincoln, but one intriguing essay by Thomas P. Lowry shows that not everyone mourned the president’s passing. For a decade Lowry and his wife, Beverly, scoured tens of thousands of transcripts from Union military courts and commissions and found that while “the vast majority of the army’s rank and file, and its officer corps, felt bereft by the news of Lincoln’s death…a small but vocal minority felt otherwise.” Lowry cites many colorful examples. “I’m glad the old son of a bitch is dead,” exclaimed a soldier in the 1st Oregon Territory Cavalry, a sentiment that earned him 10 years in prison. A member of the 8th California Infantry was actually sentenced to death for saying, “Abraham Lincoln…ought to have been killed long ago” (though lesser punishment was eventually granted on his appeal).

Lowry concludes, “These records show that in the wake of national tragedy, the courts were inclined to treat outbursts of expressed enthusiasm for Lincoln’s murder with strict justice.” But several essays also explore the complex web of judicial and legal developments that arose in the assassination’s wake. Altogether, the anthology presents an engrossing view of the reaction to Lincoln’s death.

Originally published in the February 2011 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here. 

 Mark E. Neely Jr.; UNC Press

Pulitzer Prize–winning author Mark Neely Jr. caters to readers with a taste for legal and judicial affairs in Lincoln and the Triumph of the Nation. He mines contemporary sources, including judicial opinions, presidential and state papers, newspaper editorials and political pamphlets, to explore “how lawyers, judges, justices, and government officials thought about the Constitution.”

Pamphlets are an especially rich lode. For example, How a Free People Conduct a Long War, circulated in 1862 by Charles Janeway Stillé, sold more than 500,000 copies. After Horace Binney wrote The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus Under the Constitution, a defense of Lincoln’s suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, his pamphlet became “the most widely circulated tract on the subject,” according to Neely. The Confederacy “produced few pamphlets on constitutional and political questions,” he notes, but the antebellum South, embroiled in the secession crisis, produced “an avalanche of political and constitutional literature.”

Neely sets out to illuminate largely untapped sources. His goal is “to render the arguments lovingly, in their ingenuity, intricacy, and inconsistency.” That erudite approach may intimidate some readers, and his very limited index reflects a flaw in the book’s otherwise solid framework.

Originally published in the October 2012 issue of Civil War Times. To subscribe, click here.

The National Civil War Centennial Commission slated the reenactment to open a nationwide commemoration. The event was months in planning. Retired Gen. Mark W. Clark, former commander of Allied Forces in the Italian Campaign during World War II, then president of the Citadel (the Military College of South Carolina), led this endeavor. Clark said he was eager “to make every reasonable effort to ensure that the reenactment was historically authentic.”

Logistics for the observance were impressive. Five antique cannons to be fired during the pageant were borrowed from collectors—including a rare, experimental ‘iron gun’ dating from 1838. (It was revealed afterward that had any of the cannons “failed to work the day of the firing, an auxiliary noise-maker was at the ready.”) Metro Goldwyn Mayer loaned 100 replica rifles. And one former cadet recalled having to requisition pantyhose and nylon stockings from some of Charleston’s most dignified ladies to fashion into ammunition powder bags “and make damn sure we did not overload the charge.”

Citadel’s Honor Company, 111 strong, was selected to work the guns. Distinguished for their achievements in the classroom and on the drill field, these cadets honed their skills on 19th-century firearms and artillery in addition to their modern equipment. All were fitted with reproduction uniforms. They were also ordered to let their sideburns grow and “to get regulation (1861) haircuts.” Even Clark would sport a vintage uniform and side-whiskers.

Response from the Charleston community was gratifying. Nearly 3,000 people lined the city’s waterfront the day before the main event as “Cadet gunners fired the cannon and ‘sharpened their aim’ in preparation for the reenactment.” Earlier that morning Catton had addressed the Corps of Cadets. That evening a “Confederate Ball” was held at the Citadel replete with costumed attendees.

The afternoon of January 9, 24,000 spectators, bolstered by local school children who were given a half-day holiday, “jammed the rails along The Battery.” There the cannons behind sandbag revetments lined the waters edge of White Point Garden. TV news anchor Frank Blair, host of the “Today” show and a native South Carolinian, narrated the centennial commemoration for a national television audience.

Where the Ashley River merged with Charleston Harbor, the USS Orleans Parish stood ready to face the guns. On loan from the Navy, the vessel was outfitted with faux side wheels and masts to portray the Star of the West on its fateful mission.

Beginning at 1:30 p.m. and for the next hour and a quarter, the entire Corps of Cadets led a parade through the narrow streets of Old Charleston to the artillery emplacements on the Battery. Honor Company cadets prepared the cannons to fire as the target ship “moves steadily, relentlessly forward.” The guns barked on schedule.

The USS Orleans Parrish ran the gantlet twice before “the event was over.” From a loud speaker on board during one pass came the announcement: “Cadets 2–Union Navy 0.” Only a handful of cadets knew what the score meant.

Unbeknownst to organizers of the event, Citadel cadets had loaded the cannons with tennis balls. Exactly how many were launched—and who fed them into the guns in the first place—remains a mystery. That night, however, while honored guests reveled at a banquet in a downtown hotel, two miles away on the campus of the Citadel cadets of Honor Company, confided one alumnus, “reveled in our ruse.”

Originally published in the March 2015 issue of America’s Civil War. To subscribe, click here.

Long jets of flame and billows of smoke erupted from two 8-inch Columbiads on Cummings Point, at the tip of Morris Island, S.C. The crash of heavy artillery from the Confederate “Iron-clad Battery” rolled across the mouth of Charleston Harbor like spring thunder and echoed off the red brick ramparts of Fort Sumter.

Just more than 1,300 yards away and well within range of the Confederate guns, U.S. Army Maj. Robert Anderson, commander of the Federal stronghold, watched the cannon fire with his fellow officers. They calmly studied the scene  through spyglasses and noted the caliber and positions of  the enemy guns. There was nothing to fear. The Confederate cannons were firing blanks.

It was early morning March 8, 1861. Whether the festering disputes between the United States and the nascent Confederacy would erupt into open warfare remained to be seen.  Rebel forces encircling the fort routinely conducted artillery  practice. In fact, both sides had frequently engaged in such drills. The barking guns shattered the silence and rattled windows in Charleston, but nothing more.

Until this morning, that is.

Anderson and his junior officers trained their glasses on  the unique Iron-clad Battery. Fashioned from heavy timbers and railroad iron, the battery’s thick, sloping walls sheltered  a total of three 8-inch Columbiads. Two cannons had just been fired, so the bluecoats were not surprised when Columbiad No. 3 thundered.

They were very surprised, however, to see a cannonball shoot from the gun’s muzzle and arc over the still waters on a  shallow trajectory to the fort. In moments, 50 pounds of solid iron skipped twice off the water and slammed against the granite wharf near the Gorge, the fort’s main gate. Was this the opening shot of war?

The sudden impact of the projectile triggered a well-rehearsed response from the garrison inside the fort. Virtual hostages in their stronghold for more than two months, suffering shortages of food and supplies of all kinds, wide-eyed bluecoats scrambled to secure the gate and man their own big guns. “One and all,” wrote Capt. Abner Doubleday, “desired to fight it out as soon as possible.”

This article first appeared in America’s Civil War magazine

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From his perch in the fort, Anderson continued to scrutinize Southern soldiers and laborers on shore. They appeared  just as startled as he was, scattering in all directions until the beach looked empty. Other enemy cannons around the  harbor remained silent. Anderson and his men soon relaxed. Apparently the shot was an accident caused by amateur  enemy artillerymen.

Later that morning Anderson penned a blunt message “demanding an explanation” to the Rebel commander at  Cummings Point, Maj. Peter F. Stevens—who was also superintendent of Charleston’s South Carolina Military Academy, the Citadel. Citadel cadets had helped to erect batteries on Morris Island and elsewhere around the harbor.  They also helped train militiamen and civilian volunteers to  operate the cannons.

But before Anderson could send his demand, a red-faced Stevens was rowed out to the fort under a white flag, bearing an “ample apology” for the errant missile. The Southerner didn’t suspect that the cannonball “was put in by any man intentionally.”

“It appears that in practicing at drill, the fact of one of  the guns being shotted was forgotten,” wrote Capt. John G.  Foster, Sumter’s chief engineer, “and hence the occurrence.”

Anderson admonished Stevens. The incident could have triggered war. Stevens acknowledged Anderson’s patience and forbearance in not returning fire. After their meeting, the uneasy standoff between opposing forces resumed.

On March 9, Brig. Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard, overall  commander of Confederate troops in Charleston, ordered  a thorough investigation of the affair. “[H]ereafter,” he  instructed, “no gun should be practiced with without first  ascertaining whether it be loaded or not.”

Military leaders within the fledgling Confederate army  that encircled Fort Sumter had freely expressed concerns  about their neophyte gunners and the potential for trouble.  One Southern officer—a Mexican War veteran—announced  that among the volunteers with whom he was saddled were  “290 indifferent artillerymen.” Stevens himself admitted that outside of officers and cadets from the Citadel, the men  who served his cannons “had never undertaken to manage  artillery.”

On the other hand, Stevens may not have been well served by some of his own protégés. For example, C. Irvine Walker, a 19-year-old cadet, may even have indirectly  contributed to the lack of proficiency and discipline exhibited by some of the volunteer gunners that he was supposed to be instructing.

When first assigned to handle a battery of light  artillery on Sullivan’s Island, Walker admitted, “I was non-plussed. They were to be fired  with friction primers, which I had never seen.” Later on Morris Island, Walker shared a small  room with 20 other men. “It was about a foot  deep in straw,” he confided. “Our friends in  town kept us supplied with food etc. Among which was a two gallon Demijohn of the ‘Oh be  joyful’ which was carefully hidden under the  straw.”

Elsewhere around the harbor, Confederate  Lt. Col. Roswell Ripley, a West Pointer and seasoned artilleryman, had begged his superiors to have his men spend less time laboring on defenses and more time drilling on the big  guns. “Any failure in that branch of the service, I fear, may  result in disaster,” he had written on March 5.

Beauregard’s probe into the cause of the near-disastrous  cannon shot failed to uncover a guilty party. Little more than  a month later, on April 12, 1861, another shot from a Confederate cannon struck Fort Sumter. It was one among more than 3,000 other rounds fired at the fort that day, signaling  the start of civil war between North and South. The accidental shot was all but forgotten.

Who was responsible for the loaded cannon on March 8 remained a mystery for more than three decades after the war ended. Finally, in a Charleston News and Courier article on August 25, 1893, the culprit’s name surfaced: Edwin  Lindsley Halsey.

In March 1861, Halsey, then 24 and employed at a Charleston publishing house, served with the Washington Artillery Volunteers stationed at the Iron-clad Battery. Day after day “every morning and evening” Halsey drilled with other volunteers on the three Columbiads. “[W]e went through all of  the movements required in artillery practice,” wrote a companion, “even to firing blank cartridges.” His battery mate  recalled that on March 7, 1861, “…while marching from the  battery to camp after a drill, Halsey said he was tired of this  nonsense, and that there would be some fun in the harbor the next morning.”

After the “fun” roared toward Fort Sumter, Halsey’s lips were sealed. He never commented publicly about the episode. “Possibly, he realized what a breach of discipline his prank represented,” one of his grandsons speculated a century later, noting his grandfather “was not the patient type. The explosive gesture seemed entirely representative of his feelings.”

Halsey served with distinction in South Carolina artillery units throughout the war. The  Washington Artillery Volunteers, also known as Hampton’s Legion Artillery, mustered into the Confederate Army on June 13, 1861, for  service in Virginia. Transferred to Jeb Stuart’s  Horse Artillery Battalion, Halsey was 1st sergeant and later elected 1st lieutenant in Hart’s  Battery in April 1862. He rose to captain and commanded the battery after Captain James  Hart lost a leg during the Battle of Boydton Plank Road, Va., in October 1864. A comrade remembered that Halsey “was cool, calm, fearless and as firm as a rock in battle.”

Early in 1865, Halsey and his battery, with several South Carolina cavalry regiments, accompanied Lt. Gen. Wade Hampton back to the Carolinas to fight with the Army of Tennessee under Gen. Joseph E. Johnston. Halsey’s Battery was part of the rear guard when Johnston surrendered his troops to Union Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman near  Durham, N.C., on April 26, 1865.

Unreconciled, Halsey devised a plan to elude Union forces  and lead a section of his battery to fight on, west of the Mississippi. But Hampton put a stop to it. The renowned cavalry  leader told the troops they “had been good and brave soldiers, that they had done their whole duty…and that it was their duty to remain where they were and obey commands.” The veteran gunners tearfully parted with their weapons.

Halsey “broke his saber and kept his revolver” before returning to Charleston, where he became a successful lumber and timber merchant. (His business was near present-day Halsey Boulevard.) He also married, fathering  seven sons and five daughters. His business thrived and made Halsey wealthy from selling building materials to help rebuild the war-torn South.

Edwin Lindsley Halsey died on October 12, 1903, at the age of 66, and is buried in Charleston’s Magnolia Cemetery. A family member recalled that Halsey “lived out his days totally unreconstructed.”

Schooled in history, geography and graphic arts, Ohio-based George Skoch has contributed prose and artwork to publications for more than three decades.