Issue 18 by The Civil War Monitor

BEST BOOKS 2015

LINCOLN & LITTLE MAC

P. 26

THE MODERN MEADE

P. 28

VOL. 5, NO. 4

{ a n e w l o o k a t a m e r i c a’s g r e a

ict }

The Art of War

A LOOK AT THE WORK OF ALFRED R. WAUD, ONE OF THE CIVIL WAR’S MOST PROLIFIC AND FEARLESS SKETCH ARTISTS PLUS

THE INTREPID PROFESSOR LOWE P. 20

WINTER 2015

$5.99

CIVILWARMONITOR.COM

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reconstruction a n d t h e l e g a c y o f t h e c i v i l wa r CWI SUMMER CONFERENCE

JUNE 17 – 22, 2016

For over 30 years, the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College has hosted an annual summer conference bringing leading historians and public audiences together for small group discussions, battlefield tours, panel discussions, and lectures. This year, the conference will continue the 150th commemoration by examining linkages between the war years and its revolutionary and violent aftermath.

Pictured Above: “The Freedmen’s Bureau” by Alfred R. Waud CWM18-FOB-TOC.indd 2 Artwork.indd 1 CIVI 1516-9 Advertisement

PHOTOGRAPH CREDIT HERE

The conference – one of the first of its kind for a popular audience – will explore topics ranging from Reconstruction and Civil War memory to comparative emancipation, veterans’ return home, Reconstruction in the West and reconstructing southern womanhood. Speakers will include Brooks Simpson, Catherine Clinton, David Blight, Caroline Janney, Mark Summers, Greg Downs and Carole Emberton.

www.gettysburg.edu/cwi/conference 11/6/15 9/28/15 11:41 9:08 AM AM

Contents VOLUME 5, NUMBER 4 / WINTER 2015

DEPARTMENTS

Salvo

{Facts, Figures & Items of Interest}

FEATURES

The Art of War 30

TRAVELS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 A Visit to Knoxville

VOICES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Winter Woes

FACES OF WAR. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

An exploration of the work of Alfred R. Waud, one of the Civil War’s most prolific—and fearless—sketch artists.

Love Found and Lost

PRESERVATION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 The Case for a New State Battlefield Park

FIGURES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 The Intrepid Professor Lowe

COST OF WAR . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Cyrenus Stickle Diaries

IN FOCUS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Checking the Headlines

Columns AMERICAN ILIAD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Lincoln and Little Mac

LIVING HISTORY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

COWAN’S AUCTIONS INC (CENTER); LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2)

The Modern Meade

Books & Authors THE BEST CIVIL WAR BOOKS OF 2015. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 WITH ELIZABETH R. VARON, BRIAN MATTHEW JORDAN, ETHAN RAFUSE, ANDREW WAGENHOFFER, & KEVIN M. LEVIN

In Every Issue EDITORIAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 The Art of War

PARTING SHOT. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 A Lost Memento

Duty & The Draft 44

As the North turned from enlistment to conscription, a public discussion emerged about the obligations of citizens—to both their country and their families. by j. matthew gallman

ELECTION 1880 54 The 1880 presidential election pitted former Union generals against each other in a contest in which Civil War issues—and the candidates’ military records—resurfaced to take center stage. by kanisorn wongsrichanalai

ON THE COVER: Alfred Waud at

Devil’s Den in the days following the Battle of Gettysburg. 1 Courtesy of the Library of THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR Congress. Colorized by Mads WINTER 2015 Madsen of Colorized History.

ence

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editorial VOLUME 5, NUMBER 4 / WINTER 2015

Terry A. Johnston Jr. EDITOR-IN-CHIEF TERRY@CIVILWARMONITOR.COM

Laura June Davis David Thomson Robert Poister Katie Brackett Fialka CONTRIBUTING EDITORS

writing in 1868, Theodore R. Davis, who had worked as a war artist for the illustrated newspaper Harper’s Weekly during the Civil War, reflected upon the demands of the job: “Total disregard for personal safety and comfort; an owl-like propensity to sit up all night and a hawky style of vigilance during the day; capacity for going on short food; willingness to ride any number of miles horseback for just one sketch, which might have to be finished at night by no better light than that of a fire.” In this issue, we highlight the work of Davis’ Harper’s Weekly colleague, Alfred R. Waud (pictured above), one of the era’s most prolific war artists. Unfettered by the limitations that faced photographers of the day (including bulky equipment and the inability to capture movement), Waud accompanied the Army of the Potomac from Bull Run to Appomattox, observing and recording a variety of scenes—from everyday camp occurrences to the violence of the battlefield. In the process, Waud, who was 32 when the conflict began, “became recognized as the best special artist in the field,” Davis noted, his body of work “by far the most complete and valuable made during the war, that is, so far as the Army of the Potomac is concerned.” You can view a sampling of Waud’s original sketches beginning on page 30. we regularly receive queries from readers who are interested in purchasing previous issues of the Monitor. Until recently, the only way to do so was by calling our toll-free customer service number (877344-7409). I’m happy to announce that we’re now also able to take orders for back issues online (civilwarmonitor.com/back-issues). Get them while supplies last!

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: letters@civilwarmonitor.com

Stephen Berry Patrick Brennan John Coski Judith Giesberg Allen C. Guelzo Amy Murrell Taylor Matthew C. Hulbert EDITORIAL ADVISORS

Jennifer Sturak COPY EDITOR

Brian Matthew Jordan BOOK REVIEW EDITOR BRIAN@CIVILWARMONITOR.COM

Katharine Dahlstrand SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR

Patrick Mitchell CREATIVE DIRECTOR MODUS OPERANDI DESIGN (WWW.MODUSOP.NET)

Zethyn McKinley ADVERTISING & MARKETING DIRECTOR ADVERTISING@CIVILWARMONITOR.COM (559) 492 9236

Margaret Collins ADVERTISING ASSOCIATE MARGARET@CIVILWARMONITOR.COM

Howard White CIRCULATION MANAGER HWHITEASSOC@COMCAST.NET website

www.CivilWarMonitor.com

M. Keith Harris Kevin M. Levin Robert H. Moore II Harry Smeltzer DIGITAL HISTORY ADVISORS SUBSCRIPTIONS & CUSTOMER SERVICE

Civil War Monitor / Circulation Dept. P.O. Box 292336, Kettering, OH 45429 phone: 877-344-7409 EMAIL: CUSTOMERSERVICE@CIVILWARMONITOR.COM

The Civil War Monitor (issn 2163-0682/print, issn 21630690/online) is published quarterly by Bayshore History, llc, 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402. Periodicals postage paid at Atlantic City, NJ, and additional mailing offices. postmaster: Send address changes to The Civil War Monitor, P.O. Box 292336, Kettering, OH 45429. Subscriptions: $21.95 for one year (4 issues) in the U.S., $31.95 per year in Canada, and $41.95 per year for overseas subscriptions (all U.S. funds). Views expressed by individual authors, unless expressly stated, do not necessarily represent those of The Civil War Monitor or Bayshore History, LLC. Letters to the editor become the property of The Civil War Monitor, and may be edited. The Civil War Monitor cannot assume responsibility for unsolicited materials. The contents of the magazine may not be reproduced in whole or part without the written consent of the publisher.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

The Art of War

printed in the u.s.a.

THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR WINTER 2015

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Watch American History TV on C-SPAN3 Every Sat. 8 am – Mon. 8 am ET

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Every Weekend – 48 Hours of People and Events that Help Document the American Story Created by Cable

@cspanhistory

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d i s pat c h e s

In fact, I enjoyed it so much I went to your website and subscribed.

Embattled Banner

I must say up front that I enjoy The Civil War Monitor and read every issue from cover to cover. In regards to your fall issue’s lead story [“Embattled Banner,” Vol. 5, No. 3], with all due respect to those involved, I believe that the Confederate battle flag should not be removed from all public areas. In my opinion, many of the young men who served in the Confederate army did not fight for slavery, but rather to protect their homes from northern invasion. As the author Shelby Foote tells the story, when a young southern soldier taken prisoner by Union troops was asked why he was fighting, the Confederate responded, “I’m fighting because you’re down here.” To him and to other Confederate soldiers, the war constituted a threat to his family and home. It is too bad that we have come to protecting the rights of one group by destroying the rights of others. Donald Colongeli VIA EMAIL

Kudos

Rick Breze CABOT, ARKANSAS

* * * I recently subscribed to The Civil War Monitor and I’m very glad I did. Excellent magazine! You blow the other two Civil War magazines I get out of the water! Question: Is it possible to buy hard copies of back issues instead of reading the digital versions at the Monitor website? William Catalina VIA EMAIL ED. Thanks for your message,

and prints I’ve never seen before, and superb writing and editing have blown me away. I just renewed my subscription. I won’t ditch the other Civil War publications—they are good at what they do—but you all have added a new dimension to coverage of the conflict. Keep it up! Ken Lyle CHESTER, VIRGINIA

Thank you for having the courage to put the Confederate battle flag on the cover of your fall 2015 issue, at a time when all things CSA are getting banned by out-of-control political correctness. I have to say, the Monitor just gets better with each issue. Your coverage of obscure topics, the use of photos

* * * I just picked up my first copy of The Civil War Monitor at the base exchange in Jacksonville, Arkansas. How refreshing it was to have your latest issue to read last night. I like how it’s laid out, and I appreciate the inclusion of articles on both northern and southern topics.

William. Yes, it is possible to purchase back issues of The Civil War Monitor, either by ordering online (civilwarmonitor.com/ back-issues) or by calling our toll-free customer service number (877-344-7409).

Letters to the editor: email us at letters@civilwarmonitor.com or write to The Civil War Monitor, P.O. Box 428, Longport, NJ 08403.

Heat of Battle

There is an error in Kenneth Noe’s article “Heat of Battle” [Vol. 5, No. 3]. He states that General Joseph E. Johnston used the Virginia Central Railroad to ferry his Confeder-

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ate troops from Piedmont Station to Manassas en route to the Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. Actually, Johnston used the locomotives and rolling stock of the Manassas Gap Railroad. That line ran west of Manassas to Strasburg, Virginia, then south up the Shenandoah Valley, terminating at Mt. Jackson. The Virginia Central Railroad ran essentially east-west through Central Virginia, hence its name. It started in Richmond, headed north to Hanover Junction, turned west through Gordonsville, Charlottesville, and Waynesboro, and finally terminated west of Staunton. Ron Beavers SKANEATELES, NEW YORK ED. Thanks for your message, Ron, which

we forwarded to Ken Noe. He writes: “As soon as I read Mr. Beavers’ comment, my hand met my forehead. He is correct, of course. I apologize for the error.”

Correction

The Williamsburg travel story in the fall issue of The Civil War Monitor [“Travels,” Vol. 5, No. 3] is excellent, and we appreciate the inclusion of Jamestown Settlement and the Yorktown Victory Center in your experts’ “Best Family Activity” suggestions. However, the image on page 12 identified as Jamestown Settlement actually depicts Historic Jamestowne. Jamestown Settlement is a living-history museum that chronicles 1600s Virginia with re-creations of a Powhatan village, the three ships that brought English colonists to Virginia in 1607, and a colonial fort. Historic Jamestowne is the actual site of the settlement and features ongoing archaeological work, an archaeology museum, and a visitors center. Debby Padgett MEDIA RELATIONS MANAGER, JAMESTOWN-YORKTOWN FOUNDATION WILLIAMSBURG, VIRGINIA ED. Thanks for setting the record straight,

Debby. We appreciate it.

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agenda

National Museum of Civil War Medicine’s holiday celebration. Docents will be on hand to talk with visitors about the museum’s galleries, and children can make 19th-century crafts to take home. FREE; FOR MORE INFORMATION: CIVILWARMED.ORG or 301-695-1864.

JANUARY 2016 Your Guide to Civil War Events

D E M O N S T R AT I O N

19th Century Games Day

WINTER 2015-2016

SATURDAY, JANUARY 16, 11 A.M. – 3 P.M.

A Confederate reenactor at Endview Plantation in Newport News, Virginia

The Museum of the ConfederacyAppomattox APPOMATTOX, VIRGINIA

Visitors of all ages can play games that were popular during the 19th century— checkers, dominoes, marbles, and jacks— as well as learn how to solve wooden puzzles and decipher secret messages using Civil War reproduction decoders. FREE; FOR MORE INFORMATION: ACWM.ORG or 434352-5791. TELEVISION

A scene from the PBS drama Mercy Street

Mercy Street

DECEMBER 2015

(CHECK LOCAL LISTINGS)

Christmas in the Field SATURDAY, DECEMBER 12, 10 A.M. – 5 P.M.

The Mariners’ Museum’s Explorers Theater, site of a December 12 talk on USS Monitor’s final days

Endview Plantation

NEWPORT NEWS, VIRGINIA

Watch as Union and Confederate troops prepare their camps for winter, drill, and demonstrate combat. $7 ADULTS; $5 CHILDREN 7–18; $6 SENIORS; FOR MORE INFORMATION: ENDVIEW@NNVA.GOV or 757887-1862. LECTURE

The Last Days of the Monitor SATURDAY, DECEMBER 12, 2:30 P.M.

The Mariners’ Museum NEWPORT NEWS, VIRGINIA

The last week of USS Monitor’s existence began with a hearty Christmas celebration and ended tragically in a fierce winter gale off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. Learn about the crew’s holiday dinner and the

desperate efforts to save Monitor during this talk by historian John V. Quarstein. FREE WITH MUSEUM ADMISSION; FOR MORE INFORMATION: MARINERSMUSEUM.ORG or 757-596-2222. C E L E B R AT I O N

Museums by Candlelight SATURDAY, DECEMBER 12, 10 A.M. – 9 P.M.

National Museum of Civil War Medicine FREDERICK, MARYLAND See living historians portray Union and Confederate surgeons and listen to live period Christmas music during the

Set in Virginia in the spring of 1862, Mercy Street follows the lives of two volunteer nurses on opposite sides of the conflict: Mary Phinney (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), a staunch New England abolitionist, and Emma Green (Hannah James), a naive young southern belle. The two collide at Mansion House, the Green family’s luxury hotel that has been taken over and transformed into a Union army hospital in Alexandria, a border town between North and South and the longest-occupied Confederate city of the war. FOR MORE INFORMATION: PBS.ORG/MERCY-STREET/ HOME/ DISCUSSION

Sherman’s “Other” March: Burning the Carolinas WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27, 6:30 PM

Robert H. Smith Auditorium, New-York Historical Society

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OPERAPHILA.ORG

PBS

BRIAN CALLAN, THIRTY THREE PHOTOGRAPHY (UPPER LEFT); THE MARINERS’ MUSEUM (CENTER); PBS (RIGHT)

SUNDAY, JANUARY 17, 10 P.M.

LIVING HISTORY

Nathan Gunn and Isabel Leonard in Cold Mountain

Dark Fields of the Republic: Alexander Gardner Photographs, 1859–1872

From Civil War battlefields to the American West, Gardner produced unforgettable images of a historic era. Through March 13, 2016

#DarkFields

NEW YORK, NEW YORK

$38; $24 MEMBERS; FOR MORE INFORMATION: NYHISTORY.ORG or 212-4859205.

gruesome possibility: Has the war’s violence withered his capacity to love? This performance, based on Charles Frazier’s award-winning novel, runs through February 14.

8th and F St. NW • Washington, DC 20001 • npg.si.edu

TICKETS FROM $19–$239; FOR MORE INFORMATION: OPERAPHILA.ORG or 215-893-3600. CLEANUP

Trail Work Day SATURDAY, FEB. 13, 8:30 A.M.

Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park KENNESAW, GEORGIA

FEBRUARY 2016 OPERA

Cold Mountain FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 8 P.M.

Academy of Music

PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA

OPERAPHILA.ORG

BRIAN CALLAN, THIRTY THREE PHOTOGRAPHY (UPPER LEFT); THE MARINERS’ MUSEUM (CENTER); PBS (RIGHT)

After making Georgia “howl” by marching his army from Atlanta to the sea, Union general William T. Sherman led an even more destructive march— through the Carolinas. Join three eminent historians—John F. Marszalek, James M. McPherson, and Harold Holzer—as they explore Sherman’s devastating follow-up campaign to break Confederate resistance and end the Civil War.

Abraham Lincoln by Alexander Gardner, 1865, Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery

Fatigued by the horrors of the Civil War, Confederate army deserter W.P. Inman foots the arduous terrain of North Carolina toward home and his love, Ada Monroe, herself transformed by his absence. Once a southern lady of privilege, Ada adapts to years of profound deprivation thanks to a resourceful new friend, Ruby. Inman’s odyssey home is plagued by not only the Home Guard’s marshals, but a more

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Join the Kennesaw Mountain Trail Club—a group of volunteers who assist the National Park Service by maintaining the 20-plus miles of trails in the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park—for a battlefield cleanup. FREE; FOR MORE INFORMATION: KENNESAWMOUNTAINTRAILCLUB.ORG or VOLUNTEERKMTC@GMAIL.COM.

Share Your Event Have an upcoming event you’d like featured in this space? Let us know: events@

civilwarmonitor. com

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FA C T S , F I G U R E S & I T E M S O F I N T E R E S T

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In this lithograph by Kurz & Allison, Confederate troops assault Fort Sanders, part of the Union defenses of Knoxville, Tennessee, on November 29, 1863. The failed attack marked the end of Confederate efforts to retake the city, which had been occupied by Union forces two months earlier. FOR MORE ON KNOXVILLE, TURN THE PAGE. â&#x2DC;&#x203A;

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IN THIS SECTION Travels

A VISIT TO KNOXVILLE . . . . . . . 10 Voices

WINTER WOES . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Faces of War

LOVE FOUND AND LOST . . . . . 16 Preservation

THE CASE FOR A NEW STATE BATTLEFIELD PARK . . . . . . . . . . 18 Figures

THE INTREPID PROFESSOR LOWE . . . . . . . . . 20 Cost of War

CYRENUS STICKLE DIARIES . . 22 In Focus

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

CHECKING THE HEADLINES . . . 24

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KNOXVILLE TENNESSEE after knoxville’s occupation in September 1863 by Union forces commanded by Ambrose Burnside, Confederates led by James Longstreet were dispatched to take back the strategically significant East Tennessee city, through which the railroad corridor connecting Chattanooga and Virginia passed. Setting out in early November, Longstreet moved his roughly 15,000 troops east toward Knoxville, pushing Union forces back toward the protection of the city. On November 17, with all of Burnside’s approximately 20,000 men now positioned behind Knoxville’s perimeter defenses, the Siege of Knoxville began. Waiting for reinforcements, Longstreet delayed an attack until early on November 29, when he launched an assault against Fort Sanders, an earthen structure on heights northwest of the city. The attack ended in disaster, however, as Sanders’ defenses proved impregnable. After 20 minutes, the lopsided fight was over, with the Confederates suffering 813 casualties to the Union’s 13. Faced with an approaching Union relief force, Longstreet abandoned the siege on December 4. Knoxville would remain in Union control for the remainder of the conflict. Interested in visiting Knoxville? We’ve enlisted two experts on the area—Stephen Dean and Joan Markel— to offer suggestions for what to see and do in and around the historic city.

DON’T MISS

One location visitors shouldn’t miss is the Confederate artillery trench in the middle of the University of Tennessee campus, uncovered by archaeologists during construction on Morgan Hill a few years ago. Unfortunately the entire trench was not preserved, but about 60 feet of it has been saved. From this spot, a visitor can see where the Confederate artillery salvo that initiated the attack on Fort Sanders originated. If you visit, ask for directions to Sorority Village. SD Knoxville’s Civil War story is well told at the Mabry-Hazen House (1711 Dandridge Ave.; 865-5228661). Constructed in 1858 for local merchant Joseph Mabry Jr., the home atop Mabry’s Hill was surrounded by Union soldiers and fortifications during the Siege of Knoxville. The structure remained in family hands until the death of the builder’s granddaughter in the 1980s. Visitors to the house shouldn’t miss the nearby Bethel

Bethel Confederate Cemetery

Confederate Cemetery (1917 Bethel Ave.; 865-522-8661), where over 1,600 Confederate soldiers, including about 100 killed during the fight for Fort Sanders, are buried. JM

The Confederate artillery trench on the University of Tennessee campus

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PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN DOE

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Mabry-Hazen House

BEST KEPT SECRET

Ijams Nature Center (2915 Island Home Ave.; 865-577-4717) is an engaging outdoor area along the banks of the Tennessee River. Its bike trail and many hiking trails offer marvelous urban wilderness trips. The Museum of Appalachia (2819 Andersonville Hwy., Clinton, TN; 865-494-7680), about 20 minutes north of Knoxville, is also worth a visit. The museum’s authentic mountain farm and pioneer village offer an engaging view of southern Appalachian culture from the early 1800s through the mid-20th century. SD Ijams Nature Center is a great place to visit any time of the year. I enjoy hiking along the river and quarry trails, and the quarry water activities (kayaking, swimming, stand-up paddling) are fun to watch even if you don’t feel like getting wet yourself. Excellent local food trucks make a weekend trip even more fun and offer a great reward for a brisk hike. For those who prefer more organized activities, there are nature walks, concerts, wildlife instruction, and gardening lectures. JM

Hedgehogs and bears (bottom) at the Knoxville Zoo

Ijams Nature Center

BEST FAMILY ACTIVITY

The Knoxville Zoo (3500 Knoxville Zoo Dr.; 865-6375331) has many exhibits that are kid friendly. The bird show includes Einstein, an African grey parrot who has appeared on Jay Leno’s and David Letterman’s shows. There are also gorillas, big cats, and an African plains area. The zoo also has one of the world’s most successful breeding programs for the red panda. SD The Knoxville Zoo is always an excellent outdoor adventure, with programming and special activities that never cease to entertain. Memories of the red pandas, large cats, gorillas, and giraffes stay with you long after the visit. JM

11 PHOTOGRAPHS BY DAVID LUTTRELL

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The Tomato Head

5 Old Gray Cemetery

BEST CIVIL WAR SPOT

High Ground Park (1000 Cherokee Trail; outdoorknoxville.com) includes the extant remains of Fort Higley, one of several earthen structures built and manned by Union forces during the Siege of Knoxville in 1863. Developed by the Aslan Foundation, the site, which opened to the public on the 150th anniversary of the siege in November 2013, contains a number of interpretative markers that help explain the fort’s history and significance. The park itself is beautifully landscaped and offers a panoramic view of downtown Knoxville. SD Blount Mansion (200 W. Hill Ave.; 865-525-2375), home to the Boyd family during the war, has a fascinating Civil War story. With her eldest son away with the Confederate army, Susan Boyd (widow of Judge Samuel Boyd, the former Knoxville mayor) and her remaining children played host to many visiting Confederate officers before Union forces occupied the city. The mansion was also where the famed Confederate spy Belle Boyd, Susan’s niece, spent several months in 1862 and was received as a heroine by the town. Owned by the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Bleak House (3148 Kingston Pike; 865-522-2371), also known as Confederate Memorial Hall, offers guided tours that present Knoxville’s Civil War story from the Confederate perspective. And Old Gray Cemetery (543 N. Broadway; 865-522-1424), the final resting place for the majority of people who lived in Knoxville during the Civil War, is also worth a visit. JM

Blount Mansion

BEST SLEEP

Those interested in exploring Knoxville’s Civil War history should stay downtown, where the street layout and several buildings remain as they were during the Civil War era. There are several well-rated chain hotels located in this historic area, including a Marriott (501 E. Hill Ave.; 865-637-1234), a Crowne Plaza (401 W. Summit Hill Dr.; 865-522-2600), a Hilton (501 W. Church Ave.; 865-523-2300), and the Holiday Inn World’s Fair Park (525 Henley St.; 865-522-2800). Those interested in independent establishments should consider The Oliver Hotel (407 Union Ave. SW; 865-521-0050). Located in the middle of downtown, it has all the charm of an older hotel and is well appointed and maintained. SD The Oliver is a boutique hotel in an historic building on Market Square. Its busy, pedestrian-friendly location is surrounded by Knoxville’s Civil War story. JM The Oliver Hotel

Peter Kern Library, a speakeasy-themed bar at The Oliver Hotel

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PHOTOGRAPHS BY DAVID LUTTRELL

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Pete’s Coffee Shop

Tupelo Honey Cafe

BEST EATS

For breakfast, try Pete’s Coffee Shop (540 Union Ave.; 865-523-2860)—a very traditional eggs, bacon, and biscuits kind of place with the ambiance of a 1950s diner. This is a cultural and culinary recommendation, as Knoxville business and government is likely being conducted in the next booth. For lunch, try The Tomato Head (12 Market Square; 865-637-4067), where the fresh breads make wonderful sandwiches, or Bistro at the Bijou (807 S. Gay St.; 865-544-0537), located next to the historic Bijou Theatre and a favorite of downtown workers for fare that ranges from light to hearty, and from typical American to vegetarian or vegan. Tupelo Honey Cafe (1 Market Square; 865-522-0004) is a relatively new addition to Knoxville’s restaurant scene. The supper menu includes southern classics like shrimp and grits and (my favorite) Carolina mountain trout. SD Pete’s is a classic downtown breakfast spot. Particularly busy on football weekends, it’s a no-frills local favorite. I always enjoy lunch at Bistro at the Bijou, housed in a building that served as a hotel and hospital during the Civil War. Local produce, unusual sides, solid entrees, and excellent desserts are all offered. Another option is Knoxville’s first microbrewery, the Downtown Grill & Brewery (424 S. Gay St.; 865-633-8111), whose owners dared to establish themselves on Gay Street in the early 1990s before the renaissance of the downtown district. It’s always busy, and you’ll find great food and drinks. For dinner, I’d suggest my new discovery, Knox Mason (131 S. Gay St.; 865-544-2004), for a modern interpretation of traditional southern cuisine. I’m especially fond of the catfish with grits and chow-chow. JM

The Ultimate Source on Confederate Uniforms

BEST BOOK

From a military history standpoint, Earl Hess’ The Knoxville Campaign: Burnside and Longstreet in East Tennessee (2012) gives the most complete explanation of what happened in and around Knoxville in the fall and winter of 1863. For an understanding of Knoxville’s complex and fascinating civilian and political story, try Robert Tracy McKenzie’s Lincolnites and Rebels: A Divided Town in the American Civil War (2006). SD The Knoxville Campaign by Earl Hess is an excellent and readable scholarly history of the entire 1863 campaign. My own Knoxville in the Civil War (2013) tells the city’s Civil War story using the extensive visual images of the period. JM

ABOUT OUR EXPERTS

Stephen Dean owns Famfive Productions, which has produced several documentaries about the Civil War in East Tennessee. He is the treasurer of the East Tennessee Civil War Alliance.

Joan Markel is the Civil War curator at the McClung Museum of Natural History and Culture at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.

Organized chronologically and by region, The Soldier’s Words brings together a variety of first-hand accounts about what Confederate soldiers actually wore. Even the most knowledgeable Civil War uniform researcher will learn something new. Available on Kindle and Amazon.com, BooksaMillion.com & BarnesandNoble.com

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/ WINTER WOES “ Last night was bitter cold, and this morning there was ice on my wash-stand, within five feet of the fire. Is this the ‘sunny South’ the North is fighting to possess?”

f e h

CONFEDERATE WAR DEPARTMENT CLERK JOHN BEAUCHAMP JONES, IN HIS DIARY, DECEMBER 7, 1862

“ I have become so inured to the cold that I can endure it like a horse or dog.” CONFEDERATE ARTILLERIST GEORGE M. NEESE, IN HIS MEMOIRS, DESCRIBING THE WINTER MONTHS DURING HIS CAPTIVITY AT THE POINT LOOKOUT PRISON CAMP IN MARYLAND

“ By G – d, Captain, I could wish a tribe of cannibals no worse luck than to get me for breakfast. I’m frozen hard enough to break out half their teeth, and the frost would set the rest aching.” “ [T]he lateness of the hour of our arrival in camp prevented us from pitching our tents, and receiving early intimation to arise, we emerged from our blankets to find that ‘Mr. Jack Frost’ had paid us an unwelcome visit, and left his icy marks behind to be testimony to the same.” PRIVATE GEORGE SHARLAND, 64TH ILLINOIS INFANTRY, IN HIS DIARY DURING SHERMAN’S MARCH TO THE SEA, DECEMBER 12, 1864

“ I suffered terribly on guard last night. A heavy impenetrable mist … enveloped the earth till 9 A. M. freezing in icy down upon everything. When I came off post I looked more like some ghostly spectre in white than a soldier in blue.” UNION ARTILLERIST JENKIN LLOYD JONES, IN HIS DIARY WHILE IN CAMP AT NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE, NEW YEAR’S DAY 1865

“ YOU CAN HAVE NO IDEA OF THE BITTER COLD OF THE LAST FEW DAYS…. THE INK IN MY PEN FREEZES AS I WRITE. LAST NIGHT, BESIDE BEING IN MY BAG WITH A SINGLE BLANKET OVER ME, I HAD OUTSIDE OF THAT TWO OVERCOATS, HAVERSACKS, BOOTS, AND EVERY VARIETY OF THING, YET WAS TOO COLD TO SLEEP. ONE OF OUR OFFICERS HAD THREE OF HIS TOES FROZEN DURING THE NIGHT, WHILE IN BED. I AM ALL PUCKERED UP BY THIS WEATHER, BUT FIND IT HEALTHY.” UNION SURGEON JOHN GARDNER PERRY, IN A LETTER WRITTEN WHILE IN CAMP AT STEVENSBURG, VIRGINIA, FEBRUARY 15, 1864 SOURCES: THREE YEARS IN THE CONFEDERATE HORSE ARTILLERY (1911); A REBEL WAR CLERK’S DIARY … (1866); ARMY LIFE OF AN ILLINOIS SOLDIER (1906); KNAPSACK NOTES OF GEN. SHERMAN’S GRAND CAMPAIGN … (1865); LETTERS FROM A SURGEON OF THE CIVIL WAR (1906); AN ARTILLERYMAN’S DIARY (1914).

CENTER: HISTORY OF DURELL’S BATTERY IN THE CIVIL WAR (1903); LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (3)

A CAPTAIN IN THE 103RD ILLINOIS INFANTRY TO A FELLOW OFFICER WHOSE FIRE HE HAD APPROACHED, “BLUE AS A CONSCRIPT, TO THAW OUT” FROM THE COLD, MARCH 24, 1864

14 THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR WINTER 2015

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onfederate Currency rounded into poker chip form. Original images and artwork from actual Confederate Currency appeal to cardplayers, historians, collectors, and enthusiasts alike. Detailed illustrations, rich color, and powerful symbols honor the history and the heritage of -

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CENTER: HISTORY OF DURELL’S BATTERY IN THE CIVIL WAR (1903); LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (3)

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11/5/15 12:33 AM

s a lv o

fa c e s o f wa r

by ronald s . coddington publisher , military images

Private George W. Ladd of the 2nd New Hampshire Infantry and his wartime sweetheart, Carrie Deppen (inset)

LOVE FOUND AND LOST one summer’s day in 1861, 14-year-old Carrie Deppen stood at a train depot outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and looked on as cars packed with volunteers from New Hampshire paused on their way to Virginia. When one of the soldiers tossed a small card toward her, she retrieved it and, soon after, sent a response. “Dear Sir,” Carrie began, “When I wrote this letter it seemed very strange to me that I should write to a stranger that I have never seen before and maybe never see you again.” She asked him to send his likeness and promised to reply with hers. The soldier was Private George W. Ladd of the 2nd New Hampshire Infantry. He replied, “I scribbled off those lines and threw it towards you, but didn’t think you would notice a poor soldier enough to answer such scrawl as I favored you with.”

Thus began a yearlong epistolary romance between two young northerners who had never properly met. In August 1862, George wrote, “[I]f I had a nice little wife, why, I don’t think I should object to her kissing me, for although I am a soldier I am not very savage.” He closed with, “Much love to you and sweet kisses. Dream of me, love.” It was his last known letter to Carrie. Three weeks later, George suffered a severe leg wound during the fighting at Second Manassas and was carried from the field to a surgeon’s tent where the useless limb was amputated. He succumbed to the effects of the wound and the surgery on September 25. He was 22. Carrie eventually married, had two children, and lived until 1919.

KEVIN D. CANBERG (GEORGE W. LADD); RICHARD R. LONG (CARRIE DEPPEN)

“

COURTESY OF MILITARY IMAGES, A MAGAZINE DEDICATED TO SHOWCASING, INTERPRETING, AND PRESERVING PHOTOS OF CIVIL WAR SOLDIERS AND SAILORS. TO LEARN MORE, VISIT MILITARYIMAGESMAGAZINE.COM. THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR WINTER 2015

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A GRIPPING NEW CIVIL WAR DRAMA

KEVIN D. CANBERG (GEORGE W. LADD); RICHARD R. LONG (CARRIE DEPPEN)

The nation is divided, and a bloody Civil War looms on the horizon. Two young men enlist, each with very different strengths, weaknesses, and reasons for service. They end up on opposite sides of the conflict and, in the end, learn largely the same lessons about honor, human nature, and the horrors of war.

“ Smith took care in grounding his novel in a solid understanding of the people and battles he included…. [He] does not shy away from the reality of the battlefield or ignore the impact that wartime experiences might have on soldiers…. It is in the novel’s finale that Smith really breaks away from the ‘expected’ homecoming of the war-worn veteran, and it has tremendous effect on the reader.” —THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR READ THE FULL REVIEW: CIVILWARMONITOR.COM/BLOGS/ SMITH-HOME-AGAIN-2014

H P aperback, Kindle and audio editions available at Amazon.com

HHHHH Amazon 5-Star Rated IndieFab Book Award Finalist CWM18-FOB-Faces of War.indd 17

H O r, order through the purchase link on the author’s website: www.michaelkennethsmith.com SEE BOOK TRAILER HTTP://VIMEO.COM/102590524

11/5/15 5:27 PM

s a lv o

by o . james lighthizer president , civil war trust

p r e s e r vat i o n

The Case for a New State Battlefield Park

Gettysburg Campaign in June 1863, was the scene of the largest cavalry battle ever fought in North America. Many of the building blocks for a new park are already in place: Both the Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain battlefields have interpretive trails with signage, and the Civil War Trust will unveil a new trail at Brandy Station this fall, bringing the lands one step closer to state park readiness. In addition to historical interpretation, the proposed park would offer many natural resources and recreational opportunities. Access to the Rappahannock River provides a scenic waterway for fishing and canoeing. Hiking, biking, horseback riding, and camping all have the potential to draw a wide variety of visitors. Situated near James Madison’s Montpelier, Shenandoah National Park, and Monticello, a Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain State Park could create a tourism hub for history lovers and outdoor enthusiasts in a location that the Commonwealth of Virginia has long considered prime for a park.

Currently the Brandy Station Foundation and the Civil War Trust own 1,031 acres at Brandy Station; the Trust holds an additional 164 acres at Cedar Mountain. Much of this land is already available for public use and could be swiftly transferred to the Commonwealth. Another 3,638 acres held in conservation easement by the Virginia Department

LOOK FOR REGULAR PRESERVATION NEWS AND UPDATES FROM THE CIVIL WAR TRUST IN FUTURE ISSUES. TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE ORGANIZATION AND HOW YOU CAN HELP, VISIT CIVILWAR.ORG

of Historic Resources and the Virginia Outdoors Foundation would enhance the park’s viewshed and atmosphere. The alliance is preparing a feasibility study to examine and expand upon themes central to the park’s creation. The Commonwealth of Virginia has a longstanding commitment to historic preservation and a vision for creating educational and recreational resources that benefit the state and local economies. The Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain State Park Alliance aims to prove the value of such a resource in the Piedmont region. You can join the Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain State Park Alliance at BSCMstatepark.com. This land at Cedar Mountain—currently held by the Civil War Trust—could become part of a proposed state battlefield park in Culpeper County, Virginia.

CIVIL WAR TRUST

virginia’s piedmont region could be home to a state park—if a new group called the Brandy Station and Cedar Mountain State Park Alliance succeeds in creating a heritage tourism and outdoor recreation destination centered in Culpeper County. ¶ A state park would preserve, promote, and interpret some of the most historically significant acres in Virginia, much of it Civil War battlefield land already protected in some way by alliance members. Cedar Mountain, where in August 1862 Confederates commanded by Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson defeated a Union force led by Nathaniel P. Banks, was the first major battle fought in Culpeper County. Brandy Station, where Union and Confederate horsemen clashed at the beginning of the

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Excerpt from Book IV

Return to Gettysburg Lord! O Lord! The burden, Lord more than I can carry a fair hair lad’s last dying wish Return… to Londonderry Scribbled parchment… pocket safe addressed ‘Dear Mother Mary’ stayed t’ brave th’ reb assault O Hell! O Hell! So scary!! Her words- loud! Louder o’er th’ din ‘Run! my dear lad- Run!’ proved your son’s no coward mum stayed there with my gun Come on us like a whirling wind Twister- mile wide We held th’ line! We held th’ line! an’ thirteen dozen died A Shadow cast upon a shed Bright white in the new sunrise Faced th’ big dark chasm, mum Stared him in th’ eyes Jerked th’ triggers- instantly ‘s he give up his breath ‘what, reb brother, is thy name?’ Silent whisper… Death! When thee find me, God fear‘n soul these bones… these words thou carry that she believe-- where she may grieve The hills of Londonderry

CIVIL WAR TRUST

Often prior to battles, soldiers would place letters in their pockets or pinned to their uniforms bearing their names and ‘final will’ in the event of their demise. In this instance, a metal pin case.

©2004 Postlethwaite Publishing. RHawk61@gmail.com Illustrations and design by DM Designs, LLC. Video Production by G.Muse Studios. “Red Hawk” The Battle of Gettysburg Narrative online at www.youtu.be/rOTiew8ziVA

Books & Illustration Note Cards at Turn The Page Bookstore Boonsboro, Md. www.RHJournal.com and www.TTPbooks.com CWM18-FOB-Preservation.indd 19

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figures

The Intrepid Professor Lowe “Have you been able to ascend this morning? Your … messages should be sent constantly—at least every fifteen minutes. The balloon must be up all day.” So wrote Union general A.A. Humphreys to professor Thaddeus Lowe at 6:45 a.m. on June 1, 1862, during the Battle of Fair Oaks, Virginia. Lowe, a well-known aeronaut before the war, had been appointed head of the Union army’s newly formed Balloon Corps in July 1861. He and a team of civilian aeronauts operated the corps’ seven hydrogen-filled aerial reconnaissance balloons, which were tethered to the ground by guide ropes. The balloonists or their military passengers could observe enemy locations and movements and report their findings back to the ground, either by hand or flag signals or by wire, the larger of the balloons each being equipped with telegraph equipment and an operator. ¶ Until the Balloon Corps’ collapse in 1863 (following Lowe’s disgruntled departure after he was accused of financial impropriety), the balloons provided valuable intelligence to the Union army. At Fair Oaks in particular, the information gathered during the professor’s repeated ascensions in Intrepid, one of the largest of his balloons and his favorite, was hailed by many as saving the day for the Army of the Potomac. Shown here are Lowe (circled, far right) and his crew preparing Intrepid for duty on June 1, 1862.

Number of portable hydrogen gas generators, designed by Lowe, assigned to Intrepid

1,000

Weight in pounds of each gas generator tank

$500

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Approximate cost to construct a generator

4,900

Combined weight in pounds of fine iron filings and sulfuric acid used to make gas for a single inflation

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Number of days Intrepid could retain its power on a single inflation

500–2,000

Elevation, in feet, of a typical ascension

Diameter, in feet, of Intrepid at its widest point of circumference

1,200

Approximate number of yards of silk-woven fabric, or “pongee,” used in Intrepid’s construction

$1,500

Gross cost of materials used to build Intrepid

Lowe’s age at the time of the Battle of Fair Oaks

$10

Lowe’s daily payment from the government for his services

Number of men Intrepid was capable of carrying

35,000 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Intrepid’s gas capacity in cubic feet

Number of guide ropes (0.5 to 0.75 inches in diameter) used to help Intrepid ascend and descend

150–195

Number of minutes required to inflate Intrepid

$75

Cost of helium required to inflate Intrepid

CWM18-FOB-Figures.indd 21

SOURCES: J. DUANE SQUIRES, “AERONAUTICS IN THE CIVIL WAR,” THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW, VOL. 42, NO. 4 (JULY 1937); W.A. GLASSFORD, “THE BALLOON IN THE CIVIL WAR,” JOURNAL OF THE MILITARY SERVICE INSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, VOL. 18 (1896); F. STANSBURY HAYDON, MILITARY BALLOONING DURING THE EARLY CIVIL WAR (1941; REPRINT EDITION, 2000); UNITED STATES WAR DEPARTMENT, THE WAR OF THE REBELLION: A COMPILATION OF THE OFFICIAL RECORDS 129 VOLS. (WASHINGTON, 1880-1901), SERIES III, VOL. 3.

11/4/15 11:57 PM

s a lv o

c o s t o f wa r

by tktktktktktk

$4,500

AN ENGINEER’S DIARIES OFFER A RARE PERSPECTIVE Three wartime pocket diaries written by Cyrenus R. Stickle, a soldier in the 1st New York Volunteer Engineers, between November 1861 and December 1864 CONDITION

The diaries show some wear and minor smudging, neither of which significantly affects legibility. DETAILS

On November 16, 1861, Stickle, a 24-year-old resident of Schuler Falls, New York, enlisted as a private in the 1st New York Engineers, whose men were primarily responsible for costructing and repairing military bridges, fortifications, and defensive works. A month later, Stickle, by then appointed to the rank of artificer (skilled mechanic), accompanied several companies of the 1st on an assignment to Port Royal, South Carolina, where Union forces had established a foothold in their quest to capture Charleston. In the spring of 1862,

Stickle’s company was transferred to a new base at Hilton Head, from which it participated in operations against Confederate positions on James Island. The following summer, Stickle, recently promoted to sergeant, and the 1st were engaged in the efforts to take Fort Wagner and Battery Gregg on Morris Island and Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. When Battery Gregg fell to Union forces that fall, Stickle represented his company in raising the U.S. colors over the structure. Although eight companies of the 1st Engineers were sent to Virginia in 1864, the regiment’s four remaining companies, including Stickle’s Company I, stayed in South Carolina through the end of the war. Stickle continued in the regiment until his discharge at New York City in December 1864.

VALUE

EXTRAS

In addition to the diaries, the collection included a collar and cuff box, covered in red fabric, that belonged to Stickle and dates to the postwar years. Its leather top is embossed with an eagle motif. QUOTABLE

In addition to writing about military matters, Stickle recorded

the deaths by suicide of several comrades. Of one, who killed himself while the regiment was en route to Port Royal, Stickle noted, “We buried him in the deep, deep sea. It was rather of a solemn sight but no one felt as they would if he had been an honest man

to himself. He loved his bottle most to well for his own good. He had his liquor … and taking it away from him at once caused his death so he killed himself. He had no family.”

$4,500 (price realized at Cowan’s Auctions Inc. in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 2008). “Diaries from engineering regiments are among the rarest of all Civil War diaries, and Stickle’s are a fine and relatively complete accounting of one engineer’s service,” noted Wes Cowan, founder and owner of Cowan’s Auctions, at the time of the sale. “An enjoyable read from one of the rare engineering regiments in the Union army.”

COWAN’S AUCTIONS INC. (COWANSAUCTIONS.COM)

THE ARTIFACT

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The Civil War and Reconstruction in Indian Territory Edited and with an introduction by Bradley R. Clampitt $25.00 • paperback “[It is] required reading in the history of the Trans-Mississippi during the Civil War period.”—Earl J. Hess, author of The Civil War in the West: Victory and Defeat from the Appalachians to the Mississippi Spring 1865 The Closing Campaigns of the Civil War Perry D. Jamieson $34.95 • hardcover “Jamieson covers the many facets of his history with extraordinary precision and verve, offering rich biographical detail, solid research, appropriate maps and illustrations, and spot-on analysis.”—John Carver Edwards, Library Journal

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The Legacy of St. George Tucker

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T he uni vers iT y o f Tennessee press

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in focus

Checking the Headlines

by bob zeller president , center for civil war photography

THE CENTER FOR CIVIL WAR PHOTOGRAPHY IS A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION DEVOTED TO COLLECTING, PRESERVING, AND DIGITIZING CIVIL WAR IMAGES FOR THE PUBLIC BENEFIT. TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE CCWP AND ITS MISSION, VISIT CIVILWARPHOTOGRAPHY. ORG

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

“the great news of today fills the city with gladness. The cheering still continues, as successive crowds gather about … the offices of the newspapers to hear the confirmation of the tidings….” So noted the New York Evening Post on July 8, 1863, of the excitement that gripped Manhattan as word arrived of General Ulysses S. Grant’s capture of Vicksburg, Mississippi, four days earlier. Such scenes were common during the Civil War. Northern and southern civilians routinely monitored newspaper offices’ bulletin boards to look for the latest headlines on battlefield victories and defeats, or information, including casualty lists, about locally raised regiments. In this undated wartime image published by E. & H.T. Anthony & Co., men gather outside the Evening Post’s New York City office to read the day’s headlines, as a newsboy at left offers the full paper for sale. In the wake of the fall of Vicksburg, a throng of jubilant locals occupied the same spot. “Men fell to shaking each other’s hands with extreme violence,” noted the Evening Post at the time. “Others slapped their neighbors on the back, and said ‘Isn’t it glorious!’ … [O]ne old gentleman, unable to contain himself, mounted our doorstep and delivered the following brief but pithy speech: ‘Gentlemen! … I don’t know how you feel—but I am just as happy as I can be!’”

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PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN DOE

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

25 PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN DOE

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THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR FALL 2015

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american iliad

Lincoln and Little Mac

“ I AM WILLING TO HOLD McCLELLAN’S HORSE IF HE WILL ONLY BRING US SUCCESS.” Abraham Lincoln (top) on George McClellan (above)

To view this article’s reference notes, turn to our Notes section on page 78.

land.” He is just 34 years old.2 McClellan has little regard for Lincoln, an Illinois lawyer bereft of executive experience who seems out of his depth as president. He calls Lincoln “the Gorilla,” telling his wife that the president is “nothing more than a well-meaning baboon.”3 He resents Lincoln for dropping by his headquarters and pestering him with questions. One autumn evening he returns from a wedding to find the president unexpectedly awaiting him. Without speaking to the president McClellan goes up to his bedroom and does not return. Lincoln is patient. He quietly leaves, telling his outraged secretary to forget it. “I am willing to hold McClellan’s horse,” he says after a similar snub, “if he will only bring us success.”4 For months, however, McClellan does nothing but conduct fancy troop reviews. The Confederate army is at Manassas, just 25 miles from Washington, yet McClellan refuses to go out and fight. He says the Confederates outnumber him. He has a better idea than a head-on attack, he says—although he won’t tell Lincoln what it is. Lincoln continues to support McClellan despite a growing public clamor for action. McClellan repays that support with continued contempt.

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

he vexed command partnership between Abraham Lincoln and George B. McClellan, the most important Union general in the Civil War’s early years, is one of the most famous episodes in the American Iliad. It involves two key figures with sharply contrasting reputations. In popular imagination, Lincoln is the man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, who through patience and perseverance leads the country through the four bloodiest years of its existence. He breaks the chains of 4 million enslaved Americans. He nobly saves the Union—the last, best hope of earth. And in the hour of final victory he perishes a martyr, his memory forever enshrined in the heart of every patriotic American. McClellan’s image is almost the polar opposite. If Lincoln is a secular saint, McClellan is the arrogant narcissist, the hubristic “Young Napoleon.” He dreams of saving the republic yet proves so timid in battle, so self-pitying in defeat, and above all so disdainful of Lincoln, that he is widely despised. When historian Thomas J. Rowland told friends that he had embarked upon his 1998 study of McClellan, even those only casually acquainted with the Civil War knew enough to loathe “Little Mac.” “At the very mention of McClellan’s name,” he wrote, “a visage of contempt generally crept over their otherwise benevolent gazes, or worse, they mimed sticking their fingers down their throats.”1 In capsule form, the story of the LincolnMcClellan relationship goes like this. McClellan arrives in Washington on July 26, 1861, five days after the disaster at First Bull Run. The Union army is in shambles. Everyone looks to McClellan to repair the damage. On the basis of two modest victories in western Virginia, the press extolls him as “the Napoleon of the present war.” He writes his wife that Lincoln, the cabinet, and Winfield Scott, the elderly general-in-chief, all defer to him and that “by some strange operation of magic I seem to have become the power in the

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2); COLORIZED BY MADS MADSEN OF COLORIZED HISTORY

RECONSIDERING THE TROUBLED RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE PRESIDENT AND HIS STAR GENERAL BY MARK GRIMSLEY

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS (2); COLORIZED BY MADS MADSEN OF COLORIZED HISTORY

Ultimately McClellan reveals that he intends to use northern sea power to convey his army to a point on the Virginia coast from which he can bypass the Confederate army and strike directly at Richmond. Lincoln prefers a direct attack but reluctantly approves McClellan’s plan, provided the general leaves behind sufficient troops to protect Washington. McClellan assures the president that he has done so. Lincoln discovers that he hasn’t and withholds 40,000 troops that McClellan intended to use for the Richmond offensive. McClellan cries foul. McClellan constantly asks for more troops. He insists that the Confederates outnumber him, but this increasingly seems an excuse for inaction. Despite Lincoln’s repeated calls for prompt action, McClellan wastes a month in a needless siege of Yorktown, then spends

The command partnership between President Abraham Lincoln and General George McClellan was characterized by mistrust and a lack of respect. Above: Alexander Gardner’s photograph of Lincoln and McClellan meeting in the general’s tent in the days following the Battle of Antietam. Soon after, the president removed McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac.

nearly another month advancing 60 miles to the gates of Richmond. The delay gives Robert E. Lee time to prepare a counteroffensive that strikes McClellan’s army on June 26. During the Seven Days’ Battles that ensue, McClellan outnumbers Lee and his soldiers actually stop Lee in every fight save one, but McClellan insists upon a retreat to the banks of the James River that he spins as a mere “change of base.” He blames Lincoln for the defeat, citing the administration’s failure to give him enough troops: “You have done your best to sacrifice this Army.”5 In the wake of his failure on the Peninsula, McClellan receives a visit from Lincoln as the Union army licks its wounds at Harrison’s Landing. McClellan hands Lincoln a letter in which he has the gall to lecture the president on the politics of the war, urging

Lincoln to maintain a conciliatory policy toward the South and reject emancipation. Lincoln gives McClellan one last chance. But when the Young Napoleon fails him yet again, by letting Lee escape after the Battle of Antietam and resisting Lincoln’s urging to promptly resume the offensive, the president at last removes him. This retelling of the Lincoln-McClellan relationship functions as a powerful object lesson, frequently invoked for two main purposes. The first is the need for boldness in war. Pundits often cite McClellan’s timidity as the reason Lincoln sacked him in November 1862, and they sometimes mangle history in order to underscore the need for aggressiveness. They forget that Lincoln replaced McClellan with the bungling Major General Ambrose E. ☛ } CONT. ON P. 72

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living history

The Modern Meade n january 1985, a crowd gathered at the Grand Army of the Republic Civil War Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to hear George G. Meade reminisce about his life. It wasn’t him, of course. Meade—the general who assumed command of the Army of the Potomac just days before the Battle of Gettysburg, overseeing the Union army’s most pivotal victory—had been dead for 113 years. But the man standing before them bore an eerie resemblance to the original. His name was Anthony “Andy” Waskie. He wore a Civil War-era officer’s uniform, which he had painstakingly assembled. That night marked his first-ever living-history performance as General Meade, and he wanted badly to do the job right. Days earlier, the museum’s president had asked, “How well do you know this Meade guy?” Pretty well, Waskie had said. “You’d better, because his great-grandson is coming,” the president had replied. Sure enough, George Meade Easby, well into his 80s, sat in the front row, in a chair used by Meade at his Gettysburg headquarters. Afterward, he approached Waskie. “You know a hell of a lot more about granddad than I do,” he said. Actually, Andy Waskie knows a hell of a lot more about Meade than anybody. For 30 years, he has been depicting Meade, retelling the story of the Union general’s life and wartime experiences and working to ensure that his deeds and legacy will not be forgotten. In the living-history world, there are probably a hundred Abraham Lincolns. But there is only one Meade, and he is the foremost expert on the man he portrays so passionately. “I have so many intimate details that no one else does, no one,” Waskie said. Waskie has been keen on the Civil War since boyhood. But his career took a different direction. He had a talent for foreign languages and spent 31 years teaching them in public schools in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He also served as a linguist in the Army Reserves. During the Cold

“ HE WROTE LONG, VOLUMINOUS LETTERS, HUNDREDS AND HUNDREDS OF THEM. IF YOU READ THOSE OVER AND OVER AGAIN, WHICH I HAVE, YOU REALLY COME UP WITH HIS SOUL.” Andy Waskie on General George G. Meade (above)

War, in the late 1970s, he taught Russian to troops and was a trained interrogator. In 1999 he launched a second career as a professor of German at Temple University, where he still teaches. In 1983, Waskie came across Battles and Leaders of the Civil War—four thick volumes filled with firsthand wartime accounts—and pored into it. Curious if there were Civil War soldiers in his family tree, he started searching. On his mother’s side, three branches up, he found one: Private George Slusser, a Pennsylvania volunteer wounded at Antietam and Petersburg. The discovery flipped a switch inside him. “I began to devour all the books I could get on the Civil War, particularly the connection to Pennsylvania and Pennsylvanian regiments,” Waskie said. Eventually, he’d write his own books, including the highly regarded Philadelphia and the Civil War and a forthcoming regimental history of the 110th Pennsylvania Infantry. That same year, Waskie took his son to Gettysburg. They went in July, during the anniversary of the battle. One of the rangers told him not to miss the encampment. Waskie had no idea what that was. He’d never heard of living historians, either. But when he saw hundreds of men in Civil War

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ONE MAN’S QUEST TO PRESERVE THE LEGACY OF AN OVERSHADOWED UNION GENERAL BY JENNY JOHNSTON

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uniform, milling about camp and drilling on the battlefield, a second switch got thrown. “It was almost like stepping alive out of a history book. I was just totally blown away.” Waskie chatted with a reenactor from his area, asking if he needed recruits. The next weekend, he was in his first reenactment. Waskie spent a few years portraying Sergeant Enoch T. Baker of the 110th Pennsylvania, a soldier killed at Fredericksburg. “You adopt a personality in order to make your presentation more authentic. Then, when you present, you are that person. And that takes a lot of study, a lot of research, a lot of involvement,” he explained. When Waskie-asBaker started talking at local schools, the students loved it, and so did he. “I couldn’t believe how involved they became. And how very powerful this whole presentation, this style, was in creating a connection.” An ongoing fascination with Gettysburg kept leading him back to George Meade. The more he read, the more confounded he became that the general wasn’t better remembered. “Most people you talk to, they don’t know who Meade is or they think it was Grant who was in command at Gettysburg,” he said. Waskie’s theory on the general’s obscurity? “He

Andy Waskie (above), who has portrayed George G. Meade since 1985, spent years studying the Union general’s life. “I read everything that Meade wrote or was written about him,” Waskie said, “and I internalized it.”

was quiet. He didn’t toot his own horn. You look at Sheridan, you look at Custer or even Grant for that matter, they had press entourages following their every move.” Meade also died fairly quickly after the war, never held public office, and didn’t leave any real memoirs. But Meade getting overshadowed didn’t sit well with Waskie. And he had an idea. “If I could create such passion and such credibility by doing living history for a sergeant in the Union army, wouldn’t that be great to do for General

Meade?” Waskie studied Meade’s life as if it were another new language: his early years in Spain, his impressive prewar work as a military engineer (“He was the Thomas Edison of topographical engineering”), his battlefield achievements, his postwar life in Philadelphia— and every detail in between. “I read everything that Meade wrote or was written about him, and I internalized it,” Waskie explained. Some of the greatest insights came from Meade himself. ☛ } CONT. ON P. 72

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THE

AN EXPLORATION OF THE WORK OF ALFRED R. WAUD, ONE OF THE CIVIL WAR’S MOST PROLIFIC—AND FEARLESS—SKETCH ARTISTS

In this September 1862 sketch by Alfred Waud, Union scouts (in the foreground) look on as troops from the Army of Northern Virginia cross the Potomac River during their move northward into Maryland. The Battle of Antietam would 31 be fought less than two weeks later. THE CIVIL WAR MONITOR WINTER 2015

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“ There had galloped furiously by us, backwards and forwards during our journey, a tall man, mounted on a taller horse. Blue-eyed, fair-bearded, strapping and stalwart, full of loud cheery laughs and comic songs, armed to the teeth, jack-booted, gauntleted, slouch-hatted, yet clad in the shooting-jacket of a civilian, I had puzzled myself many times during the afternoon and evening to know what manner of man this might inwardly be.” So wrote British journalist George Augustus Sala of his first encounter with Alfred R. Waud during a visit to the Army of the Potomac in early 1864. After learning about Waud’s wartime exploits, Sala could hardly contain his admiration for the famed sketch artist. “He has been in every advance, in every retreat, in every battle, and almost in every reconnaissance [of the Army of the Potomac],” Sala wrote. “He probably knew more about the … campaigns, the rights and wrongs of the … fights, [and] the merits and demerits of the commanders, than two out of three wearers of generals’ shoulder-straps.” Indeed, Waud did observe—and record with his pad and pencil—many of the conflict’s most notable events. Born in London in 1828, Waud had arrived in America a decade before the outbreak of the Civil War as a budding artist and began working as an illustrator for the New York Illustrated

News in 1860. After Fort Sumter’s fall, the newspaper dispatched him to the front as a “special correspondent” who sent back “authentic sketches and information of the interesting and important events of the war.” Waud switched employers at the end of 1861, sketching through war’s end for Harper’s Weekly. By the time of the surrender at Appomattox, he had compiled an impressive body of work, one that documented the experiences of the Army of the Potomac—from the mundane occurrences in camp to the fury of combat—during its many campaigns. In the process, Waud had become popular not only among the thousands who viewed his published drawings, but also among the soldiers he sketched. “[H]e was a prudent man, who could keep his own counsel,” noted George Sala. “Commanding officers were glad to welcome in their tents the genial companion who could sing and tell stories … [and] who could transmit to posterity … their features and their exploits—but who was not charged with the invidious mission of commenting in print on their performances.” On the following pages we offer a sampling of Waud’s original wartime sketches, which are preserved today at the Library of Congress.

3 Waud titled this sketch—made during the Battle of the Wilderness in May 1864, a brutal struggle between the forces of Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee that produced over 28,000 casualties—“Wounded Soldiers Escaping from the Burning Woods of the Wilderness.” He described the scene as follows: “The fires in the woods, caused by the explosion of shells, and the fires made for cooking, spreading around, caused some terrible suffering. It is not supposed that many lives were lost in this horrible manner; but there were some poor fellows, whose wounds had disabled them, who perished in that dreadful flame. Some were carried off by the ambulance corps, others in blankets suspended to four muskets, and more by the aid of sticks, muskets, or even by crawling. The fire advanced on all sides through the tall grass, and, taking the dry pines, raged up to their tops.” 7 Alfred Waud (far right) with a group of artillery officers from the Army of the Potomac’s III Corps in December 1863

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5 In June 1861, Waud sketched this group of Ohio soldiers on a reconnaissance mission near Fairfax Court House, Virginia. “A great deal of this part of Virginia seems to be good farming land,” Waud noted of the surrounding countryside. “[T]his … place … [is] a beautiful and romantic spot.”

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5 Of his sketch titled “Burning the Rappahannock Railway Bridge,” which appeared in the November 7, 1863, edition of Harper’s Weekly, Waud noted: “This bridge was destroyed on Tuesday, the 13th of October, to prevent the rebels bringing up supplies by railroad after we evacuated the line of the Rappahannock River. Of course it could be rebuilt, but that would take a week at least.”

7 Waud, who is thought to have arrived on the field during the night of July 1, 1863, made several sketches of the fighting at Gettysburg, where he was one of only two war artists present. He was almost certainly at Pickett’s Charge on the battle’s third and final day; his drawing of the epic Confederate assault against the center of the Union position on Cemetery Ridge (shown here) is thought to be the only one made by an eyewitness.

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1 Of the scene he recorded in the camp of the 7th New Jersey Infantry in March 1863—the marriage of a Miss Lammond and a Captain De Hart—Waud wrote, “The camp was very prettily decorated, and being very trimly arranged among the pines, was just the camp a visitor would like to see.… It was rather cold, windy, and threatened snow … but the ladies bore it with courage, and looked, to the unaccustomed eyes of the soldiers, like real angels in their light clothing…. Few persons are wedded under more romantic circumstances…. After the wedding was a dinner, a ball, fire-works, etc.; and on the whole it eclipsed entirely an opera at the Academy of Music in dramatic effect and reality.”

5 Waud’s July 1862 sketch of the interior of a sutler’s tent near Harrison’s Landing, Virginia, on the James River shows Union soldiers relaxing—smoking, drinking, and writing letters—while two African-American women do their laundry. Note the figure seated to the left of the doorway, which bears a close resemblance to Waud and is thought to be a self-portrait.

“ It was a very wet and uncomfortable trip…. I did not get dry for two days; and was shot at into the bargain … [by] about twenty sharp-shooters. Luckily I was not touched; but I did some tall riding to get out of the way.” Alfred Waud, in a letter about his recent exploits with the Army of the Potomac, September 18, 1863

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GOING TO PRESS Once Waud had completed a sketch in the field, it was sent by mail or messenger to New York for publication. At both the New York Illustrated News and Harper’s Weekly, a staff of engravers meticulously copied the drawings onto blocks of boxwood. A single re-created sketch required multiple blocks— sometimes as many as 40—from which a metal plate was then created for printing. On average, it would be three to four weeks from the time Waud made a sketch until it appeared in the papers. While the resulting prints lost some of the character and artistry of the originals, they remained meticulously accurate representations of the scenes he drew. Shown here is Waud’s original sketch of the charge of General Andrew A. Humphreys’ division during the Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862. The woodcut version appears on the right.

Original sketch

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As published in Harper’s Weekly

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1 “There is something very touching in seeing these poor people coming into camp,” Waud wrote of the slaves he sketched entering Union lines after the Emancipation Proclamation became law in January 1863, “giving up all the little ties that cluster about home, such as it is in slavery, and trustfully throwing themselves on the mercy of the Yankees, in the hope of getting permission to own themselves and keep their children from the auctionblock.” Waud, who was particularly struck by “[o]ne of the females represented in the picture [who] had a nearly white child,” noted that the “party evidently comprises a whole family from some farm” and that “all seemed highly delighted at getting into our lines.” 3 During the Battle of Fredericksburg in December 1862, Waud sketched members of the Union signal corps as they rushed to lay new telegraph wire to aid in the communication between various parts of the army. “The army signal-telegraph has been so far perfected that in a few hours quite a large force can be in constant connection with head-quarters,” he wrote in a note to Harper’s Weekly. “This, while a battle is progressing, is a great convenience.” Of this particular scene, Waud noted, “The wire and the instrument can be easily carried in a cart, which as it proceeds unwinds the wire, and, when a connection is made, becomes the telegraph-office. Where the cart can not go the men carry the drum of wire by hand. In the picture the cart has come to a halt, and the signal-men are hastening along—some with the drum, while others with crow-bars make the holes for the poles, upon which it is rapidly raised.”

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1 In the winter of 1863, Waud recorded the punishment meted out for gambling in one Union regiment. He wrote in a note that accompanied the sketch’s publication in Harper’s Weekly, “Some inveterate players, belonging to the Ninety-third New York, were provided with a table, dice, and a tin cup for a dice-box, and, under charge of a guard, were kept at their favorite amusement all day, playing for beans, with boards slung on their shoulders with the word GAMBLER written on them. They did not seem to enjoy it, an attempt to make the most of their time and play for greenbacks being nipped in the bud. Dinner was also denied them, on the plea that gamblers have no time for meals.” Waud concluded, “Much harm, no doubt, results from gambling; but it is useless to punish the men while it is so prevalent a vice with the officers.”

“ Mr. Alfred Waud has been with the army ever since the first battle of Bull Run, and is as well known throughout the camp as General Grant himself…. His numerous adventures and narrow escapes would fill a volume.” Harper’s Weekly, 1864 Right: Alfred Waud, photographed at the headquarters of the Army of the Potomac, February 1864

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33 “The Army of the Potomac is literally stuck in the mud, and no one attempts locomotion unless obliged.” So wrote Harper’s Weekly of this Waud sketch (far right) of the Union army during the first weeks of 1863, when heavy rains turned the terrain surrounding its Virginia encampment into a quagmire, grinding General Ambrose Burnside’s planned winter offensive to a demoralizing halt. Waud captured the misery of these weeks in four scenes, which he labeled (starting from upper left): “The Relief,” “Going to Camp,” “Difficulties of Teaming,” and “King Mud in Camp.” 3 During the fighting at Cold Harbor, Virginia, on June 3, 1864, soldiers positioned at the far left of the Union line commanded by Brigadier General Francis C. Barlow attacked and overran Confederate positions to their front. Waud’s sketch (right) catches the moment, showing the men of the 7th New York Heavy Artillery, who were fighting as infantry, soon after they captured a Rebel trench and as they were preparing to advance on another. “Some of the men are seen over the embankment endeavoring to turn the enemy’s captured guns upon them,” Waud wrote of the scene. “In the fore-ground the prisoners are seen rapidly divesting themselves of their accoutrements, the first thing being always the disarming of the captured….” Barlow’s men were ultimately forced to fall back; by the time it was over, the battle had produced some 18,000 Union and Confederate casualties.

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5â&#x20AC;&#x201A; Waud sketched President Abraham Lincoln during his visit to the Army of the Potomac in April 1863. Here, Waud shows the president riding alongside General Joseph Hooker (whose head has been removed from the drawing) and his staff. The woman on horseback at right is not identified.

SOURCES: Frederic E. Ray,

Alfred R. Waud: Civil War Artist (1974); Harperâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Weekly. All images courtesy of the Library of Congress.

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5 A year after war’s end, during a western trip for Harper’s Weekly, Waud captured this poignant scene of black Union soldiers mustering out at Little Rock, Arkansas. Waud described the moment: “[Wives] rushed into the arms of their husbands with an outburst of uncontrollable affection…. Children ran about with bundles of blankets or knapsacks for the papas, or begged the privilege of carrying a gun for some sable warrior, and all were in high good humor, with the exception of those who missed the faces of their husbands or brothers.”

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“ Our energetic special artist, Mr. Waud, … somehow or other gets a look at every thing, and is useful and agreeable everywhere….” New York Illustrated News, September 23, 1861

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PHOTOGRAPH CREDIT HERE

To view this article’s reference notes, turn to our Notes section on page 78.

PHOTOGRAPH CREDIT HERE

DUTY & THE DRAFT

A blindfolded man pulls slips of paper with the names of men eligible for military conscription from a draft wheel. Nearly 777,000 names were drawn in the four federal drafts held during the Civil War.

PHOTOGRAPH CREDIT HERE

As the North turned from enlistment to conscription, a public discussion emerged about the obligations of citizens—to both their country and their families. By J. Matthew Gallman

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one direction and some in the other, would be presented to the mind of each man physically fit for a soldier, upon the combined effect of which motives, he would, or would not, voluntarily enter the service. Among these motives would be patriotism, political bias, ambition, personal courage, love of adventure, want of employment, and convenience, or the opposites of some of these. We already have, and have had in the service, as appears substantially all that can be obtained upon this voluntary weighing of motives. And yet we must somehow obtain more, or relinquish the original object of the contest.” In sum, those northern men particularly inclined to enlist were already in uniform, and the Union required more recruits.1 Lincoln’s larger purpose was to lay out an argument for why a nation at war must—and legally can—turn to conscription. But this early passage offers a window into individual decision making and helps modern readers see why it’s an oversimplifi-

THE UNION WAR EFFORT CAN BE

understood as the end product of hundreds of thousands of individual decisions by independent citizens facing a bewildering array of circumstances. We think of wars as occasions when government compulsion—in the form of laws or the raw exercise of power—shapes behavior and limits individual freedoms. And, no doubt, the Civil War witnessed various affronts to personal

To view this article’s reference notes, turn to our Notes section on page 78.

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a 2,000-word memo he wrote in the fall of 1863 called “Opinion on the Draft.” As students of his writing know, sometimes Lincoln wrote to exhort or even chastise, while on other occasions his words taught and encouraged. This memo, however, seems to be one of those pieces in which he used the act of writing to work through complicated problems, even if no one would ever read the results. Lincoln did not publish this “Opinion,” although it’s likely that he did share it with his cabinet and perhaps originally considered it as a public address of some sort. Written in the aftermath of that summer’s bloody draft riots, much of it adopts an almost scholarly tone, offering a rigorous defense of the constitutionality of conscription. But I am most struck with how Lincoln sets up his argument, by imagining the decisions that young men wrestled with as they contemplated enlistment. “At the beginning of the war,” he explained, “and ever since, a variety of motives pressing, some in

(PREVIOUS SPREAD): EDWARD TAYLOR, THE MODEL HISTORY (1897 ); THE SOLDIER IN OUR CIVIL WAR (LEFT); LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

ONE OF MY FAVORITE PIECES OF PRESIDENT ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S PROSE IS ALSO ONE OF HIS LESSER KNOWN,

cation to place Civil War Americans into the usual categories of eager patriotic volunteers, copperheads who opposed the war and declined to enlist, and cowards who did all they could to avoid service. These are not terrible categories, but they do lack nuance. Consider how Lincoln frames the issue with empathy for men of military age. In this imagined ledger sheet, Lincoln notes physical fitness, ideological concerns, and personality traits such as “ambition,” “courage,” and “love of adventure.” Finally, and most crucially, the president acknowledges that matters of “employment” and “convenience” surely figured into these decisions. He reveals how, in the first two years of the Civil War, white northern men weighed their situations, with some simply deciding that they were either not fit for the soldier’s life, or that their personal circumstances—including family and work obligations—made such a decision impractical or impossible. So, now the United States had to turn to conscription.

PHOTOGRAPH CREDIT HERE

(PREVIOUS SPREAD): EDWARD TAYLOR, THE MODEL HISTORY (1897 ); THE SOLDIER IN OUR CIVIL WAR (LEFT); LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

In need of fresh manpower for the Union army and faced with a dearth of new volunteers, the federal government instituted a military draft in 1863. That fall, President Abraham Lincoln (shown here in August 1863) reflected on the necessity of such an action in an unpublished, and little known, memo titled “Opinion on the Draft.” Opposite page: Civilians cheer on Union volunteers as they march through the streets of New York en route to the front in April 1861—a time when war enthusiasm was high and the need for a draft non-existent.

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To view this article’s reference notes, turn to our Notes section on page 78.

of state militia conscription with the Federal Militia Draft of 1862. Under the terms of the more ambitious federal legislation, the Union held four major drafts directed by Provost Marshal General James Fry, who worked under the supervision of Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. Drafting unfolded in stages. First, the United States government would announce an upcoming draft, with a specified number of recruits needed. This number would be divided into quotas for each community or congressional district. Fry’s army of provost marshals would direct the activities of federal draft enrollers, whose (sometimes perilous) job it was to assemble lists of men of draft age. Meanwhile, civilians and office holders in individual towns or city

NORTHERN MEN WHO WERE

military-aged during the Civil War— and the loved ones who cared about them—faced a challenging and unfamiliar world, as Lincoln’s “Opinion on the Draft” illustrates. Calls to enlist forced many civilians to balance highly personal and familial

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choice and autonomy. But in a larger sense the Civil War—especially in the North—depended on individuals making choices, even if various war measures restricted options and influenced those decisions. Federal conscription is best understood in this context. The inner workings of the Union’s massive conscription enterprise were byzantine, and they evolved over time. But it’s worth noting a few key points. First, prior to the implementation of full federal conscription with the Enrollment Act of 1863 (enacted in March), the United States had pursued a more limited policy

districts would busily seek to fill their quotas before draft day arrived, while the most energetic also lobbied hard to get those quotas adjusted. When draft day arrived, assuming the quotas had not been met, each draft district would publicly draw names and publish a draft list. Appearing on a list was far from the end of the story. Drafted men faced an array of strategic decisions. For many, the draft rules themselves offered paths for avoiding service. Some draftees were too old or too young; others could claim a family obligation such as sole provider for a widowed mother; others met various other legal exemptions. For a very large group, a visit to the medical examiner determined they were not physically fit to serve. Others simply skipped town to avoid service, and some were excused because the local quota had been reached before they had been examined. The end result was that only a relatively small percentage of drafted men were actually “called to service”— and even those men had options. During the 1863 call-ups, draftees could either pay a $300 commutation fee, which excused them from serving for that draft, or hire a substitute to serve in their place. According to the 1866 report submitted by Provost Marshal General Fry to the secretary of war, nearly 777,000 names were drawn in the four federal drafts. Of these drafted men, only 46,347 were “held to personal service” and another 73,607 hired substitutes to serve for them.2 The federal Enrollment Act proved extremely successful in encouraging communities to become more aggressive in recruiting (including the raising of impressive bounty funds). But it yielded only a modest number of actual conscripts and substitutes, and those men were generally seen as the least effective soldiers.

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Provost Marshal General James Fry (pictured here) and his army of provost marshals directed the Union’s four major federal drafts.

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demands with the pull of patriotism. Faced with this unfamiliar terrain, Civil War-era Americans did what they had been doing for decades and turned to a diversity of written materials for advice on how to proceed. In the decades before the Civil War the highly literate northern population had grown accustomed to relying on the printed word for guidance. They read advice books, travel guides, etiquette manuals, published sermons, and all manner of explicitly didactic materials. They also devoured a wide assortment of published fiction, from short stories and novels to humorous essays and song sheets. Those publications entertained, but they also provided models for behavior that shaped how individual men and women approached their own lives. The Civil War witnessed an explosion in all sorts of publications, ranging from strongly worded sermons and newspaper editorials to light, romantic home front stories and novels. Many thousands of stories, cartoons, pamphlets, songs, patriotic envelopes, recruiting posters, and popular novels combined to produce a public conversation about duty and citizenship in time of war. The consensus that emerged was not precisely what a modern reader might expect. In the first 18 months of the war, this massive outpouring of popular culture praised the patriotic volunteers and selfless women who fought or worked for the cause. But the popular fiction also seemed to have no trouble portraying able-bodied heroes who remained at home. In some cases authors explained a character’s work or family obligations, much as Lincoln would suggest, but often these fictional men were simply not soldiers—with no stigma attached. Meanwhile, at the outset of the war public outrage and biting satire targeted the North’s bad citizens. Some were corrupt war profiteers, selling shoddy goods to clothe and arm the nation’s fighting men. Others—notably the urban “swells”—were ridiculed because they failed to grasp the significance of the war while attending parties

Public notices concerning the draft, such as those pictured above, regularly appeared in northern communities during the war’s final years.

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“Although they had no reason why,” it explained, “Theirs but to push and try.”6 Humorist Artemus Ward’s “Circular No. 78,” which was republished across the North, took aim at both the draft’s complex bureaucracy and the many ingenuous strategies drafted men had devised to avoid service.7 David Locke’s Petroleum Nasby offered a list of 10 reasons “Why He Should Not Be Drafted,” each more ridiculous than the one before.8 For many draftees, the best route to avoid service was to claim some sort of ailment or deformity. In some cases, as the popular media was quick to point out, this involved simple fraud. Cartoons showed men with packages of greenbacks strapped to their backs visiting the doctor in search of a medical exemption for a “back ailment.” In other cases, men— both real and imagined—maimed themselves to avoid going to war. One story from Connecticut, which made the rounds in newspapers throughout the Union states, described several men who cut off their trigger fingers to avoid service.9 (One wag tweaked this story by claiming that one of

While a variety of northern publications—from sermons and novels to songs and cartoons—promoted the notion that good citizens were bound by duty and honor to cooperate with the rules of the federal draft, not all northerners heeded that advice. Above: A draft wheel used on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in July 1863.

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COLLECTION OF BOB ZELLER

ing a recruiting officer that he is an “idiot,” and thus ineligible for service. Another cartoonist drew “before” and “after” pictures of a northern gentleman. In the first the stout fellow is blustering about how willing he is to serve, but in the second the same man—now drafted—is bent over in supposed pain, assisted by two crutches.4 The Civil War years were a great moment for the publication and distribution of song sheets and books of lyrics, which ranged from the unwaveringly patriotic to the cynical and humorous. Some of the most popular made fun of drafted men who were desperate to avoid service. “I Am Sick, Don’t Draft Me” featured verses in the voices of men claiming bizarre and unfortunate diseases. Presumably in response, “I Am Not Sick, I’m Over Forty-Five” imagined draftees insisting that they were really too old to serve.5 The author of the poem “The Sick Brigade” produced an extended parody of the popular “Charge of the Light Brigade,” mocking the droves of men who sought medical exemptions from doctors.

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and wearing fancy clothes. But the greatest targets of northern distain were those fake soldiers who claimed the nation’s admiration while never straying into harm’s way. These were the “shoulder strapped” officers who hung around watering holes talking about war, without taking a regiment into the field, or the Home Guard heroes who dined in fancy restaurants while real soldiers ate meager rations in camp. The chief sin in the first year of the war was to be a fraud, a hypocrite, or some sort of a scoundrel. Simply choosing to stay at home did not earn national scorn. The national discourse became more complicated when the United States began exhausting its supply of willing recruits. It is when the Union started drafting men that the commentary about ordinary civilians became much more satirical. The near unanimous message from hundreds of disparate sources was quite clear: A good citizen follows the rules. Cartoonists and other humorists had great fun with those men who ran off to Canada or Europe rather than risk the draft. In August 1862, as the first state militia draft eased into motion, the Chicago Tribune ran almost daily reports on men crossing the border and finding refuge in Windsor, Canada. Petroleum Nasby, the fictional alter ego of humorist David Locke, followed a similar path, abandoning life in small-town Ohio to join a band of draft evaders north of the border. In October 1862 the humor magazine Yankee Notions ran a cover illustration prepared by cartoonist Howard Del and featuring a well-dressed man on the “horns of a very horrible dilemma.” The man— carrying a suitcase—was about to be gored by a bull labeled “Uncle Sam” as he considered whether to run to Canada or Europe.3 As the draft officials began drawing names, hapless draftees who were desperate to avoid service proved an irresistible target. A June 1863 cartoon in Frank Leslie’s Budget of Fun portrayed a gentleman negotiating in the park with a poor woman who agrees to pose as his widowed mother to the draft board. Another cartoon showed a man convinc-

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these cowards got confused and used his dominant right hand to cut off a finger on his left hand.) These sorts of fellows were the subject of unending jokes. Another story described a fellow who sought a medical exemption because he had “accidentally” cut off several toes chopping wood, but the doctor noted that both boots were uncut.10 Another popular strategy was to knock out one’s front teeth, so that the draftee could not bite into a cartridge to load his weapon. This produced stories of enrolling officers who simply assigned the toothless fellows to the artillery.11 No doubt these medical exemption stories combined fact and fiction, and the readers of newspapers and journals would often have no way of discerning the truth. But the larger message was that men who made false claims, or who mutilated themselves to avoid wearing a uniform, deserved the same sort of scorn as the fraudulent “shoulder straps” from the war’s first year. The collective lesson from all of these prescriptive wartime sources was clear: Now that the nation had turned to the draft, good citizens were bound by duty and honor to cooperate with the rules. That meant submitting their names to the draft enrollers and, if chosen, following the guidelines. Men who had legitimate medical ailments, were too old or too young, supported widowed mothers, or met any other of the long list of exemptions were doing nothing wrong by avoiding military service— so long as they followed the rules. If violating the rules of the draft constituted the greatest affront to patriotic citizenship, hypocrisy about military service was a close second. Newspaper editors and cartoonists had no patience for tough-talking patriots who turned coward when the provost marshal came calling. In New York, pro-war mayor George Opdyke and staunch abolitionist and celebrated newspaper editor Theodore Tilton both came under fire when their sons were drafted and sent substitutes in their place. In the June 1863 issue of Frank Leslie’s Budget of Fun, a two-part cartoon titled “Precept and Practice” featured a newspaper editor in the left frame,

The popular literature of the war years did not denigrate those men who avoided military service—so long as they had good reasons to do so. Above: Civilians go about their daily business in this wartime photograph taken in New York City.

lounging on an easy chair while reviewing his latest bellicose editorial. In the right frame the same man is rushing out the back as his servant informs him that the “conscription man” is at the front door.12 Artemus Ward—the pseudonym of popular humorist Charles Farrar Browne— captured the point perfectly in his story “A War Meeting.” Faced with the specter of a draft, the citizens of Ward’s fictional town of Baldinsville, Indiana, gather for an evening of speechifying in hopes of filling the assigned quota. The crowd hears patriotic words from a politician, a newspaper editor, a college student, and a minister. All offer excellent reasons why their listeners should enlist, but each (except the minister) also has his own reasons to avoid

donning a uniform himself. Ward’s satirical point was clear: It was the war’s blowhards and hypocrites who deserved criticism, not everyday fellows who chose not to serve.13 The Civil War presented northern civilians, and particularly men of military age, with difficult choices. The recurring message in the media was that men of good will, and the women who loved them, would wrestle with those choices earnestly and honestly. The popular fiction is full of characters who did not go to war for various good reasons. In Louise Chandler Moulton’s June 1863 story “The Cool Captain,” Charley admits that he wishes he could enlist, but he has a widowed mother to support. The protagonist in “John Morgan’s Substitute” stays home because he

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has a wife and five children. Mary S. Robinson’s novel The Brother Soldiers traces the wartime experiences of two brothers. Early in the war the youngest, Daniel, writes to his parents explaining that “I ought to serve my country in her need.... I’m young and strong, just the one that ought to go; one who could give the least excuse for not going.” Horace, the older brother, has no family but he has a business to run and thus chooses to remain at home.14 In quite a few stories and novels a man’s personal inclination to enlist runs up against resistance from mothers, wives, or sweethearts. Here the prescriptive ground becomes a bit rocky. On the one hand, the overwhelming cultural message to north-

ern women was that they should be willing to sacrifice their men to the army. On the other hand, in a surprising number of plots a man chooses to stay at home specifically because a woman in his life wishes it. In short, individual decisions were respected as genuine choices, and serious patriots mulled many considerations. As the war dragged on, and the Union turned to conscription, individual citizens did not lose this freedom of choice, but the terms did shift. If society had expected able-bodied men to think hard about enlistment earlier in the war, it now asked them to revisit that decision if they faced conscription. Pro-war newspapers generally liked the idea of the draft, largely because it spread the risk over the

entire population, but the same editors who praised the new rules were often quick to point out that the enrollment guidelines gave ample options for those who felt that they could not— or should not—go to war. In response to an August 1864 query from a young reader about the extent of his duty, the editor of the Boston Daily Advertiser replied, “The question is one for each of us to answer in his own conscience.”15 In the children’s story “Kathie’s Soldiers,” when Kathie’s uncle is drafted he elects to hire a substitute and stay at home to care for Kathie’s widowed mother and family. In the same story, Kathie’s young cousin wants to enlist as a drummer boy, but he defers to his mother who wants him to go to school.16

ANNE S.K. BROWN MILITARY COLLECTION

Unlike draft appeals to young white men, public messages to the North’s African Americans emphasized the interests of the black community as well as individual character. Above: A recruiting poster aimed at Philadelphia’s African-American population shows a group of black Union soldiers in camp.

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Sometimes the cultural messages were quite subtle. It was clear that the man who broke or bent the conscription rules was a bad citizen, as was the hypocrite who spoke enthusiastically about going to war until his name was called. And it was equally apparent that the honest man who thought hard about what he should do, and concluded that he should stay at home, deserved respect. But the key was that the draftee should truly wrestle with the decision. In “Netty’s Touchstone,” a story published in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine in 1864, Henry—one of Netty’s suitors—is drafted and proudly reports that he has “cancelled his obligation” by hiring a substitute. Henry has followed the rules, but Netty finds his explanation too glib, and thus she gives her heart to George instead.17 Edith, the heroine in “The Narrow Escape,” thought that she had found her ideal partner, until her beau proudly reports that he has managed to escape the draft enroller by sneaking out the back of his boarding house. Edith, who had previously shown no particular signs of patriotism, experiences a profound conversion upon hearing this news, unleashing a wonderful tongue-lashing:

ANNE S.K. BROWN MILITARY COLLECTION

I might have looked past a natural shrinking from the hard and dangerous life of a soldier—excused you on the ground of constitutional impediments, if you will call them so—and on this plea accepted your failure to spring to the rescue when your country was assailed—still believing in your honour—still having faith in your will to do right, no matter how stern the demand might be, when it came clear and unmistakable. I can understand that there may be good reasons why one may hold away from the act of volunteering, and I gave you the benefit of this assumption. But when the danger becomes so imminent that an allotment has to be made for defence, only the meanest spirits seek to evade their duty.

Edith’s comments are quite instructive. She was willing to accept that her lover was not inclined to take on the “dangerous life of a soldier” when those requests came, but she drew the line at a man who would actively seek to “evade their duty” by refusing to take his chances along with other men once the draft was under way.18

Perhaps the best illustration of this crucial distinction comes from a rather unlikely source. The Rev. William J. Potter was a highly respected abolitionist and Unitarian minister in New Bedford, Massachusetts. From his pulpit Rev. Potter had been a strong advocate of the war as a Christian conflict against a deserving foe. But of course the New England clergyman did not enlist when the first calls for volunteers came, and nobody would have expected him to do so. In August 1863, however, Potter received a draft notice, prompting him to write a sermon— which was widely reprinted—called “The Voice of the Draft.” As Potter explained, for two years he had urged members of his flock to enlist, and, he continued, the great virtue of a volunteer army was that it gave each man the opportunity to assess his own circumstances and make his own decision. As a conscript, Potter still had choices to make. He could certainly have paid a commutation fee or sent a substitute, and nobody would have given it a second thought. But, he explained, the very act of being drafted required that he—like any other man—revisit his earlier decision in light of his nation’s new call. And, having reviewed his own personal circumstances, the 34-yearold Potter announced that he would submit himself for service as an ordinary private.19 For Rev. Potter, much like for Edith’s fictional boyfriend, the Civil War required careful decisions in response to complex situations. When asked to volunteer in 1861 or 1862, a reasonable man could be patriotic and still decide not to serve, so long as he took the issue seriously and considered both his circumstances and his constitution. But if that same man was drafted a year or two later, patriotic duty required that he once again look in the mirror and make new, hard choices. By this logic, Rev. Potter could decline to volunteer early in the war, and yet feel compelled to serve when his name was called.

OF COURSE THIS PUBLIC CONVERSA-

tion was almost exclusively among white authors and readers, both

in fictional discussions and in real personal decisions. The home front literature only rarely acknowledged the existence of free African Americans in the North. This is perhaps less shocking than it might appear at first glance. Free blacks made up less than two percent of the population of the northern states during the war. And for fully half of the conflict the United States did not give black men an opportunity to bear arms and fight the Confederacy. But as is so often the case, the experiences of a small and highly distinct group can illuminate the larger story. The halting steps that led the United States to finally accept uniformed black soldiers in the Union army, albeit with inferior compensation and conditions, are too complex to revisit here. Suffice it to say that by 1863 black men—both free northerners and recently freed slaves—had the opportunity to enlist. Once that opportunity had been established, the rhetoric surrounding recruiting followed a narrative that was not unlike the messages that had been aimed at white men two years before. That is, the first wave of recruiting—in speeches, recruiting broadsides, and editorials—appealed to young men who were most anxious to serve. Later, when the most willing recruits had already volunteered, the recruiting messages combined patriotic rhetoric with straight talk about compensation, bounties, officers, and so forth. Of course there were huge practical differences as well. Potential black recruits quickly learned that they would not receive the same compensation as their white comrades, nor would they be commanded by black commissioned officers. Moreover, Confederate rhetoric and battlefield practice made it clear that members of the United States Colored Troops faced particular risks specifically because of their race. These concerns forced recruiters to make appeals that acknowledged harsh truths, even while they insisted that black Americans had a stake in this war’s outcome. Certainly there were a host of reasons why African Americans in the North might have thought twice about joining an ☛ } CONT. ON P. 73

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ELECTION Winfield Scott Hancock and James A. Garfield (opposite page) as they appeared during the Civil War.

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The 1880 presidential election pitted former Union generals against each other in a contest in which Civil War issues—and the candidates’ military records—resurfaced to take center stage.

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BY KANISORN WONGSRICHANALAI

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15 years after Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House and a few years beyond the contentious period of Reconstruction, echoes of the Civil War still reverberated. While many—including even some scholars—may have the impression that wartime controversies had given way to the Gilded Age’s economic and western expansion, these issues remained a potent topic of discussion, especially in the realm of politics. The presidential election of 1880, in which all four candidates were former Union generals, offers one of the best examples of the war’s continuing relevance.1 Like most Gilded Age political contests, the 1880 campaign concerned domestic affairs, tariffs, and civil service reform. Republicans, who nominated James A. Garfield, reminded voters of wartime and Reconstruction accomplishments, while Democrats and their nominee, Winfield S. Hancock, supported greater autonomy for the former Confederate states. The Greenback Party nominated General James B. Weaver to fight for financial reform, and the Prohibition Party ran General Neal Dow on a platform of banning alcohol.2 The election offered the odd spectacle of former Rebels cheering on a Union general who had helped end their chances of independence. Hancock became the focus of attention during the campaign, perhaps because voters had difficulty reconciling his reputation and legacy with their own beliefs. How could former Confederates support a man who fought against them? How could northerners attack one of their most prominent war heroes?

The Candidates Born in 1831 in Ohio, James Abram Garfield grew up impoverished but committed himself to obtaining an education to better his circumstances.

He attended the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (now Hiram College), where he worked as a janitor to pay his way. Later, he transferred to and graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts. Returning to Ohio as an educator, he pursued his political ambitions and won election to the state senate. An abolitionist and a Republican, Garfield organized the 42nd Ohio Infantry when the Civil War began and became its colonel. He saw combat in the western theater at Shiloh and, most prominently, at Chickamauga, where he served as the Army of the Cumberland’s chief of staff. Elected to the House of Representatives from Ohio’s 19th congressional district in 1862, he left the front lines for Washington, D.C., in late 1863. By 1880, when he received the party’s nomination, he was a Republican leader in Congress.3 Seven years Garfield’s senior, Winfield Scott Hancock graduated from West Point in 1844 and served in the Mexican-American War. In the early months of the Civil War, he rose up the Army of the Potomac’s chain of command, earning the nickname “Hancock the Superb” for his performance during the Peninsula Campaign of 1862. He took command of the II Corps before the Battle of Gettysburg and famously helped establish the Union position on the field. On the third day of the battle, his troops were hailed for repelling Pickett’s Charge, but Hancock received a severe wound that bothered him for the rest of his life. In 1864, during the Overland Campaign, he led the II Corps with distinction at the Battles of the Wilderness and Spotsylvania. After the war he commanded the

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In 1880,

Fifth Military District, encompassing Louisiana and Texas, an assignment that led to much controversy. Former Confederates bristled under military rule during the period known as Congressional Reconstruction, when Radical Republican leaders imposed strict sanctions upon the defeated South. In some areas, the federal government imposed martial law to uphold Republican-led state governments, protect black and white officials, and combat paramilitary groups. Hancock expressed his discomfort with such actions, challenged his superiors, and, as a result, became a hero to southerners. Following the end of Reconstruction in 1877, he commanded the Division of the Atlantic from its headquarters on Governors Island in New York Harbor.4 Political observers in 1880 realized that with a projected solid South providing 138 electoral votes, the Democrats needed only 47 additional electoral votes to win the presidency. New York, with 35 electoral votes, and Indiana, with 15, became the most contested states.5 Republicans could count on the support of business leaders, veterans, and African-American men, a result of the party’s wartime policies, alliances, and success. Democrats, meanwhile, drew support from white southerners who had backed the party before the conflict and returned to it after the Confederacy’s demise. During the war, some northern Democrats had urged a peaceful solution to the conflict, questioned the Union’s military ability, and challenged the federal draft. The Republicans who had called them traitors during the war now reminded voters of that behavior. In fact, many postwar Republicans participated in “waving the bloody shirt,” a tactic that involved constantly accusing Democrats of having sided with Rebels. By holding Democrats responsible for the war and the deaths that resulted from it, Republicans sought to keep the conflict on voters’ minds and maintain their constituency. Many Republicans went even further and, without hesitation or subtlety, insinuated that Democrats

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Republican (above) and Democratic campaign posters from the 1880 presidential election

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represented the former Confederates. In light of this, many northerners considered the South’s support of Hancock ironic. As Vice President William Wheeler observed, “General Hancock, who hurled shot and To view this article’s reference notes, turn to our Notes section on page 78.

shell at the Democratic Party when it sought the life of the nation on the fiery heights of Gettysburg, now leads that party in its assault upon the ballot box, through which it proposes to control the Government it could not destroy.”6 One northern newspaper wondered how Democrats, still fighting for “the lost cause for which Lee and Jackson fought,” had “a major

general of the Union Army” to carry “their flag.”7 James G. Blaine, Republican senator from Maine, quipped that whereas Hancock had fought to keep Confederates “out of the government” in 1863 he now sought to “bring the rebels back in 1880.”8 Even as they denigrated their Democratic opponents, Republicans made sure to praise a particular seg-

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By nominating Winfield Scott Hancock as its presidential candidate, the Democratic Party hoped to appeal to ex-Union soldiers, a group that had traditionally supported Republicans. Above: Thure de Thulstrup’s depiction of the Battle of Gettysburg shows General Hancock (left center, on horseback) in command of the Army of the Potomac’s II Corps during the repulse of Pickett’s Charge. Hancock’s performance at the battle would become an issue during the 1880 campaign.

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ment of the voting population: African Americans. Reminding voters of the war’s legacy also helped link the Republican Party to the policy of emancipation. Speaking to a crowd of 10,000 in New York City, Garfield praised the wartime actions of the country’s black population: “We have seen white men betray the flag and fight to kill the Union, but in all

that long, dreary war we never saw a traitor in a black skin.” He and other Republicans repeatedly praised the Civil War military service of African Americans as well as the efforts of slaves who had helped Union prisoners escape captivity, “fleeing to our lines by the light of the north star.” Since “no Union soldier was ever betrayed by a black man or woman,” Garfield promised, “so long as we live we will stand by these black citizens”—a reference to the fact that many states had written laws that kept blacks from exercising their civil rights. By invoking the support and loyalty of African Americans to the Union cause, Republicans hoped especially to galvanize northern veterans who had witnessed firsthand the sacrifices and bravery of black men in the war. Now, former soldiers could support the party that defeated the Confederacy and advocated for their former black comrades by voting Republican.9 Republicans were not alone in their quest to appeal to Civil War veterans. By nominating Hancock, Democrats, already generally supported by Confederate veterans, hoped to challenge the Republicans’ traditional strength with ex-Union soldiers. They thought that Union veterans might give their party a second look and vote for a man who had demonstrated his loyalty to the United States, shed blood alongside them, and emerged as one of the war’s most respected soldiers. The Dubuque Herald reported on a reunion attended by “four thousand Republican soldiers in line all for Hancock,” and predicted “the largest reunion of Democratic soldiers will meet on election day in November.”10 One officer attending a III Corps reunion in Cape May, New Jersey, guessed Hancock would “get the vote of nine-tenths of the soldiers who fought in the Army of the Potomac.” General Gershom Mott surmised that Hancock was “stronger with the soldier element than any other man in America, not even excepting Grant.”11 Republican papers denied that Union veterans could be swayed by Hancock’s wartime record alone. In August, the Boston Evening Tran-

script quipped that “Hancock will get the bulk of the soldier vote,” then clarified, “that is, of the rebel soldier vote.”12 In Philadelphia, the Transcript reported, the Hancock Veteran Club was “struggling along with less than five hundred members, unequipped and unprepared for active campaign work” while Garfield had “a whole division of soldiers at his back.”13 One Republican paper assured readers that “the boys who fought for the Union will vote to sustain it” by voting for Garfield.14 Famous Civil War soldiers took sides in the campaign and also appealed to voting veterans. Many former officers and prominent Democrats, including Generals George McClellan, William Rosecrans, and Daniel Sickles, openly supported Hancock.15 Hancock’s allies used his status as a war hero to recruit others to their side. One Hancock supporter sent an unsolicited letter to Joshua L. Chamberlain, another Gettysburg hero, asking him to support the Democratic candidate. He acknowledged Chamberlain’s four terms as a Republican governor of Maine, but argued, “we as Democrats feel emboldened ... to hope that many staunch and honorable Republicans who cannot fail to admire the eminently honorable, manly and patriotic record of that grand soldier, Gen. Winfield S. Hancock, will yet cast their lot with and lend their influence to secure the election of ‘the man whom the people delight to honor.’”16 Regardless of Hancock’s wartime record, Republicans kept employing their “bloody shirt” tactics, reminding voters that ex-Confederates had returned to the Democratic Party after the war.17 Former President Ulysses S. Grant, a Republican, admitted that he “could not bear the idea of seeing the country in its legislative and all its branches, turned over to a party composed in greater part of those who so recently tried to destroy it.”18 Meanwhile, Republican papers took delight in reporting “evidence” of any link between Democrats and former Confederates. Less than a month before the election, the Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph, for instance, noted that “two rebel flags

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were carried in a Democratic procession in Elwood, Ind., Sept. 29th; a rebel flag was carried in a Democratic procession, in Circleville[,] Ohio, Sept. 29th; a rebel flag was raised by Democrats in Georgetown, near Washington, Sept. 27th. Farther South it is said, the picture of the stars and bars appears frequently in Democratic newspapers.”19

Democrats had high hopes for the candidacy of Winfield Scott Hancock (shown here in a postwar photo), whose status as a war hero they emphasized at every opportunity.

actions at the epic 1863 engagement by claiming that he had saved “the army from disaster, and the country from dismemberment.”21 One New York paper went so far as to give Hancock sole credit for the Union victory there, claiming, “Gettysburg was planned by Hancock alone as he was whirled along in an ambulance from Taneytown to the place of conflict, with the maps spread on his knees, and it was won when, two days later, he was carried away with a shattered thigh.” “Gettysburg,” the paper advanced, “was in every sense Hancock’s battle. His strategy selected the field, his skill posted the troops, and his valor met the enemy’s grand culminating onset.” Pennsylvania’s newspapers produced especially effusive praise. The Gettysburg Compiler, for one, asked its readers, “Hancock assisted, more than any other man, to immortalize Gettysburg. What is Gettysburg’s duty

now?” Meanwhile, former governor John Palmer of Illinois accused Garfield of abandoning his own regiment to accept a staff position. Palmer, who, like Garfield, had served during the war as an officer in the Army of the Cumberland, recalled that when “it was apparent that nothing was left for us but a disastrous retreat or a bloody battle, with our enemy in position, General Garfield left us and quit the army.” He accused Garfield of being “without soldierly instincts or sympathies.”22 Garfield’s decision to leave the army for Congress midway through the war provided plenty of fodder for his opponents, who presented him as less committed to his martial duty than to his political fortunes. As one Connecticut Democrat declared, “General Hancock was not one of those soldiers who deserted the boys in blue in the front to electioneer for a seat in Congress.”23 Roger Pryor, a

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While the South remained solidly Democratic, party leaders felt the need to justify Hancock’s selection to voters in the former Confederacy. In his nominating speech at the party’s convention in Cincinnati, Daniel Dougherty, a Pennsylvania lawyer and prominent orator, outlined points that Democratic speakers and editors would echo as they promoted the general’s candidacy. Although Hancock had won the nickname “the Superb” on the battlefield, Dougherty told the crowd, the general had won even “nobler renown” as the military governor of Louisiana and Texas during Reconstruction, when he gave hope to “oppressed people” by affirming “that the military, save in actual war, shall be subservient to the civil power.” He predicted that Hancock would unite the nation, and that his nomination would “thrill the land from end to end, crush the last embers of sectional strife, and be hailed as the dawning of the longedfor day of perpetual brotherhood.” Dougherty claimed too that Hancock would be immune to Republicans’ bloody shirt tactics because of his wartime record.20 Democrats also emphasized their candidate’s military credentials, declaring Hancock’s record more distinguished than Garfield’s. In a bid to make both candidates’ army records an issue, Democratic papers highlighted Hancock’s undeniable war hero status while portraying Garfield as a politician who used his limited military service as a steppingstone to political office. Both party officials and supporters routinely invoked Hancock’s role at the Battle of Gettysburg. The Democrats’ Campaign Text Book praised Hancock’s

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The Case for Hancock

pion of white southerners’ civil rights because he impeded Radical Republicans’ policies during Reconstruction. The Jacksonville Republican proclaimed Hancock “a defender of constitutional government and civil liberty,” explaining that he “refused to become a tool for fanatics in power.” Instead, he had defended the “right of trial by jury, the habeas corpus, the liberty of the press, the freedom of speech” and “the natural rights of persons and the rights of property.”26 Applause for Hancock’s postwar actions could sometimes reach the level of absurdity. Roger Pryor reminded a New Jersey audience of the time “when the Republican

In contrast to Hancock’s military record, the Civil War service of former general James A. Garfield (pictured here in an undated postwar image) was scoffed at by Democrats, who characterized him as an opportunistic politician who used his time in the Union army as a stepping-stone.

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former Virginia politician and Confederate general, noted that Garfield had “speedily retired from the field to the comfortable seclusion of a seat in Congress, while Hancock bore the brunt of all the fight or halted only to heal his wounds.”24 A letter signed by dozens of Union officers supporting Hancock, including George B. McClellan, Benjamin Butler, and William Rosecrans, referred to Garfield as “the undeserving who quit the field when the contest was at its heights, who left his post in the supreme moment when the fate of the Union was trembling in the balance.”25 The Democratic press consistently portrayed Hancock as a cham-

Party, ascendant in all the departments of government, had relegated the Southern States to a condition of subjection, and ... parceled them out into military districts”—a reference to when Union generals had supreme control over the defeated former Confederate states during Congressional Reconstruction. In Pryor’s eyes, Hancock had “recollected his allegiance to the Constitution” and stood up against the radicals as commander of the Fifth Military District. In Hancock, Pryor concluded, the “virtue of the civilian prevailed over the instinct of the soldier”; in his “heroic” actions during Reconstruction, Hancock had “approved himself another Washington.”27 Other Democrats echoed the comparison to the nation’s first president, who had surrendered his sword to Congress after the American Revolution, refusing dictatorial authority. “Clothed with the iron power of a military governor,” one newspaper editor argued, Hancock had not considered southerners enemies “but preferred to see in them citizens loyal to the government he had defended.” Hancock, the editor noted, “never puts pen to paper without illustrating the virtues that made Washington ‘first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.’”28 Southern newspapers highlighted Hancock’s potential to unite the nation in general and Union and Confederate veterans in particular. As Roger Pryor explained, “[T]he nomination of Hancock by the delegates from the South was meant as a pledge of their fidelity to the Union.” He argued that the South had been subjected to bloody shirt tactics since the end of the war, so “the Southern delegates said: ‘You impute to us hostility to the Union; but we will refute the calumnious accusation by sending as sentinel over the Union the vigilant and unconquerable hero of the Union who knows no other object of fealty than the Federal flag.’” By nominating Hancock, he explained, “the Southern people make a sacrificial offering of every principle and of every prejudice inimical to the interests of the Union, and proclaim by an act which none but the fool or the knave

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Tearing Down the Union Hero In September 1880, U.S. Representative John Henry Camp, a Republican from New York, spoke at a political meeting in his home state and used many of the tactics that his party had been employing against the Democratic candidate. Camp alluded to the Civil War, arguing that once again, “a solid North will meet a solid South, laying siege to your Nation’s capitol, and for the second time will hurl it back in peaceful but inglorious defeat.” He warned that if the Democrats “captured the three departments of the Government,” their first action would “be to have the Constitutional amendments which give freedom to the slave, equal rights to all, and prohibit and forbid the payment of the rebel debt ... declared ‘revolutionary, unconstitutional and void.’” In short, he warned, the Democrats would undo the social progress of the Civil War. Would northerners allow the South to “gain at the ballotbox what they lost upon the field of battle? Shall the men who fought to preserve, or the men who fought to destroy this Nation guide and control its destinies?” Camp called Hancock a “figure-head ... behind which” the real influences behind the Demo-

cratic Party sought “to hide.” “A fountain,” he warned, “cannot rise higher than its source; and I say to you that General Winfield Scott Hancock has not the height, the thickness to cover, to screen or blot out the record of the dominant southern wing of the Democratic Party for the last quarter of a century.”32 Hancock’s candidacy, he claimed, served as a Trojan horse by which former Rebels would wrest control of the government from Republicans and seek to accomplish what their revolution had failed to achieve. Republicans everywhere found novel ways to assail the general’s reputation. They claimed that Hancock’s presidential ambition had corrupted his usually honorable bearing. By portraying Hancock as an office seeker, critics attempted to mar the image of the self-sacrificing public servant that Democrats proffered. Ulysses S. Grant accused his former subordinate of being “ambitious, vain, and weak.” Hancock had coveted the presidency since the Civil War, Grant charged, and “had the bee in his bonnet and shaped everything to gain Democratic and southern favor.”33 The Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph warned, “The people will take with great caution and much allowance any promise made by a person of Hancock’s caliber, made to advance a burning, long cherished ambition to be President. His pen is always ready and any pledge which he thinks will aid him to votes, will not be withheld.”34 The Sacramento Daily Record-Union published lyrics set to the tune of “Yankee Doodle.” The first stanza had Hancock singing, “My Brigadiers, let us forget/Which side it was we fought on/The Union up or Union down/For I have quite forgotten.” The chorus went, “For I a weather (Han) cock am/Your favor now imploring/I turn my tail toward the North/The solid South adoring.”35 Some newspapers played up Hancock’s naiveté about politics, arguing that scheming southern politicians would manipulate the general once he took office.36 The Daily Alta California warned that while the general was to be elected “on his record of

Unionism in aiding in conquering them and putting down their Rebellion,” his actual beliefs did not matter. Southern Democrats intended “to make him do their bidding, and, with his entire ignorance of statesmanship, political history, and the necessary policy of the country, he would be as pliable a piece of machinery in their hands as ever were the poor Africans in their cotton-fields.”37 One paper quoted former Confederate general Robert Toombs as saying, “We cannot put in one of our own men this time, and have to take a

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PUCK

will gainsay, that they renounce every sectional feeling and ambition, and stand for the Union, one and indivisible, now and forever.”29 Another supporter thought Hancock would “bind together the fragments of our dismembered Union” and “heal the wounds of sectional hate and kindle the warmth of fraternal affection.”30 The Jacksonville Republican declared that “the boys in gray and blue” would “throw up their hats in response to the question: ‘Who is the friend to the constitution of his country and to civil liberty?’” “Over him,” the paper continued, “they will bury the last vestige of the bloody shirt and over its grave, instead of hearing the deafening roar of cannons, aimed at each others bosoms, will be heard their thunder saluting constitutional rights and announcing to the civilized world the overthrow of the enemies of their birth rights.”31

PUCK

While Democratic leaders were confident that Winfield Scott Hancock could unite the nation—and particularly Union veterans—behind the party, the Republican press depicted Hancock as unable to overcome the Democratic Party’s southern wing, which they feared would manipulate the former general if he were elected. above: Joseph Keppler’s cartoon “Inspecting the Democratic Curiosity Shop,” which appeared in the September 1, 1880, edition of the humor magazine Puck, shows Hancock being introduced to—and clearly taken aback by—what was seen as the Democratic Party’s political baggage, including relics representing responsibility for the war, Lincoln’s assassination, and the horrors of slavery.

‘Yank.’” But, Toombs assured, “You may depend upon it, sir, that ‘Yank’ or no ‘Yank,’ if elected the old boys of the South will see that Hancock does the fair thing by them.”38 “If he is elected,” the Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph predicted, “the power that controls the Democratic caucus, gives him the scepter of power, which he will wield as it directs.”39 Republican papers presented a vote for Hancock as a vote to return to the days when southerners ruled the nation. One newspaper warned that a Hancock victory would mean

a regression in American politics, back “to the antebellum principles, and generally to the same methods, sharpened by the teachings of experience.”40 The National Republican observed that sectionalism in 1880 was “not unlike what it was twenty years ago” with “a solid South, and a Democratic Party north acting with and for a solid South, willing and pledged to carry out the policy which the South demands.”41 In a satirical letter published in the Western Home Journal, “Eli Perkins” listed reasons for supporting the Democratic ticket.

“I am for Hancock,” Perkins knowingly declared, “not because he is a soldier, but because the noble South can use his Yankee uniform as a Confederate masked battery to capture the Northern Unionists and catch the soldiers’ vote…. I am for Hancock’s Yankee uniform, because with it we can dress up our rebel policy in a blue uniform and fool the Yankee soldiers.” “With Hancock,” the letter concluded, “this noble South can make the Northern war Democrats undo at the polls the great victory which they helped to win over ☛ } CONT. ON P. 74

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More than a decade in the making, the most extraordinary Civil War book you have ever seen will soon be in your hands.

The epic battle of America’s defining war as you have never before experienced it in print, with hundreds of riveting reenactment and iconic historical photos—including action and death scenes shot on location at Little Round Top and Devil’s Den, with rare permission of Gettysburg National Military Park. The complete sweeping Gettysburg Campaign from early June 1863 all the way to the Confederate escape across the Potomac after the battle, told dramatically in the soldiers’ own words, selected from thousands of original letters home, daily diaries, journals and eyewitness accounts—many you likely have never read. More than 400 pages printed on high-quality glossy paper in a large, museum-caliber hard cover format, with four fold-out color maps. Publi cat i on Januar y 2 016 ★

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$75 per copy plus Priority Mail handling and shipping. EARLY BIRD SPECIAL: A limited number of advance copies of Gettysburg 1863—Seething Hell will be available in December 2015, for arrival at your home by Christmas. It’s the perfect gift for yourself and for every Civil War buff you know. These will go quickly. Please pre-order now to guarantee your early-delivery copies: online at www.newgettysburgbook.com or phone toll-free 866-278-1994. You may also send a check for $75 plus $15 for Priority Shipping to: Gettysburg 1863, Post Office Box 240608, Montgomery, Alabama 36124 FOR A SNEAK PREVIEW GO TO: www.newgettysburgbook.com

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BOOKS & AUTHORS

The Best Civil War Books of 2015 it’s time again for our annual roundup of the year’s best Civil War titles. As usual, we’ve enlisted the help of a handful of Civil War historians and enthusiasts, avid readers all, and asked them to pick their favorite and second favorite books published in 2015. We also gave them a chance to name an additional title or two that they’re looking forward to, books that either were released this year or are coming out in print soon.

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B&A ELIZABETH R. VARON From a pioneering scholar of Civil War social history comes Defining Duty in the Civil War: Personal Choice, Popular Culture, and the Union Home Front (University of North Carolina Press), a bracingly original interpretation of the Union war effort. While much recent scholarship focuses on the political spectrum’s extreme ends (abolitionists and Copperheads), J. Matthew Gallman explores the range of opinions along its vast middle, among those who supported the Union war effort but struggled to define their patriotic duties. And he homes in on those able-bodied northern men—some 60% of the population—who chose not to serve in the military. Gallman examines a wide range of wartime stories, poems, cartoons, pamphlets, and other printed materials, showing how such materials offered up archetypes of unacceptable wartime behavior: “shoulder strap” pretend soldiers, “shoddy aristocrat” profiteers, draftdodging “swells,” and so on. He observes that these negative caricatures permitted honest, loyal, hard-working men to feel patriotic even if they chose not to volunteer. This is a rare Civil War study that is both serious and humorous, thanks to Gallman’s attention to the genres of satire and humor, and to the many evocative illustrations, including cartoons and patriotic envelopes, that adorn the book. Top Pick

HONORABLE MENTION I admire

many things about William C.

Davis’ Crucible of Command: Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee—The War They Fought, the Peace They Forged (Da Capo Press): the ways that Davis interweaves the two men’s outward behavior and their inward struggles; makes judicious use of their private correspondence, especially with the women in their families; and shows that the two men’s flaws and humanness are what make them both so compelling. He demonstrates that certain characteristics we have associated with one man—say, audacity, in the case of Lee—also characterized the other. But he also traces their different trajectories, with Lee becoming inwardly more bitter and ideologically cramped, even as he is outwardly exalted, and Grant embracing conciliation while waging hard war. Davis’ tone is both authoritative and humble throughout. The book is a pleasure to read. LOOKING FORWARD TO Due to appear

this November, George C. Rable’s new book on antiUnion discourse, Damn Yankees! Demonization & Defiance in the Confederate South (Louisiana State University Press), is already generating considerable buzz, as it promises to shed new light on what motivated and sustained the Confederate war effort. Rable’s books have all become modern classics, due to his deep knowledge and lucid prose. ELIZABETH R. VARON TEACHES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA. HER MOST RECENT BOOK IS APPOMATTOX: VICTORY, DEFEAT AND FREEDOM AT THE END OF THE CIVIL WAR (2013). SHE IS CURRENTLY WORKING ON A ONE-VOLUME SYNTHESIS OF THE CIVIL WAR

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“ This is a rare Civil War study that is both serious and humorous, thanks to Gallman’s attention to the genres of satire and humor....” ELIZABETH R. VARON ON DEFINING DUTY IN THE CIVIL WAR.

FOR OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS AND A BIOGRAPHY OF USCT VETERAN AND HISTORIAN JOSEPH T. WILSON.

BRIAN MATTHEW JORDAN Mourning Lincoln (Yale University Press), Martha Hodes’ unforgettable history of how everyday Americans made sense of Abraham Lincoln’s death, dazzles on so many levels. The argument is important. The reading of sources is innovative. The prose is engaging. And the research is stunning—the notes burst with literally hundreds of manuscript sources that she brings to life. Hodes reveals the myriad responses to Lincoln’s murder, rendering an intimate human portrait that whipsaws between grief and glee. No Top Pick

other book has re-created those tentative months immediately after the war with such candor—and no other book has told us with such clarity why John Wilkes Booth’s bullet and the emotions it elicited still matter. HONORABLE MENTION Thomas

J. Brown demonstrates the stamina of the Lost Cause in Civil War Canon: Sites of Confederate Memory in South Carolina (University of North Carolina Press), an eclectic journey through Charleston and Columbia. Brown’s incisive analysis of the structure of memory moves well beyond the field’s stale debates. The book is grounded by place yet remarkably wide-ranging— meditating on Confederate poetry, antebellum politics, tourism, and even steampunk.

The TopSelling Civil War Titles of 2015 The books pictured here are the 10 bestselling Civil War titles published in 2015. They are ranked in order of copies sold through mid-October. based on sales data provided by Nielsen BookScan

Capital Dames: The Civil War and the Women of Washington, 1848-1868

The War That Forged a Nation: Why the Civil War Still Matters

By Cokie Roberts (harper) Hardcover, $27.99

By James McPherson (oxford university press) Hardover, $27.95

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B&A It’s a thought-provoking read.

ETHAN RAFUSE

LOOKING FORWARD TO I’ve been wait-

Simply put, William Marvel’s Lincoln’s Autocrat: The Life of Edwin Stanton (University of North Carolina Press) is one of the most important and best biographies I have read on a major Civil War figure in some time. Stanton’s life is a great and undeniably important story, one that Marvel exhaustively researched and compellingly chronicles. If you have a favorable opinion of Stanton (and by extension, the president who employed him), you will have a hard time maintaining it after reading this! Of course, if you are looking for revisionism on anything, there are few out there who are more reliable in this regard than Marvel. Top Pick

ing to tackle Brian Craig Miller’s Empty Sleeves: Amputation in the Civil War South (University of Georgia Press), which finally is next on my towering “to be read” pile. As for 2016 releases, I’m looking forward to Kirk Savage’s The Civil War in Art and Memory (NGW-Stud Hist Art) and Elaine Frantz Parson’s Ku-Klux: The Birth of the Klan During Reconstruction (University of North Carolina Press). BRIAN MATTHEW JORDAN IS ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AT SAM HOUSTON STATE UNIVERSITY, WHERE HE TEACHES UNDERGRADUATE AND GRADUATE COURSES ON THE CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION. HE IS THE AUTHOR OF MARCHING HOME: UNION VETERANS AND THEIR UNENDING CIVIL WAR (LIVERIGHT, 2015) AND IS AT WORK ON A STUDY OF THE LIFE OF BENJAMIN BUTLER.

Our Man in Charleston: Britain’s Secret Agent in the Civil War South

The Civil War in 500 Photographs

Mourning Lincoln

President Lincoln Assassinated!!

By Time-Life Books

By Christopher Dickey

(time-life) Paperback, $17.95

(yale university press) Hardcover, $30

(crown publishing group) Hardcover, $27

By Martha Hodes

By Harold Holzer (library of america) Hardcover, $29.95

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“ Stanton’s life is a great and undeniably important story.... If you have a favorable opinion of Stanton (and by extension, the president who employed him), you will have a hard time maintaining it after reading this!” ETHAN RAFUSE ON LINCOLN’S AUTOCRAT: THE LIFE OF EDWIN STANTON BY WILLIAM MARVEL

HONORABLE MENTION Nobody

knows the Civil War battlefield better than Earl J. Hess, and his outstanding book Civil War Infantry Tactics: Training, Combat, and Small-Unit Effectiveness (Louisiana State University Press) is confirmation of that fact. It will appeal to anyone interested in the “nuts and bolts” of how infantry units were actually used on the Civil War battlefield. It also effectively builds on Hess’ earlier work debunking the “rifle revolution” thesis and reflects his close engagement with the sources and extensive study of a wide range of campaigns and engagements. In short, this is first-rate military history. LOOKING FORWARD TO It’s hard to

believe no one thought to do something like Lens of War: Exploring Iconic Photographs

of the Civil War (University of Georgia Press) before. Editors Gary W. Gallagher and J. Matthew Gallman have enlisted a group of outstanding contemporary scholars of the war (including me—in a frightening lapse in editorial judgment) to write essays analyzing a single wartime photograph they found particularly interesting or compelling. It is a wide-ranging work with an impressive number of photographs, all of which are handsomely reproduced. I have it on my shelf, but just have not had the time to read it yet. I’m also looking forward to Damn Yankees! Demonization & Defiance in the Confederate South. Simply put, anything written by George Rable deserves and rewards close reading. ETHAN RAFUSE IS PROFESSOR OF MILITARY

Sea of Darkness: Unraveling the Mysteries of the H.L. Hunley

Lincoln’s Body: A Cultural History

Their Last Full Measure: The Final Days of the Civil War

Marching Home: Union Veterans and Their Unending Civil War

By Joseph Wheelan

By Brian Matthew Jordan

(da capo press) Hardcover, $26.99

(liveright) Hardcover, $28.95

By Brian Hicks (spry publishing) Hardocver, $26.95

By Richard Wightman Fox (w.w. norton & co.) Hardcover, $28.95

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B&A HISTORY AT THE U.S. ARMY COMMAND AND GENERAL STAFF COLLEGE. HIS RECENT PUBLISHED WORKS INCLUDE GUIDE TO THE RICHMOND-PETERSBURG CAMPAIGN AND CORPS COMMANDERS IN BLUE.

ANDREW WAGENHOFFER Countless authors have pored over the details of Civil War battles in thousands of books, but Earl Hess’ Civil War Infantry Tactics is truly a landmark study. It is the first volume to fully explore the mechanics of how regiments, the building blocks of Civil War armies, maneuvered and fought, with special attention paid to the various line and column formations used in combat. To make these often-complex concepts more readily understandable to readers, Hess liberally distributes diagrams and case studies throughout the text. He clearly demonstrates how officer mastery of the manuals, meticulous training, and constant drilling were necessary tasks if regiments were ever to take advantage of the full range of tactical options under the chaotic stress of battle. A brief discussion (with examples) of higher evolutions of the line not only shows readers that the practice of mixing formations extended up the army order of battle to the division and corps, but also why it was so difficult for Civil War commanders to coordinate attacks above the level of the brigade. Finally, Hess places the linear tactics used in the Civil War within the context of two centuries of European and American Top Pick

innovation and adaptation, also extending his analysis into the postwar period. In doing so, he effectively refutes common arguments made in the literature that the weaponry of the 1860s rendered linear tactics obsolete. Hess’ study should be the first stop for anyone seeking to better comprehend the ground-level machinery of Civil War battle. HONORABLE MENTION Save the Red

River Campaign of the same year, no other operation conducted west of the Mississippi River in 1864 can match the numbers involved and geographic sweep of Sterling Price’s expedition in Missouri, yet no full-length military treatment of it has been published until now. Kyle S. Sinisi’s The Last Hurrah: Sterling Price’s Missouri Expedition of 1864 (Rowman & Littlefield) is noteworthy not only for bridging this long-standing gap in the Trans-Mississippi Civil War historiography but also for being by any estimation a firstrate operational history. The author persuasively rejects or revises a large number of traditional campaign interpretations while advancing fresh ones of his own. LOOKING FORWARD TO Close study

of Edwin Stanton is critical to any understanding of the Union high command, its war policies, and the many controversies surrounding limits that the Lincoln administration imposed on civil liberties, so I would like to be able to find the time for William Marvel’s biographical tome Lincoln’s Autocrat. And although there’s

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Abraham been a modest uptick in recent years, academic and popular press coverage of the Civil War in Indian Territory continues to be sparse, so I’m looking ahead to December when The Civil War and Reconstruction in Indian Territory (University of Nebraska Press), a collection of scholarly essays edited by Bradley R. Clampitt, will be published. ANDREW WAGENHOFFER IS THE FOUNDER AND EDITOR OF CIVIL WAR BOOKS AND AUTHORS (CWBA.BLOGSPOT. COM), AN ONLINE BOOK REVIEW JOURNAL.

KEVIN M. LEVIN Gregory P. Downs’ After Appomattox: Military Occupation and the Ends of War (Harvard University Press) challenges the notion that Confederates were prepared to acquiesce after Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House in April 1865. Indeed, he argues that a state of belligerency continued to define life in the South until 1871. Downs shows how federal military occupation remained a potent force during much of this period as the government attempted to protect the freedom and civil rights of the African-American population. Clearly influenced by America’s occupation experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, Downs argues convincingly that force was a crucial component of democracy’s shortlived life in the postwar South. This book is a must read. Top Pick

HONORABLE MENTION In Beyond Free-

dom’s Reach: A Kidnapping in the Twilight of Slavery (Harvard University Press), Adam Rothman tells the story of Rose Herera, a Louisiana slave whose young children were taken from her when their owners’ family fled to Havana in the wake of the Union occupation of New

Orleans in 1862. Rose, who considered her children to have been kidnapped, struggled to get them back, her cause eventually being taken up by the U.S. Senate and State Department. It’s a powerful tale, one that explores myriad issues, including the end of slavery in the U.S. and the scope of African-American civil rights. This is a wonderful book. LOOKING FORWARD TO In the wake of the shootings at the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston last summer, Americans across the country are rethinking how the Civil War should be remembered in their communities. I have a feeling that Thomas J. Brown’s Civil War Canon: Sites of Confederate Memory in South Carolina will get us closer to appreciating these places’ evolving meaning with some much needed historical context. Coming next year is Manisha Sinha’s The Slave’s Cause: A History of Abolitionism (Yale University Press), a book that looks to cast a wide net in its handling of the abolition movement by expanding its scope beyond the typical short list of white reformers to include black and white men and women, free and enslaved, who struggled to find common ground on the question of slavery’s future. The book also places America’s abolitionist struggles within a broader transnational context.

Lincoln Book Shop, Inc. Specialists in Historical Americana since 1938

Featuring a Fine Selection of

• Artifacts • Autographs • Books • Letters • Campaign Memorabilia • Ephemera • Paintings • Photographs • Prints • Sculpture Relating to Abraham Lincoln, the Civil War and U.S. Presidents

KEVIN M. LEVIN IS A HISTORIAN AND EDUCATOR BASED IN BOSTON. HE IS THE AUTHOR OF REMEMBERING THE BATTLE OF THE CRATER: WAR AS MURDER (2012) AND IS CURRENTLY WORKING ON A BOOK ABOUT CONFEDERATE CAMP SERVANTS AND THE MYTH OF THE BLACK CONFEDERATE SOLDIER. HIS MOST RECENT WORK CAN BE FOUND IN COLD HARBOR TO THE CRATER: THE END OF THE OVERLAND CAMPAIGN (2015), EDITED BY GARY GALLAGHER AND CAROLINE JANNEY. YOU CAN FIND HIM ONLINE AT CIVIL WAR MEMORY (CWMEMORY.COM).

Abraham Lincoln Book Shop, Inc. 357 W. Chicago Ave. Chicago, IL 60654 (312) 944-3085 ALincolnBookShop.com

For in-depth reviews of the latest Civil War titles, visit civilwarmonitor.com/book-shelf.

If it’s on our Shelves…

It’s History!

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AMERICAN ILIAD CONTINUED FROM P. 27

Burnside, as that hardly makes the desired point. Thus, in a 2009 editorial endorsing President Barack Obama’s replacement of General Stanley McChrystal with General David Petraeus as top commander in Afghanistan, Investor’s Business Daily told its readers that such measures were sometimes necessary. “Union fortunes were bleak in the summer of 1864 until President Abraham Lincoln sacked the pedestrian Gen. George McClellan and chose Gen. Ulysses S. Grant.”6 The second purpose is to underscore the need for military subordination. In his memoirs, President Harry Truman famously likened his decision to fire the flamboyantly insubordinate General Douglas MacArthur with Lincoln’s relief of McClellan. McClellan, Truman averred, “made political statements on matters outside the military field” and chronically balked at Lincoln’s demand that he take the offensive. “The President would issue direct orders to McClellan and the general would ignore them.... Lincoln was patient, for that was his nature, but at long last he was compelled to relieve the Union Army’s principal commander. And though I gave this difficulty with MacArthur much wearisome thought, I realized that I would have no other choice myself than to relieve the nation’s top field commander.”7 But however useful this mythic retelling may be, it’s worth recalling that after the war, when asked to name his most formidable opponent, Lee replied, “McClellan, by all odds!”8 Our view of Little Mac is so jaundiced that we don’t take that appraisal seriously. We should. Until mid-1864 McClellan was the only Union commander to get anywhere near the Confederate capital of Richmond (and unlike Grant, who managed the feat only at the cost of 55,000 casualties, he did so with little loss of life). During the

Seven Days he easily thwarted Lee’s attempt to destroy the Army of the Potomac. At Antietam he repelled Lee’s first invasion of the North. It’s one thing to be critical of McClellan. It’s another to get so carried away in our derision that we foreclose rational analysis. MARK GRIMSLEY, A HISTORY PROFESSOR AT THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY, IS THE AUTHOR OF SEVERAL BOOKS, INCLUDING AND KEEP MOVING ON: THE VIRGINIA CAMPAIGN, MAY-JUNE 1864 (2002) AND THE HARD HAND OF WAR: UNION MILITARY POLICY TOWARD SOUTHERN CIVILIANS, 1861-1865 (1995). HE HAS ALSO WRITTEN MORE THAN 50 ARTICLES AND ESSAYS.

LIVING HISTORY CONTINUED FROM P. 29

“He wrote long, voluminous letters, hundreds and hundreds of them. If you read those over and over again, which I have, you really come up with his soul.” His first living-history presentation led to another, then another, until Waskie was speaking at the Smithsonian, West Point, and the Library of Congress. He wore through several uniforms, and repeatedly lugged his authentic field staff sword through airport security. He led Union forces in numerous reenactments, reveling in those “time slip” moments when the veil between past and present appeared to lift: “You look back and see a thousand men marching in step, all in the complete period dress, authentic to the nth degree, and all of a sudden you can almost float away and think, Wow, this is the way it was.” The more he “played” Meade, the more the connection deepened. When several of Meade’s descendants wanted to sell a collection of his artifacts, Waskie was the one they called to help them sort through everything. As a thank you, they gave him the last known photograph of General Meade, taken shortly before he died. On December 31, 1995, Waskie led a ceremony at Meade’s grave site in Philadelphia’s Laurel Hill Cemetery to celebrate the general’s birthday. Fifty people showed up

to lay wreaths, read poems, and sip Meade’s favorite drink, champagne. They did it again the next year, then formed themselves into the General Meade Society, an organization that promotes Meade, his career, and his service. The society now has 200 members. Many were present when, in 2003, Waskie married his second wife, at the cemetery, after the annual graveside ceremony. “Meade was married on his birthday. It’s his wedding anniversary and it’s my wedding anniversary,” said Waskie. Facts like that leave one to wonder whether Waskie hasn’t melded himself into Meade a little too powerfully. But Waskie sees the boundaries as more clear. “I couldn’t say I feel like him,” he explained. “It’s more I’m trying to do the best job I can to represent him authentically, correctly, using the same diction, using his words. I mean, I think I have him down really well, but I’m never thinking that I’m him. I’ve never gone to that point.” He added: “I never do Meade at these ceremonies. I just feel that the attention should be on him, on the general himself, and not on me trying to portray him.” Meade was 56 when he died. Waskie is 12 years older than that. But Meade didn’t age well—in his final photo, the one Waskie has, he looks 80—so Waskie figures he can portray the general for another decade. Still, he has started to peel back some of his Meade responsibilities. In 2013 he retired from field reenacting. Waskie being the only Meade, the news made headlines. “Rock stars make the cover of Rolling Stone. I’m on the cover of Civil War News,” he quipped. Waskie will still do first-person living-history presentations—and promote Meade at every opportunity. This December 31 marks the general’s 200th birthday, and Waskie and the Meade Society plan to commemorate the event with picnics, dinners, a symposium, and their annual ritual at Laurel Hill Cemetery. Meade is buried in the oldest section, on a hillside overlooking the Schuylkill River. On a lower terrace, within full view, are two empty grave plots, which Waskie has purchased. It’s where he

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and his wife will be buried. The general and his reenactor, having lived a century apart, will spend eternity about 20 feet from each other. It’s hard to imagine what General Meade would have thought of Waskie’s devotion and the ongoing efforts to preserve his memory. But Waskie thinks he might know. “He probably wouldn’t have liked it. He wasn’t interested in self-aggrandizement, and maybe the Meade Society is a little of that. But why not? He can’t do it, but I can. And he deserved the recognition. He probably would have pooh-poohed it, but then he wouldn’t be remembered.” JENNY JOHNSTON IS A FREELANCE WRITER AND EDITOR BASED IN SAN FRANCISCO.

DUTY & THE DRAFT CONTINUED FROM P. 53

army that declined to treat them as equals, to fight for a nation that had no commitment to civil rights. And yet, many black men did just that.20 But the public discussion of enlistment within the African-American and abolitionist press presents another interesting—and perhaps illuminating—difference.21 It is certainly true that the thousands of appeals to young white men stressed the importance of Union, but when it came to the individual’s personal decision-making, the emphasis was on the needs, goals, and character of the individual. The public messages directed at the North’s African-American men, however, were quite different. Time and

again, recruiters, editors, poets, and ordinary black citizens called on black men to make decisions with the interest of the black community in mind. The celebrated Philadelphia recruiting poster aimed at “Men of Color” is an excellent illustration. This broadside, which originally appeared in July 1863 as an eight-foot banner, included nearly 700 words appealing to men who had not yet enlisted and carried the names of more than 50 leading black citizens who endorsed the message. The lengthy text called on hesitant young men to step forward and “silence the tongue of calumny” in response to those who questioned their valor, or who compared free black men unfavorably against white immigrants or southern slaves who had already enlisted and served well. This extraordinary recruiting banner used the words “our,” “we,” and “us” more than 50 times. African-American men who read this poster and heard the scores of recruiting speeches understood that their individual decisions, and their subsequent behavior on the battlefield, could effect how the nation perceived all people of color.22 Whereas white men enjoyed the freedom to make choices that considered personal needs and family obligations, black men understood that their decisions came with larger societal stakes attached.

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sonally inclined to huge sacrifices. Government action shaped their options and sometimes constrained those personal choices. When the calls came for more and more volunteers, northern men had a choice— and large numbers chose to stay at home. And when the nation turned to conscription, even most drafted men had options and only a small percentage actually served. So long as these individuals behaved honestly, and made their personal decisions with integrity, the larger society was surprisingly willing to accept those choices. J. MATTHEW GALLMAN IS PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA. HE IS THE AUTHOR OR EDITOR OF 10 BOOKS, MOST RECENTLY DEFINING DUTY IN THE CIVIL WAR: PERSONAL CHOICE, POPULAR CULTURE, AND THE UNION HOME FRONT (UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA PRESS, 2015) AND—EDITED WITH GARY W. GALLAGHER—LENS OF WAR: HISTORIANS REFLECT ON THEIR FAVORITE CIVIL WAR PHOTOGRAPHS (UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA PRESS, 2015).

ELECTION 1880 CONTINUED FROM P. 63

the noble Confederacy on the battlefield.”42 Some Republicans even went so far as to target Hancock’s military record, something Democrats had thought irreproachable. Republican critics subtly deflated Hancock’s accomplishments, arguing that his wartime reputation had been exaggerated. The Boston Evening Transcript, for example, revisited the Battle of Williamsburg, where he had earned the moniker “Hancock the Superb.” One writer declared that the units most heavily engaged were not commanded by Hancock, who “was on the extreme right, working his way up the York River to reach the enemy’s flank” and “scarcely in that fight.” An eyewitness to the battle remembered, “Hancock lost just thirty men—killed and wounded—on

Winfield Scott Hancock fought that battle single-handed, without the assistance of either officers or privates. It was a herculean task, and whenever the General had a leg or arm shot off, or the top of his head carried away by a shell from a Rebel gun he naturally felt discouraged, and was on the point of surrendering to the enemy; but suddenly remembering that the future success of the Democratic Party depended upon a victory, he became endowed with fresh courage and almost superhuman strength, and dashed into the jaws of death and mowed down regiment after regiment, until the gore of the enemy fairly sizzled upon his heated sword.

The rest of the army, meanwhile, had “fled at the first fire of the Rebels,

and were therefore not present to witness” Hancock’s “heroic deeds” as he “won the battle and thereby saved the Union.”46 A veteran who served under Hancock at Gettysburg declared that the general “is ‘the hero of Gettysburg’ in the same sense as a half-a-dozen other generals who were there and fought their corps well.”47 In the presidential contest of 1880, nothing was off limits, not even a stellar soldier’s military record.

The Outcome On November 2, 1880, Americans delivered a decisive Electoral College victory to James Garfield: 214155. Garfield also won the popular vote, but with only 4,449,053 votes to Hancock’s 4,442,030, a difference of a mere 7,023 ballots. The close tally showed that both ex-Rebels and northerners had indeed accepted Hancock, although for different reasons. In the former Confederacy, voters focused on Hancock’s actions during Reconstruction in support of southern rights. In the North, Democrats heralded Hancock’s wartime service. Meanwhile, Republicans assailed Hancock’s lack of political experience, questioned his wartime achievements, and deployed their bloody shirt tactics. Asked how he felt about the outcome, Hancock responded, “If the American people can stand it, I can.”48 In his inaugural address, Garfield addressed wartime issues, declaring that the “supremacy of the nation and its laws should be no longer a subject of debate.” The issue had been settled “in the high court of war by a degree from which there is no appeal.” He then turned to the issue of freedmen, stating that the “elevation of the negro race from slavery to the full rights of citizenship is the most important political change we have known since the adoption of the Constitution in 1787.” Acknowledging that the change had “caused serious disturbance to our Southern communities,” he warned “those who resisted” that there “was no middle ground for the negro race between slavery and equal citizenship.”49 An assassin’s bullet took Garfield’s life

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

DUTY & THE DRAFT

that occasion, while Hooker’s division lost 1700.” Given these numbers, he thought Hancock’s “admirers are rubbing it on rather thick when they call him ‘the superb,’ considering the way he obtained the title.”43 Other papers attacked Hancock’s actions at Gettysburg, his most famous battle. The National Republican accused Hancock’s supporters of trying “to rob his old commander, Meade of the glory due to him as the hero of Gettysburg.”44 Another paper explained that “a combination of hungry politicians, Northern copperheads and doughfaces, draft rioters, bounty brokers, ex-cotton speculators across the lines” had united “with ex-Confederates in ushering in his nomination at Cincinnati with the famous ‘rebel yell’” to laud Hancock as “the hero of Gettysburg.” The paper also noted that much had been made about Hancock’s riding “along the crest of Cemetery Ridge” during heavy cannonading in the lead-up to Pickett’s Charge. “Was it so wonderful a thing for a general officer to thus expose himself?” the author wondered. “That General Hancock was one of the heroes of Gettysburg is an admitted fact,” the paper acknowledged, and claimed that its probing questions were designed to prevent history from being “perverted to invest him [Hancock] with fictitious glory and honors which he himself would be the last to claim.”45 One Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph reader, apparently fed up with the praise for Hancock, wrote sarcastically in September:

Dear Beloved Wife: the Civil War letters of Andrew Davis, Co "I" 15th Indiana Infantry, to his wife Sarah By David Paul Davenport, Ph.D. University of Illinois, Urbana, 1983, and Past-president of the San Joaquin Valley Civil War Round Table

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

James Garfield lies on his deathbed in this 1881 lithograph by Currier & Ives.

before he could demonstrate whether he would truly have upheld African Americans’ civil rights in the South. Ironically and tragically, the legacy of the 1880 election was instead an electoral map that showed Republicans they could win the presidency without any southern states. Republicans realized they could ignore racial issues at the national level, leaving southern blacks to fend for themselves.50 For the next several decades, as racial violence gripped the South and state laws chipped away at freed people’s civil rights, African Americans found themselves without a political party to champion their issues on the national stage. In the post-election gloom, southern papers claimed that former Confederates supporting the Democratic Party’s candidate had done their best to demonstrate their loyalty and assuage Republican fears by nominating a northern war hero. The election results, southerners claimed, proved that the North was not yet serious about reconciliation. “The fools of the North,” one Alabama paper predicted, “will never cease to scare at

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the ghost of the Southern Confederacy.” The paper concluded that northerners would “not vote for a man the South votes for, no matter what his character, the extent of his service to country, his ability, statesmanship or patriotism.” “Our friendship,” it lamented, “has been fatal to them all.”51 These southern writers acknowledged that the specter of the Civil War still haunted national politics 15 years after Appomattox. A Democratic paper from South Carolina took Hancock’s nomination as evidence of “the lengths to which the Democracy would go in order to have a chance of winning.” With just two northern states in their column, “the South could elect the President and be master of the Government.” Power, it noted, would “have been exercised wisely; but the conquerors were not ready to be ruled, even to their own advantage, by the conquered.”52

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KANISORN WONGSRICHANALAI IS AN ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF HISTORY AT ANGELO STATE UNIVERSITY. HE IS CO-EDTIOR (WITH LORIEN FOOTE) OF SO CONCEIVED AND SO DEDICATED: INTELLECTUAL LIFE IN THE CIVIL WAR-ERA NORTH (2015). THE AUTHOR THANKS KATHRYN OSTROFSKY FOR HER HELP WITH THIS ARTICLE, WHICH HE WOULD LIKE TO DEDICATE TO THE MEMORY OF GUOQIANG “JOE” ZHENG (1955-2012), AN ASSOCIATE, MENTOR, AND FRIEND.

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When his father is killed at Shiloh, Blake decides to go to the war and kill the soldier who killed his father. But it's not as simple as he thinks. Entering the war during the Kentucky Campaign of 1862 with the 2nd Tennessee, he later finds himself with the 31st Indiana when he falls at Perryville. Young Blake comes face to face with the gut-wrenching destruction and aftermath of battle with its loss of life and of friends, wounded and killed. He no longer wants to kill Yanks. He just wants to go home. Friendship with an enemy soldier has unexpected consequences. Published in full color by

Duane Kinkade was ten years old in the summer of 1861 when raiders struck his farm after his pa had gone to the war; eleven the following spring when he left in search of his father and became a part of the war himself; thirteen the summer he returned home, a veteran soldier, after two and a half years of army life and battlefield experience from Tennessee/Kentucky to Pennsylvania to Virginia. Xlibris, LLC 600 pages, hardback [$34.99], softback [$23.99], & eBook [$3.99] The regiments and their histories in these stories are real, the events did happen.

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dates; Petroleum V. Nasby [David Locke], “To Canada,” The Nasby Papers (Indianapolis, 1863); Yankee Notions 10 (October 1862): cover. 4 Frank Leslie’s Budget of Fun, June 1863; Vanity Fair, September 20, 1862; Yankee Notions 11 (October 1862): 309. 5

Song sheets, Library of Congress.

the sort of popular fiction that mass market periodicals aimed at white readers. For a much more extended discussion of debates within the northern black community, see Gallman, Defining Duty, chapter 7. 22 E.D. Bassett et al, Men of Color. Recruiting Broadside. (July 1863). Original in the Library Company of Philadelphia.

6 Yankee Notions 12 (March 1863): 91.

SOURCES & CITATIONS FROM THIS ISSUE’S ARTICLES

AMERICAN ILIAD (Pages 26-27, 72) 1

Thomas J. Rowland, George B. McClellan and Civil War History: In the Shadow of Grant and Sherman (Kent, OH, 1998), vii.

2 McClellan to Mary Ellen McClellan, July 27, 1861, Stephen W. Sears, ed., The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan: Selected Correspondence, 1860-1865 (New York, 1989), 70. 3 McClellan to Mary Ellen McClellan, October 11, 1861, November 17, 1861, November 18, 1861, Sears, ed., The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, 106, 135, 136. 4 Quoted in Michael Burlingame, Abraham Lincoln: A Life, 2 vols. (Baltimore, 2008), 2:197. 5 McClellan to Edwin M. Stanton, June 27, 1862, Sears, ed., The Civil War Papers of George B. McClellan, 323. (A horrified War Department telegrapher deleted this accusation from the dispatch. Lincoln didn’t learn of it until 1864.) 6 Investor’s Business Daily, May 14, 2009, A10. 7 Harry S. Truman, Memoirs by Harry S. Truman, 2 vols. (Garden City, NY, 1956), 2:443-444. 8 Cazenove Lee, undated memorandum printed in Robert E. Lee [Jr.], Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee (New York, 1904), 416.

DUTY & THE DRAFT (Pages 44–53, 73–74) 1

Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, 8 vols. (New Brunswick, NJ, 1953), 6: 445-6. For a further discussion of this memo, and the other issues raised in this essay, see J. Matthew Gallman, Defining Duty in the Civil War: Personal Choice, Popular Culture, and the Union Home Front (Chapel Hill, 2015). For a good analysis of Fry’s report, see Peter Levine, “Draft Evasion in the North during the Civil War, 1863-1865,” Journal of American History 67 (March 1981): 816-834.

3 Chicago Tribune, August 1862, various

Artemus Ward [David Farrar Brown], “Circular No. 78.” This satirical circular appeared in newspapers across the North. See, for instance, the New Haven Daily Palladium, August 21, 1863.

Nasby, “Shows Why He Should Not Be Drafted,” The Nasby Papers, 9. Essay is dated August 6, 1862.

See, for instance, Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, August 21, 1862.

10 Newark Advocate, August 29, 1862. 11 Boston Daily Advertiser, June 24, 1864. 12 Frank Leslie’s Budget of Fun (June 1863): 8. 13 Ward, “A War Meeting,” Vanity Fair, October 4, 1862. 14 Louise Chandler Moulton, “The Cool Captain,” Harper’s New Monthly Magazine 27 (June 1863): 120-121; “John Morgan’s Substitute,” The American Mail-Bag (London, 1863), 332342; Mary S. Robinson, The Brother Soldiers: A Household Strong in the American Conflict (1866; reprint, New York, 1871). Events later in the war lead Horace to enlist, but prior to that point there is no indication that his family or the larger society thought ill of his decision to stay home. 15 Boston Daily Advertiser, August 23, 1864. 16 Amanda Minnie Douglass, “Kathie’s Soldiers,” summarized in James Marten, ed., Lessons of War: The Civil War in Children’s Magazines (Chapel Hill, 2011), 158. 17 Mary E. Dodge, “Netty’s Touchstone,” Harper’s New Monthly Magazine 28 (March 1864): 517-519. 18 “The Narrow Escape,” The American MailBag, 84-92. 19 “Clergyman and the Draft,” Vermont Chronicle, August 11, 1863. This newspaper reprinted the full text of Potter’s sermon, which was later released as a broadside. The Union army accepted Potter’s service, but assigned him as a member of the military clergy and not as a foot soldier. 20 For three excellent illustrations of these recruiting statements see Address of the Hon. W.D. Kelley, Miss Anna E. Dickinson, and Mr. Frederick Douglass at a Mass Meeting, Held at National Hall Philadelphia, July 6, 1863 … (Philadelphia, 1863). 21 This analysis comes largely from reading newspapers aimed at African-American readers, and periodicals—such as William Lloyd Garrison’s The Liberator—that spoke to both black and white abolitionists. These publications included quite a bit of poetry, but not

ELECTION 1880

(Pages 54–63, 74–75) Note: The author has corrected contemporary misspellings to avoid the frequent use of “[sic].” 1

Stanley P. Hirshson, Farewell to the Bloody Shirt: Northern Republicans and the Southern Negro, 1877-1893 (1962; Chicago, 1968); Albert V. House, “Republicans and Democrats Search for New Identities, 1870-1890,” The Review of Politics 31, no. 4 (October 1969): 475; David M. Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock: A Soldier’s Life (1988; Bloomington, 1996), 289, 296-297; Allan Peskin, Garfield (Kent, OH, 1978), 493; Perry D. Jamieson, Winfield Scott Hancock: Gettysburg Hero (Abilene, TX, 2003), 168-169; Herbert J. Clancy, The Presidential Election of 1880 (Chicago, 1958), 196, 219. See also Justus D. Doenecke, The Presidencies of James A. Garfield & Chester A. Arthur (1981; Lawrence, 1988) and Allan Peskin, “The Election of 1880,” The Wilson Quarterly 4, no. 2 (Spring 1980): 172-181.

2 Doenecke, Presidencies, 25. 3 Doenecke, Presidencies, 21-24; Candice Millard, Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President (New York, 2011), 19-23. 4 See Glenn Tucker, Hancock the Superb (Charleston, 2011); Jamieson, Winfield Scott Hancock: Gettysburg Hero; and Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock. 5 Clancy, The Presidential Election of 1880, 153; Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 298. 6 “Republican Rally at St. Albans,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 13, 1880. 7 “Jottings,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 5, 1880. 8 “Hancock’s Popularity,” The Dubuque Herald, October 3, 1880. 9 “The Political Campaign,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 7, 1880. 10 Untitled, The Dubuque Herald, October 7, 1880. 11 Untitled, The Wayne County Democrat, July 14,

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1880. 12 “Jottings,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 3, 1880. 13 Untitled, Boston Evening Transcript, August 20, 1880. 14 “Veteran Straws,” The Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph, October 9, 1880. 15 Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 263, 305. 16 E.H. Delmar to Joshua L. Chamberlain, September 17, 1880, Papers of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 17 Thomas C. Reeves, Gentleman Boss: The Life of Chester Alan Arthur (New York, 1975), 194195. 18 “Immense Concourse at Utica—General Grant Speaks,” Winona Daily Republican, October 26, 1880. 19 “Stars and Bars,” The Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph, October 9, 1880. 20 Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 275-276. 21 Quoted in Peskin, “The Election of 1880,” 180.

26 “Winfield S. Hancock,” Jacksonville Republican, July 10, 1880.

41 “Not Much Change,” The National Republican, October 26, 1880.

27 “The Speech of the Campaign,” Kentucky New Era, July 16, 1880.

42 “Garfield Deserted Again,” The Western Home Journal, September 2, 1880.

28 “From Garfield to Hancock,” The Hartford Weekly Times, October 28, 1880.

43 “The ‘Superb Soldier’—One of McClellan’s Peninsular Blunders Revived,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 4, 1880.

29 “The Speech of the Campaign,” Kentucky New Era, July 16, 1880. 30 “The Life of Winfield Scott Hancock,” Daily True American, September 1, 1880. 31 “Winfield S. Hancock,” Jacksonville Republican, July 10, 1880. 32 “Records Contrasted,” The Chenango SemiWeekly Telegraph, September 18, 1880. 33 Quoted in Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 289. 34 “Rebel Claims Once More,” The Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph, October 2, 1880. 35 “Hancock to His Southern Brigadiers,” Sacramento Daily Record-Union, October 30, 1880. 36 Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 294.

44 Untitled, The National Republican, October 26, 1880. 45 “Some Facts About Gettysburg,” Boston Evening Transcript, August 5, 1880. 46 “Who fit the battle,” The Chenango SemiWeekly Telegraph, September 18, 1880. 47 “What I Know About Hancock,” The National Republican, October 26, 1880. 48 Tucker, Hancock the Superb, 303; Jordan, Winfield Scott Hancock, 307. 49 Bartleby.com, “James A. Garfield: Inaugural Address,” Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States, bartleby. com/124/pres36.html (accessed December 9, 2012).

22 Gettysburg Compiler, October 21, 1880.

37 “A False Conversion,” Daily Alta California, October 31, 1880.

23 “The Hancock Veteran Legion,” The Hartford Weekly Times, July 29, 1880.

38 Untitled, The Western Home Journal, September 2, 1880.

50 Peskin, Garfield, 511-512; Howard V. Young Jr., “James A. Garfield and Hampton Institute,” in Stony The Road: Chapters in the History of Hampton Institute, ed. Keith L. Schall (Charlottesville, 1977), 34-50.

24 “The Speech of the Campaign,” Kentucky New Era, July 16, 1880.

39 “Rebel Claims Once More,” The Chenango Semi-Weekly Telegraph, October 2, 1880.

51 “The Election,” Jacksonville Republican, November 6, 1880.

25 “The Question,” The Lancaster Intelligencer, October 30, 1880.

40 “Something for Young Men to Ponder,” Winona Daily Republican, October 28, 1880.

52 “What Next, and Next?” The News and Courier, November 4, 1880.

STATEMENT OF OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT AND CIRCULATION (required by Section 3685, Title 39, United States Code)

1. The Civil War Monitor. 2. (ISSN: 2163-0682). 3. Filing date: 11/9/15. 4. Issue frequency: Quarterly. 5. Number of issues published annually: 4. 6. Annual subscription price: $21.95. 7. Complete mailing address of known office of publication: 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402. 8. Complete mailing address of headquarters or general business office of publisher: 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402. 9. Full names and complete mailing addresses of publisher, editor, and managing editor. Publisher: Terry A. Johnston Jr., 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402, Editor: Terry A. Johnston Jr., 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402, Managing editor: n/a. 10. Owner: Bayshore History LLC, 8008 Bayshore Drive, Margate, NJ 08402. 11. Known bondholders, mortgages, and other security holders owning or holding 1 percent or more of total amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities: None. 12. Tax status: Has not changed during preceding 12 months. 13. The Civil War Monitor. 14. Issue date for circulation data below: Fall 2015. 15. Extent and nature of circulation: A. Total number of copies printed (net press run). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 29,500. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 40,250. B. Paid circulation. 1. Mailed outside-county paid subscriptions. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 9,255. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 10,275. 2. Mailed in-county paid subscriptions. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 0. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 0. 3. Paid distribution outside the mails including sales through dealers and carriers, street vendors, counter sales, and other paid distribution outside USPS. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 4,647. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 8,153. 4. Paid distribution by other classes of mail through the USPS. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 0. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 0. C. Total paid distribution. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 13,902. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 18,428. D. Free or nominal rate distribution (by mail and outside mail). 1. Free or nominal rate outside-county copies. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 402. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 402. 2. Free or nominal rate in-county copies. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 0. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 0. 3. Free or nominal rate copies mailed at other classes through the USPS. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 0. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 0. 4. Free or nominal rate distribution outside the mail. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 28. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 28. E. Total free or nominal rate distribution. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 430. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 430. F. Total distribution (sum of 15c and 15e). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 14,332. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 18,858. G. Copies not distributed. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 15,168. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 21,392. H. Total (sum of 15f and 15g). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 29,500. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 40,250. I. Percent Paid. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 96.9%. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 97.7%. 16. Electronic Copy Circulation: A. Paid electronic copies. Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 0. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 0. B. Total paid print copies (line 15c) + Paid electronic copies (line 16a). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 13,902. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 18,428. C. Total print distribution (line 15f) + Paid electronic copies (line 16a). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 14,332. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 18,858. D. Percent paid (both print & electronic copies) (16b divided by 16c x 100). Average number of copies of each issue during preceding 12 months: 96.9%. Actual number of copies of single issue published nearest to filing date: 97.7%. I certify that 50% of all my distributed copies (electronic and print) are paid above a nominal price: Yes. 17. Publication statement of ownership will be printed in the Winter 2015 issue of this publication. 18. Signature and title of editor, publisher, business manager, or owner: Terry A. Johnston Jr., publisher. I certify that all information furnished on thisDOE form is true and complete. I understand that anyone who furnishes false PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN or misleading information on this form or who omits material or information requested on the form may be subjected to criminal sanctions and/or civil sanctions.

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pa r t i n g shot

A Lost Memento in an engagement that marked the end of General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s successful spring 1862 cam-

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paign in the Shenandoah Valley, Union and Confederate forces clashed at Port Republic on June 9. One of the units most heavily engaged in the sharp fight—a decisive Confederate victory—was the 2nd Virginia Infantry, a regiment in Jackson’s famed Stonewall Brigade. Sometime during or shortly after the battle, a soldier in that regiment’s Company G, Private Thomas Timberlake, spotted a small framed ambrotype lying between the bodies of two soldiers, one Union and one Confederate. Inside the case was the image of a little girl seated on a draped table, with hair in long ringlets and a gold chain around her neck. ¶ Timberlake kept the photograph (shown above), which remained in the family until a relative, Olivia Timberlake Harwood, gave it to the Museum of the Confederacy (now the American Civil War Museum) in 1908. Harwood included a note with her donation: “I have treasured it.”

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“This should be considered the definitive biography on Stanton . . . Incredibly researched, amazingly written and packed to the seams with information, it should be on the shelf of every Civil War historian.” —Gettysburg Chronicle

“Filled with impressive research and superb writing, this book provides wholly new perspectives on Grant’s Overland campaign and stands as a vital contribution to our understanding of the Civil War.” —Steven E. Woodworth, Texas Christian University

“A detailed and fascinating analytical narrative. . . . A model of wellwritten Civil War History.” —Library Journal

“Offers compelling and important ideas that challenge our assumptions about post–Civil War America. An exceptional work.” —Aaron Sheehan-Dean, author of Why Confederates Fought

“This is the best published recollections we have of a Virginia artillery commander. Superbly edited, this book is a necessary source for any study of the Army of Northern Virginia.” —James I. Robertson Jr., author of Stonewall Jackson

“Captain Hinrich’s character sketches “An extremely useful resource for making one’s way intelligently of the legion of Southern generals across the battleground as well as whom he came to know intimately a stirring account of the battle and are among the most penetrating I its varied meanings in the past have ever read. This book is sure to and present. . . . no matter how become a Confederate classic.” limited or extensive one’s Civil —Peter Cozzens, War library, it deserves a special author of Shenandoah 1862 place on the shelf.” —Civil War Monitor

“Reads like a staff ride organized by an officer intimately familiar with the area’s topography. . . . Hess makes a convincing case for the importance of this still unappreciated battle.” —Civil War Times

Omnibus

The official journal of the Society of Civil War Historians

Journal of the Civil War Era visit journalofthecivilwarera.org

Best-selling books in one convenient Ebook. Visit www.uncpress.unc.edu and search for Omnibus.

Most UNC Press books are also available as E-Books.

UNC Press books are now available through Books @ JSTOR and Project Muse – and North Carolina Scholarship Online (NCSO) on Oxford Scholarship Online.

the university of north carolina press at bookstores or 800-848-6224 • www.uncpress.unc.edu • uncpressblog.com

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