Civil War Times June 2020

ONE OF FOUR I WAS SURPRISED to see a photo on page 9 of the April issue of a photo of the four brothers who all served in 22nd Georgia Infantry. It was a surprise to me as I am somewhat related to them on my mother’s side. My Pattillo ancestor, who actually married into the family, is George McIntosh Troup Pattillo, second from the left. I thought that you might be interested in additional information about George, who was likely born in Georgia on March 17, 1833. He enlisted on September 16, 1861, in the 22nd Georgia Infantry. The 22nd’s muster roll for September–October 1864 lists him as absent with the explanation, “Detailed for shoe maker in Nov 62 by order Genl. Longstreet.” A March 1863 roll has him as a…

FRESH FACES On February 11, 2020, a ceremony in the Old House of Delegates Chamber of the Maryland State Courthouse in Annapolis, Md.—the country’s oldest standing state house—welcomed bronze statues honoring the courage and determination of two legendary Maryland heroes: Frederick Douglass (born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey) and Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Ross). Douglass was born to an enslaved mother in 1818 in Cordova, Md., but escaped at age 20 to Philadelphia and became one of the country’s great abolitionist-orators and writers. Harriet Tubman was born to enslaved parents around 1822 in Dorchester County, Md. Like Douglass, she escaped to Philadelphia, but returned repeatedly to rescue family members and others from enslavement, never losing a single member of her party. The figures were sculpted with attention to historical accuracy in their…

In July 1776, John Adams hoped that future generations would celebrate the anniversary of America’s Declaration of Independence with “Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other.” But by the early 1860s, Civil War-era Americans had very different reactions to July 4. In the summer of 1863, Adams County, Miss., was under Federal control and Southerner Kate Foster pondered the lack of Independence Day celebrations: “Our old national feast day dawns upon [us] so quietly as though into the dim Past we had hauled all memories of our old war of 1776. Is it fit that we should do this?” Upriver in Vicksburg, John Quincy Adams Campbell of the 5th Iowa Volunteers described a very different day that…

April 17-19 Tennessee: Fort Donelson, Stones River &Franklin $550 Join Greg Biggs, Richard McMurry & Larry Daniel for this unique tour of three winter battles which defined the Civil War in Tennessee. April 24-26 Chickamauga, Chattanooga & Missionary Ridge $550 Join distinguished historian A. Wilson Greene for this exciting tour of the battles of Chickamauga and Chattanooga. We’ll spend two days at Chickamauga and our final day touring the sites in Chattanooga. Sept. 18-20 Fredericksburg’s Battlefields $550 Register now to follow historians Robert Krick and Frank O’Reilly as they guide you over the hallowed ground at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Wilderness & Spotsylvania. Sept. 25-27 Petersburg: Lee vs. Grant $550 Join A. Wilson Greene for this comprehensive tour of the Petersburg campaign. This tour will include City Point, Jerusalem Plank Road, Battle of the Crater, Weldon Railroad, Boydton Plank…

» Six historic silk flags have found a new home at the Varnum Memorial Armory in Greenwich, R.I., a repository of historic military items. The banners had long been in storage in the Burnside Memorial Hall in Bristol, which served as a G.A.R. post and is now an annex to the town hall. Initially thought to relate to the Civil War service of Ambrose Burnside, who served as a Union general and became a three-term governor of Rhode Island, they instead proved to be a mixed lot. Several are flags of the Babbitt Post 15, a G.A.R. unit based in Bristol. Another dating to around 1861 bears 33 stars; this was the U.S. flag from the period of 1859-1861. Most surprising is an extremely old flagpole and banner, inscribed “Capt…

IN SEPTEMBER 1864, as General Ulysses S. Grant’s forces lay siege to Petersburg, Va., Robert E. Lee sought to bolster the defenses around Richmond. “The unparalleled vigor of General Grant’s operations has awakened in the rebel mind an eye to the worst features of the darkening future,” the New York Herald reported September 19. “They do not talk so much of the impregnability of their capital, and, conscious of the indefatigable character of the present leader of our armies, have set to work digging with great industry, in hopes of rendering a possible vulnerability indubitably invulnerable.” Less than two weeks later, on September 29, Union troops assaulted and captured Fort Harrison, the strongest fort in the city’s earthen defenses and the only one to be apprehended by Union troops. Union…