New and Noteworthy---Connecticut Yankees At Antietam: A Fascinating and Very Humane Segment of Civil War History

Connecticut Yankees At Antietam, John Banks, History Press, 192pp., bibliographic notes, bibliography, index, profusely illustrated, $19.99.

Banks' Connecticut Yankees At Antietam offers compelling stories of over 30 Connecticut citizens who performed bravely, or merely adequately, or deserted at the Battle of Antietam. Delving into pension records, collections, manuscripts, reports, regimental histories, newspapers, Banks sets forth brief biographies of unique individuals who typify Union soldiers, nurses and undertakers.

The soldiers are members of the 8th, 11th, 14th and 16th Connecticut infantry and their stories are told by their letters, diaries, pension files, photographs and artifacts they left behind. The author includes the story of Maria Hall, a nurse at the Smoketown Hospital, who was one of the many women rejected by Dorthea Dix but found her way to serve the wounded on the battlefield. Also, Banks offers the story of William Roberts, a Connecticut undertaker, who travelled in October to the September battlefield in order to locate and disinter eight bodies and return them to their families. 

At times Connecticut Yankees At Antietam may be grim. Banks has collected instances of amputations made by manual chain saws, survivors of wounds that did not receive aid for nearly 48 hours. The instances of wounding, deaths and imprisonment of fathers and sons are many. Banks is careful not to carry the stories beyond the evidence provided by the primary documents available; there is no speculation of probable endings in the book. Terry Reimer of the National Museum of Civil War Medicine, Bob Zeller of the Center for Civil War Photography, Ted Alexander and Stephanie Gray of the Antietam National Military Park and many local Connecticut historians and reenactors gave Banks a hand in bringing forward the fascinating and very humane segment of Civil War history.

New and Noteworthy--- September Suspense: Military Defeat and Invasion, A National Election and Emancipation

September Suspense: Lincoln's Union in Peril, Dennis E. Frye, Antietam Rest Publishing, 292 pages,  notes, bibliography, appendices, 19 illustrations, index, 2012, $27.95.

Newspapers of the Civil War era are a fountain of information on the material aspects of life and political disputes. During the era there was no unbiased reporting of political news; there was lots of speculation. "Newspapers bring us closer to people and allow us to be there when they make their history" remarks Dennis Frye in his introduction to September Suspense: Lincoln's Union in Peril. During the first week of September of 1862 no one knew the outcome of the Confederate invasion of Maryland and Pennsylvania, the fall elections, and the revelation of an emancipation proclamation.

Frye relies heavily on southern and northern newspapers and diaries but not those written after the autumn of 1862.  Such reliance provides an immediacy which is usually not offered in most Civil War books.  Over 35 newspapers were consulted. Frye's narrative is sharp and concise. His pacing of the chapters creates an undercurrent of a  'you are there' suspense. This is reminiscent of of John Michael Priest's use of only diaries and letters of privates, corporals, sergeants, captains and lieutenants in Antietam: A Soldier's Battle and Before Antietam: The Battle of South Mountain.

In September Suspense: Lincoln's Union in Peril readers wrestle with American abolitionists and slaveholders, British politicians and American bankers, retail merchants and marauding soldiers, presidents and their cabinets, war governors and army generals, men and women on the street and soldiers in the ranks.  There is a suspense in Frye's work that moves readers forward through these American lives.

The appendices are not 'toss in the kitchen sink' material. The first appendix is the Confederate Terms of Peace published on September 11, 1862 in the Philadelphia Inquirer which was copied from and editorial appearing in the Richmond Enquirer and a Philadelphia Inquirer editorial response to it. The second appendix is General Lee's Proclamation to the People of Maryland that was made September 8, 1862 and a third appendix discusses the dilemma of attempting to ascertain how many Confederate troops crossed into Maryland the first days of September. Each is an essential document that readers in September 1862 held in their hands and read.  In September Suspense: Lincoln's Union in Peril  Frye achieves his goal of having the reader 'feel history', enter 'a time machine' and 'live the moment' with those who passed passed, day by day, through a suspenseful month when the Union was in peril.

Also,  September Suspense: Lincoln's Union in Peril is a good 'immersion' book for Civil War reenactors who enjoy a 'campaign style' story.

New and Noteworthy---History and Guide to Civil War Shepherdstown: A Community of Suffering

A History and Guide to Civil War Shepherdstown: Victory and Defeat in West Virginia's Oldest Town, Nicholas Redding, Schroeder Publications, 144 pages, 56 illustrations, 6 maps, 2 appendices, order of battle, endnotes, index, 2012, $14.95.

 A History and Guide to Civil War Shepherdstown: Victory and Defeat in West Virginia's Oldest Town offers a intriguing description  of a village that began the war in Virginia and ended the war in West Virginia. Nicholas Redding finely balances aspects of Shepherdtown's citizens, it buildings and industries, and its proximity to Harpers Ferry, South Mountain, and the Battle of Sharpsburg. A third of the book presents Shepherdstown in the path of war. Wesley Culp, a recent immigrant from Adams County, Pennsylvania is typical of the town's  citizens who are divided in their allegiances. Reddington relies on eyewitness accounts of Shepherdtown's conflicted loyalities: Dr. Charles Wesley Andrew, Caroline Bedinger, and Henry Kyd Douglas and the Shepherdstown Register newspaper.

The middle third of the book is a guide to the Civil War sites in present-day Shepherdstown. The first third of the book is not retold; the discussion offers additional information that further clarifies the suffering and destruction of the town. The burning of the covered, two lane Potomac River bridge is well told and illustrated. Redding presents a black and white illustration of the bridge intact and a photograph of the remnants of the pilings.  Remarkably the illustration and the photograph were made from nearly the same location and reveals much about Shepherdstown. Ferry Hill in Maryland overlooks Shepherdstown and was the home of Henry Kyd Douglas, whose father practiced law across the river. Hotels, the town hall,  graffitti, homes that became hospitals, the residence of a Confederate spy, the site of the wagon shop where Wesley Culp was employed, churches and the cemetery are described and presented with personal primary source accounts of the structures' appearance and uses.

The final third of the book is a clear and concise history and guide to the September 1862 battle at Shepherdstown. Offered as a appendix, Mary Bedinger Mitchell's article in the 1886 Century Magazine recounts Shepherdstown citizens' experiences of the battles of South Mountain, Antietam and Shepherdstown. A second appendix is Henrietta Lee's lamentation addressed to Union general David Hunter; it presents the heartfelt anger of woman whose ancestral home was intentionally burned on the orders of the general.

History and Guide to Civil War Shepherdstown: Victory and Defeat in West Virginia's Oldest Town is both a satifying portrait of a border community overcome by the war and a guide book to the historic town. Redding's use of period photography, pen and ink sketches and primary sources is commendable. He introduces intriguing episodes that may compel readers to look further into Shepherdstown's history:  the Confederate spy network in the county, the printing of money that could be spent only in the town and the African Americans who remained in the town during the course of the war. 

Nicholas Redding's interview by the Civil War Trust

News---Drink Beer and Support Civil War Museums

Civil War Beer Crafted In Frederick, Ike Wilson, Frederick News Post, October 8, 2012.

The first of nine beers to commemorate the 150th Civil War anniversary -- Antietam Ale -- is now on tap. The concoction was derived from a number of beer recipes from the 1800s and researched by National Museum of Civil War Medicine researcher Terry Reimer. Monocacy Brewing Co. in Fredeerick  bottled the first batch Sept. 28 for distribution.

Antietam Ale is based on a recipe for an English-style ale once brewed by Brewer's Alley -- a style commonly referred to as an ordinary bitter, Brewer's Alley marketing manager Jim Bauckman said. The National Museum of Civil War Medicine provided brewmaster Tom Flores with a variety of historic recipes that likely resemble the flavor profile of Antietam Ale, Bauckman said.  The strength is relatively low compared with that of modern beer renditions, Flores said, but making the brew still involves a lot of complexity. "The harmony of all the flavors, and making all the delicate intensity work, was important," Flores said.   Antietam Ale has a slight hoppy presence that is quickly balanced by the flavor of specialty malts, Bauckman said.

Full Text Continued at Frederick News Post October 8, 2012 

CWL: On Saturday while eating a meal in the Pry House Barn on the Antietam Battlefield I bought a National Museum of Civil War Medicine glass tumbler and refilled it twice.  A good beer with good food at a good place.

 

New and Noteworthy---To Antietam Creek: The Maryland Campaign of 1862, August 30 to September 16

To Antietam Creek: The Maryland Campaign of September 1862, D. Scott Hartwig, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012, 8 black and white images, 17 maps, 3 appendices, bibliographic notes, essay on notes, index,  794pp., $49.96.  Release date: October 15, 2012.

Both literally and figuratively, all other treatments of The Antietam Campaign may well stand in the shadow of  Scott Hartwig's To Antietam Creek: The Maryland Campaign of September 1862.  Having  800  pages and weighting three pounds, nine ounces, To Antietam Creek will be larger than any other book on most bookshelves. And . . . this is only half the campaign. Chapter one begins on August 30 with George  McClellan smoking a cigar and  requesting by telegram  to rejoin the elements of the Army of the Potomac that are under the command of John Pope.   The final chapter concludes with infantrymen and artillerymen in a restless sleep on the Henry Piper farm,  George Line farms and the German Lutheran Church in Sharpsburg  during the hours before dawn of September 17.    The narrative style is reminiscent of Bruce Catton's Army of the Potomac trilogy. The maps are clear, precise and well labeled. The September 14 Battle of South Mountain is described in seven chapters covering 221 pages. The capture of Harpers Ferry is covered in four chapters totaling  128 pages.  Tom Clemens of the Save Historic Antietam Foundation states "By far the best work done on the Maryland Campaign . . . [it] will set the standard for many, many years to come."  Yes, it looks that way.

New---So You Think You Know Antietam?: A Handy, Dashboard Reference Guide

So You Think You Know Antietam? The Stories Behind America's Bloodiest Day, James and Suzanne Gindlesperger, John F. Blair Publishing Company, 232pp, 10 maps, Index, paperback, $18.95.


So You Think You Know Antietam? The Stories Behind America's Bloodiest Day offers descriptions and photographs of  129 monuments and sites on the Antietam/Sharpsburg battlefield. GPS coordinates are given for every site. Much of the photography is in color with several black and white wartime images, including portraits of officers.  Included are the Lincoln-McClellan Meeting site, the farms, special topographic features such as the Rock Ledge in the West Woods, the Antietam train station, Lee's headquarters, Sharpsburg's Slave Block, and the National Cemetery.   War Department markers, wayside markers, artillery pieces, hospitals, fences, and reenactors are briefly described in the final chapter. The appendices includes the full text of  Lee's Special Orders 191, the Federal and Confederate Orders of Battle, and the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor winners.

News---Smaller Than 145th, The 150th Antietam Reenactment To Be Held

Two-Day Event On Private Land Near Boonsboro Will Mark 150th Anniversary Of Civil War Battles, Heather Kells, Hagerstown Herald Mail August 8, 2011.

An estimated 4,000 Civil War re-enactors will stage a public re-enactment of the battles of South Mountain and Antietam on Sept. 8 and 9, 2012, on private land near Boonsboro, organizer Chris Anders said at a press conference Monday. The event, called “Maryland, My Maryland,” is being staged by The Southern Division, an all-volunteer re-enactment organization, and will be sponsored by the Hagerstown-Washington County Convention and Visitors Bureau, Anders said. Re-enactment of the Battle of Harpers Ferry might also be included, he said.

The event will be open to 2,000 spectators per day, and tickets will go on sale soon from the Convention and Visitors Bureau, he said. Tickets will cost $25 for one day or $40 for both days, CVB President Thomas B. Riford said. Those 6 and younger will be admitted free. All proceeds from the event will go to the Central Maryland Heritage League to help preserve and interpret South Mountain State Battlefield and to Brittany’s Hope Foundation, a charity that helps with the adoption of special-needs children worldwide, Anders said. The re-enactment will be held on about 100 acres of land at the foot of South Mountain near the intersection of Alt. U.S. 40 and Md. 67 east of Boonsboro.

“We’re setting up the event to be a very authentic event so people get a true Civil War experience,” Anders said. Anders said he has organized about 20 re-enactments and is a partner in Rear Rank Productions, which specializes in coordinating logistical aspects of re-enactment events, such as water and signs. His caps of 4,000 to 5,000 re-enactors and 2,000 spectators mean the event will be considerably smaller than the Battle of Antietam re-enactments staged in 1997 and 2002, which each attracted about 13,000 re-enactors and as many as 100,000 spectators. Anders said smaller numbers will allow for higher authenticity and better views for spectators.

“The goal is that people actually see what happened in September 1862, what the troops looked like, how they camped, how they fought, not a fantasy world-type representation thereof,” he said. Though the re-enactment commemorates the 150th anniversary of the Maryland Campaign, it is scheduled for several days before the actual dates of the battles to encourage visitors to attend commemorative events at the respective battlefields on the actual anniversary dates, Anders said. The Battle of South Mountain was fought Sept. 14, 1862, for the possession of three mountain passes — Crampton’s, Turner’s and Fox’s Gaps — and resulted in about 6,000 casualties, Riford said.

The Battle of Antietam, three days later on Sept. 17, was the bloodiest single-day battle in American history, with 23,110 casualties. Dan Spedden, superintendent of the South Mountain Recreation Area, announced at the same press conference Monday that the South Mountain State Battlefield’s sesquicentennial events will include the opening next spring of the battlefield’s first professionally designed museum exhibits.

The exhibits will be in three buildings — the visitors center at Washington Monument State Park, and the hall and lodge at Gathland State Park — and will interpret the Battle of South Mountain, Boonsboro’s Washington Monument, and the life of reporter and Civil War correspondent George Alfred Townsend. The buildings that will house the exhibits are under renovation and will open in April, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony in May, Spedden said. South Mountain State Battlefield’s commemorative events will include tours, hikes and living history displays each weekend beginning in June 2012. On Sept. 14 and 15, 2012, the battlefield will have living-history and artillery demonstrations, hikes and real-time battlefield tours, he said.

At Antietam National Battlefield, lectures and symposiums are scheduled throughout 2012, culminating Sept. 9 to 22 with speakers, tours, real-time hikes, Civil War-era music, a family activities tent, artillery and infantry demonstrations, and a Sept. 17 ceremony, said Ed Wenschhof, the battlefield’s acting superintendent.

Text and Top Image Source: Hagerstown Herald Mail August 8, 2011

Top Image Caption: Thomas B. Riford, president of the Hagerstown-Washington County Convention and Visitors Bureau, leads a press conference Monday about the plans for the re-enactment of the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Antietam as re-enactment coordinator Chris Anders, left, and Ed Wenschhof, Antietam National Battlefield's acting superintendent and Dan Spedden, superintendent of the South Mountain Recreation Area, listen. (By Ric Dugan/Staff Photographer)

Maryland, My Maryland's website

CWL: The Maryland, My Maryland website states that 1] reenactor registration opens in November, 2011 and 2] Confederate forces have re-branded themselves as States Rights Forces. Looking at #2 is kinda creepy.

Does that mean that the boys in gray will re-write history and out flank Federal forces at the Sunken Road, similiar to what happened at the last Antietam reenactment five years ago? Why can't the Confederates just be Confederates? The Federals are still the Federals. Maybe the organizers couldn't get away with calling the Federal army the Abolitionist army?

New and Noteworthy---The Battle of South Mountain: Lee, McClellan And The Men Who Died For Them

The Battle of South Mountain, John Hoptak, The History Press, 222 pp., maps, illustrations, order of battle, notes, bibliography, index, 2010, $21.99.

The History Press is causing a stir with its clear, concise, accurate, well illustrated and mapped, and well designed Civil War Sesquicentennial Series. Indicative of the series is its newest addition: The Battle of South Mountain by John Hoptak. In the preface, the author recognizes John Michael Priest's Before Antietam: the Battle of South Mountain and others of being the giants upon whose shoulders upon which his own work stands. And a remarkable work it is.

Within the confines of 222 pages, Hoptak and the History Press have produced an exemplary work with seven fine maps and 50 period illustrations and photographs. Hoptak's five chapters are focused and have a fine degree of clarity. Lee's decision to drive North and McClellan's state of mind after Second Manassas are aptly described. The marches of both armies to South Mountain are presented with close attention to the men in the ranks. The combat is fully covered at each of the gaps in South Mountain. Fortunately, in a single chapter Hoptak tells the entire story of the fights at each gap. Taking the reader back and forth between the gaps would be confusing. Crampton's Gap, Fox's Gap, Turner's and Frostown Gaps, each have their own chapters, combatants, and topography. Hoptak organization creates a fullness in his story telling and even lends itself to building suspense.

Hotpak's use of biography is attractive. Clear and pertinent descriptions of many of the commanders are everywhere present in the book. Extensive, dramatic and effective quotations from both commissioned officers and enlistment men are frequently provided. Hoptak does not ignore the cavalry but puts them on the field. The reader may compare the similarities of Confederate cavalry commander Jeb Stuart's conduct at South Mountain and the Gettysburg Campaign and conclude that he did indeed have his bad days.

The work leaves the reader with questions of contingency. Jesse Reno, commander of the Federal Ninth Corps was killed at Fox's Gap on September 14. What if Jesse Reno had been in command at Burnside's Bridge on the 17th? Hoptak sides with Joseph Harsh, author of Sounding the Shallows: A Confederate Companion for the Maryland Campaign of 1862 , in that at Crampton's Gap on South Mountain, the Army of Northern Virgina suffered one of its worst defeats. What if the Federal Sixth Corps had on September 15th stormed into Pleasant Valley and trapped McLaws Division? Hoptak refrains from speculation and encourages readers to ponder the situations.

With such a geographically concentrated event and with four gaps, nine relevant towns and eight roads, readers would have been aided by at least the first map being to a measurable scale or with distances between locations written on it. Additionally a topographic map showing the steepness of the path which attackers faced would be helpful. Also, readers may have been aided if muster numbers had been included in the Order of Battle and possibly if the order of battle had been organized with forces attacking the gaps and the forces defending the gaps on the same page.

Such small discomforts do not detract from the overall usefulness and enjoyment that The Battle of South Mountain by John Hoptak offers the reader. Certainly anyone who is traveling to the Antietam National Battlefield Park, the Harper's Ferry National Park or Maryland's South Mountain Civil War Trails, will find Hoptak's book essential to their understanding of the Maryland Campaign.

Sequicentennial News---No Plans for 150th Anniversary Reenactment of Antietam

No Large-Scale Battle Of Antietam Re-Enactment Plans For Sesquicentennial, Heather Kells, Hagerstown Hearld-Mail, Arpril 9, 2011.

Hearld-Mail Editor's note: It has been 150 years since the first shot of the Civil War was fired at Fort Sumter, S.C. In observance of the beginning of hostilities on April 12, 1861, The Herald-Mail has prepared a package of stories about how that conflict affected those who lived in the Tri-State area during those times. The first stories are being published today and Monday. The package will culminate with a special section in Tuesday's newspaper. Is it possible the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Antietam could come and go next year without the thunder of hoofbeats, clank of bayonets and the sights of thousands of re-enactors in blue and gray marching through Washington County fields?

Not only possible, but likely, according to local historian Dennis Frye, who said he had not heard of any large-scale Battle of Antietam re-enactment plans for the battle's sesquicentennial in September 2012. Frye said he did not anticipate anything on the scale of the public re-enactments that were staged in 1997 and 2002, which each attracted about 13,000 re-enactors and as many as 100,000 spectators. "If anybody wanted to do something at Antietam in 2012, they're already way behind," he said.

Planning for the 1997 and 2002 re-enactments began about two and a half years before each event, he said. Frye, now chief historian at Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, chaired those two re-enactments, which were nonprofit events coordinated by the Association for the Preservation of Civil War Sites in 1997 and the Antietam Commemoration Committee in 2002. Thomas B. Riford, president and CEO of the Hagerstown-Washington County Convention and Visitors Bureau, and Liz Shatto, director of the Heart of the Civil War Heritage Area, said they had not heard of any public re-enactments planned for Antietam in 2012.

"We are putting more emphasis in general on emphasizing the product that's available 365 days a year, rather than putting a lot of effort into sort of a one-time, big blowout event," Shatto said. "But if a partner organization came forward and had the wherewithall and the interest, we certainly would do what we could to make their project known."

One obstacle to staging a re-enactment today is finding suitable land for it, Frye said. National Park Service policy prohibits re-enactment on the battlefields themselves, and much of the nearby farmland used for the 1997 and 2002 re-enactments has since been developed. "Our bloody lane battlefield is now a data processing center, and the union campground is now a satellite facility," Frye said.

Staging a large-scale re-enactment requires an "enormous" amount of land with space for not only battles, but encampments, parking and support services such as food and toilets, he said. The 1997 and 2002 re-enactments used nearly 1,000 acres of land on Rench Road, south of Hagerstown. "It would be a real challenge to find a large property in Washington County of 1,000 acres that has very good access to the interstate and could facilitate all of the logistical requirements of a massive public re-enactment," Frye said.

The National Park Service prohibition against re-enacting on battlefields was put into effect in 1962 after a 100th anniversary re-enactment of the Battle of Antietam because of the amount of damage the event caused on the historic land, Frye said. "Basically all battlefields are cemeteries without stones, so the National Park Service believes they're sacred ground — hallowed ground — and that they should be commemorated, but not re-enacted upon," he said.

Another obstacle to re-enactments is their cost, according to Thomas Clemens, a history and political science professor at Hagerstown Community College. "It counts on someone talking a financial risk because you put a lot of money in up front and if bad weather or anything else happens, then you lose a lot of money," he said. "There's nobody interested in sticking out their neck these days." Clemens said he thought cultural factors had also played a role in curbing some of the enthusiasm for re-enactments.

"Re-enactors are, from my experience, aging, like the rest of the population, and you don't see nearly as many young people as you did, even in the 90s and early 2000s," he said. "I think that there's just sort of a change in culture to some extent." Amid a shifting political climate, the attractiveness of Civil War re-enacting is becoming more controversial, Clemens said, citing a column last spring in which writer Leonard Pitts criticized Confederate "apologists and battle flag fetishists" for sweeping the issue of slavery under the rug with "heritage not hate" rhetoric.

"The idea of the Confederacy as a defender of slavery is becoming much more of an inflammatory issue than it was eight, 10 years ago," Clemens said. "I don't think that's a big factor in the lack of re-enactments, but it's another thing to keep in mind. People are just a little more politicized about it than they used to be."

Text Source: Hagerstown Hearld-Mail, April 9 2011

Top Image Source: Capitol Hill CWRT
Middle Image Source: The Donovan
Bottom Image Source: 4th Michigan

News---Sculptor Michael Kraus Restores Antietam Monument

Civil War's General Nagle Finally Gets His Sword Back, Marylynne Pitz, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 29, 2010.

In 1848, when James Nagle returned home to Pottsville after serving in the Mexican War, Schuylkill County residents gave the 26-year-old hero a beautifully engraved, silver presentation sword with a purple amethyst at its handle. Brig. Gen. Nagle treasured the weapon, carrying it through the Civil War's bloody hours at Second Bull Run, Antietam and Fredericksburg, where his brigade of 1,500 men suffered heavy casualties. The only Pennsylvanian to recruit four regiments for the Union Army during the Civil War, Gen. Nagle was honored again in 1904 when 36 surviving veterans of the 48th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry erected a statue of him at Antietam National Battlefield in Sharpsburg, Md. And, by design, a bronze sword hung beside the statue.

Sometime in the 1920s -- no one seems to know how or when -- the weapon attached to the 7-foot-tall statue disappeared. During a ceremony today, the figure of a man so beloved by his soldiers that they looked upon him as a friend will be given a new sword created by Mike Kraus, a McCandless artist, historian and Civil War re-enactor.

Great-great-grandchildren of the general are expected to come from North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Arizona, said John David Hoptak, a National Park Service ranger at Antietam. The author of two Civil War books and an authority on Gen. Nagle, Mr. Hoptak expects as many as 60 people for the ceremony. "I'm looking forward to that," he said.

Like his hero, Mr. Hoptak also hails from Schuylkill County, north of Philadelphia. He noticed that the sword was missing and in 2008, began raising $7,000 to pay for a new one. He was aided by Western Maryland Interpretative Association, a nonprofit group that runs the bookstore at Antietam. Donations arrived from descendants of Gen. Nagle and regimental veterans. "I think he represented the American spirit of the 19th century," Mr. Hoptak said. "There was a devotion to duty and to the nation. He had no military training, but he raised a company that fought in Mexico."

Gen. Nagle's daring leadership earned his men's respect. "He was always leading from the front. He had a good ability to inspire his men on the battlefield. He took care of them," Mr. Hoptak said. "We always regarded you as a friend and father, rather than a mere military commander," one of his soldiers wrote in a letter dated October 1861. His men presented him then with a field glass, a forerunner of binoculars. The instrument allowed him to get a better look at terrain and troop movements. While he earned a living as a painter, paper hanger and county sheriff, Gen. Nagle may have been influenced by a relative's example.

"His own grandfather fought in the Revolutionary War under [George] Washington. Perhaps that was an inspiration. His grandfather lived until the 1840s and was around for Nagle's adolescence," Mr. Hoptak said. A year after the Civil War ended, Gen. Nagle, 44, died of heart disease, leaving behind a wife and seven children.

"She never remarried but she did fight to get a pension from his military service. ... Most of the children were under 18 at the time of his death," Mr. Hoptak said. Earlier this month, Mr. Kraus, curator at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum in Oakland, traveled to Antietam with the new 44-inch-long sword and took measurements to make sure that it fit properly. Cast in bronze at a Cleveland foundry and weighing 9 pounds, this new solid bronze weapon will be carefully attached to the statue and draped in an American flag until it is unveiled today. To make the new version, Mr. Kraus examined photographs of Gen. Nagle's original presentation sword, which was donated by a descendant in 1999 to the Schuylkill County Historical Society.

Mr. Kraus, who earned a degree in fine art at Edinboro University in 1976, is no stranger to working in bronze. In 2000, he created a Holocaust memorial for Temple Ohav Shalom in McCandless. In a more recent commission, he used 850 pounds of memorial plaques from various Jewish congregations that have closed to forge a new sculpture. From the plaques, he created six bronze triangles that emerge from a boulder at a Beaver Falls cemetery in Beaver County. Together, the bronze triangles form a six-pointed Star of David. But this is the first sword he has ever made. He is excited to see his work at Antietam, and to see Gen. Nagle's statue intact once more.

Text and Photo Source: Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Caption: "Artist and Civil War historian Mike Kraus, left, and National Park Service ranger John David Hoptak at the statue of Brig. Gen. James Nagle. A new bronze sword Mr. Kraus made for the statue in his McCandless studio will be unveiled during a dedication ceremony today at Antietam National Battlefield in Sharpsburg, Md.It connected me to the battlefield and the memorials that were placed there. We said we care. We said we want to see it the way the veterans envisioned it. We put it back to what it was."

Middle Image Source: Schuylkill County

Bottom Image Source: Nagle with presentation sword. Save Historic Antietam Foundation

Forthcoming: The Letters of Israel B. Richardson

Until Antietam: The Life and Letters of Major General Israel B. Richardson, U.S. Army, Jack C. Mack, Southern Illinois University Press; October 19, 2009, 288 pages, $29.95.

While researching this book, Jack C. Mason made the kind of discovery that historians dream of. He found more than one-hundred unpublished and unknown letters from Union general Israel B. Richardson to his family, written from his time as a West Point cadet until the day before his fatal wounding at the Battle of Antietam, the bloodiest day in American history. Using these freshly uncovered primary sources as well as extensive research in secondary materials, Mason has written the first-ever biography of Israel Bush Richardson.

Richardson’s letters span more than twenty years of service in the U.S. Army. He served on the front lines of the Seminole War, chasing Indians through the swamps of Florida; fought in every important battle of the Mexican-American War, during which he distinguished himself by capturing a Mexican artillery piece and turning it against the enemy at the Battle of Cerro Gordo; guarded dangerous outposts in southwest New Mexico; and raised a regiment at the start of the Civil War that would become the 2nd Michigan. During the Civil War, Richardson fought at the First Battle of Bull Run, patrolled the area south of Washington, D.C., and led his division in the Peninsular Campaign. He rose quickly through the ranks of the Union Army over the first year of the war, as he was admired for his common sense, motivating leadership, and straightforward approach to combat.

Mason traces Richardson’s growth as a soldier, through his experiences and the guidance of his superiors, and then as a leader whose style reflected the actions of the former commanders he respected. Though he was a disciplinarian, Richardson took a relaxed attitude toward military rules, earning him the affection of his men. Unfortunately, his military career was cut short just as high-ranking officials began to recognize his aggressive leadership. He was shot while leading his men at Antietam and died on November 4, 1862.

Until Antietam brings to life a talented and fearless Civil War infantry leader. Richardson’s story, placed within the context of nineteenth-century warfare, exemplifies how one soldier’s life influenced his commanders, his men, and the army as a whole.

Jack C. Mason is a Department of Army civilian and a lieutenant colonel in the U. S. Army Reserve. He serves as an instructor for the Command and General Staff College and has published several articles in Army magazine.



Text Source: Amazon.com
Image Source: Richardson canon at Antietam

News---Antietam's Cornfield Yields Grave of New York Soldier

Union Soldier's Remains Found at Antietam, Linda Wheeler, Washington Post, December 28, 2008.

The soldier was just a teenager. Somewhere in New York state, he had signed up to fight for the Union. The band was playing on the day he marched away from home, headed South to to kill those rebels. Everyone said it would be a short war. He'd be home in no time. All of that ended on Sept. 17, 1862 at Antietam when he and his comrades were crossing a farmer's field. A bullet or piece of shrapnel found him. He sagged to the ground and was dead. His buddies moved on; they had to. The fighting was intense. By the end of the day, the battle considered the bloodiest of the war would end with 23,000 casualties.

The next day, under a flag of truce, a Union burial detail began its grim work. Sometime in the next week, the New Yorker was put in a shallow grave near where he fell, but away from the the farmer's plow. He was buried near a limestone outcropping that rippled just above the surface. This was temporary. Either his family or the government would move him to a cemetery and give him a proper burial. No one ever came for him. His grave was overlooked when the Union dead were gathered and moved to the new Antietam National Cemetery, dedicated exactly five years after the battle.

For 146 seasons, crops were planted all around him and even over him if a farmer could make the tight turn at the rocky place, but nothing disturbed his sleep. He could have been there forever, never found and never known except for a ground hog who happened to build a tunnel at that spot. The tunnel was deep, angling down under the limestone. At some point, the tunnel became clogged with debris and the ground hog vigorously kicked it out of the way, flinging it all the way to the surface. It included pieces of tea-colored bone. A visitor who was walking the battlefield in mid-October,strayed off the Corn Field Trail and saw some bones on the ground that he later left at the visitors' center. He didn't give his name, saying only he had found something in a field off the trail, next to an animal hole.

"It was a jaw bone with four teeth attached and one loose plus some other fragments," said Ed Wenschhof Jr., Antietam's chief of Natural Resources Management and Resources Protection. "We get a lot of these bones brought in here, almost all of them are animal." He needed to check it out. Several photographs were emailed to the National Park Service's regional archaeologist, Stephen Potter, in Washington. Potter said he knew right away the jaw, and what turned out to be skull fragments, belonged to a human. And he knew they were very old bones.

"When I realized what I had -- an unmarked, unknown burial of a Civil War soldier, not a victim of modern mayhem -- it grabbed me in the gut," he said. "I was totally focused. I forgot everything else. I immediately started planning what we would do next." He said he estimated the soldier's age at 19 to 21, based on an impacted wisdom tooth in the jaw bone, the lack of wear on the teeth and an open suture in the cranium. That suture closes only when an individual ceases to grow. He called Wenschhof. Potter wanted to see the the bones but his first impulse was to collect whatever else was out there in the field. It was going to be difficult to find the spot. The field covered acres of land, but they had to move quickly because relic hunters might hear about the discovery and disturb the grave.

Wenschhof and a team of park rangers crisscrossed the field that was adjacent to the infamous Corn Field, where brutal hand-to-hand fighting had taken place during the battle. There were burrows everywhere, and they had to be careful not to step in to them. Finally, one of the team found bone fragments and several pieces of leather outside a ground hog hole. It had to be the right place. The soldier had been found. Potter had sent the photographs to Douglas Owsley, a well-known forensic anthropologist with the Department of Anthropology at the Smithsonian Institution. He agreed with Potter's assessment but felt the soldier was somewhere between 18 and 21 and most likely was a teenager.

"He said the kid never saw his 20th birthday," Potter recalled. Within a few weeks, Potter and a crew were at Antietam, also known as Sharpsburg, scraping away the top layer of brown earth and then delving into the reddish layer of clay. They were working under a blue and white tent erected to shield themselves from the rain and wind and to protect whatever they found. Two animal holes were within the the rectangle sketched on the earth, probably boundaries of the grave. The resident of the burrow had been captured a few days earlier and delivered to a new neighborhood beyond the field.

The excavation work was slow. There weren't any large bones in the grave shaft. "Ground hogs can do a lot of damage," Potter said. "Context means everything. if the bones are moved or damaged or if the ground hog gnawed on them, and ground hogs do gnaw on bones -- they need their daily calcium supplement -- things can be hard to figure out." In this case, the ground hog had destroyed most of the soldier's bones.

What they did find was a number of jacket or coat buttons that connected the soldier to a New York regiment. The ones from the cuffs had the state emblem and some of the larger ones from the front had the emblem and the Latin word, "Excelsior," meaning upward. The other buttons found were general government issue, indicating the soldier was not a green recruit but a veteran who had been around long enough to have replaced lost buttons. They also found a belt buckle with "U.S." engraved on it, and some bits of leather later identified as coming from boots or shoes.

Potter told the crew, "We now know three things: our soldier was a young guy, probably a teenager, but he was a veteran and not a new recruit and he was part of a New York regiment." The crew, having plotted the exact position on paper of every bit of metal and bone and leather taken from the grave site, filled the 18-inch-deep excavation and tried to make it look like just another part of the farmer's field. The next step is for Owsley to examine all the bones and items found in the grave to see if he can tease any more information from them. He won't be able to do that for several months.

John Howard, Antietam battlefield superintendent, had been following the progress of the search closely. He had come out to watch the crews excavating the grave. Later he said it was unlikely the solider would ever be identified because so little was known about him and, on the day of the battle, there were many New York regiments involved. One of the rangers who works for Howard, Brian S. Baracz, has studied the battle for 10 years. He said there had been 68 infantry regiments, 12 artillery and seven cavalry units from New York at Antietam. Close to the area where the soldier was found, two dozen New York infantry regiments had crossed through. Using just those 24 units and narrowing the list of possible soldiers to those of the right age who were listed as "missing," he said the number would range between 25 and 50.

Howard said if they ever got "really lucky and identified the soldier, we'd make a real effort to track down the next of kin. We'd ask them what they wanted us to do. We could ship the remains or give him a proper burial here at Antietam." If there is no identification, he expects the soldier will be buried in the New York section of the national cemetery, which is near his office. "Just like any other American soldier, we will give him a proper burial," he said. "This is where he fought. This is where he died. This is now his home."

Text, Top and Middle Images Source: Washington Post, December 26, 2008

Bottom Image Source: Through the Cornfield, Keith Rocco. Keith Rocco is among the very best artists working in the field of American Civil War and Napoleonic Era painting. He as two published collections of his work, On Campaign: The Civil War Art of Keith Rocco, and The Soldier's View: The Civil War Art of Keith Rocco

CWL---The Real War Is Getting Into the Books: First Person Accounts of Carnage, September 1862

Misery Holds High Carnival, Judson H. Nelson, America's Civil War, September 2007, pp. 30-39.

". . . a thousand blackened, bloated corpses with blood and gas protruding from every orifice and maggots hold high carnival . . . . " Surgeon Daniel Holt, 121 New York Volunteers, began writing letters home after the battle of South Mountain, Maryland on September 14th. Rare is the soldier who wrote the Mrs. of Rebels with brains blown out, eyes popped out, and arms lifted in the air.

John H. Nelson, author of As the Grain Falls Before the Reaper: The Federal Hospital Sites and Identified Federal Casualties at Antietam, a CD-Rom, has collected a series of striking remarks from surgeons, newspaper correspondents, U.S. Sanitary Commission and U.S. Christian Commission worker, civilians and rank-and-file soldiers and organized them into an article.

At the Smoketown Hospital, really shebangs for the wounded, "The medicines are on the grounds, and tables, boxes , etc. without order or regularity. There is want of attention to police the wards and camp. Direst and garbage are accumulated in large quantities. . ." describes Assistant Medical Director W. R. Mosely. He contrasts the Smoketown shebangs with the Locust Spring Hospital, that had 24 tents each with their own stone fireplaces and superior bedding, that is bedsteads described as sacks filled with straw and covered with sheets, quilts and blankets.

Among the many descriptions Nelson has presented, CWL fully appreciates the material on the Otto Farm, located on the west side of Burnside's Bridge, a discussion that may be representative of the blight upon the farming community. With damages in excess of $2,300, Otto received a settlement check for $893.85. Another farmer,
Ephraim Getting whose farms held a portion of the Locust Spring hospital, claimed $1,238.45 in damages. He received no settlement.

For CWL, the article is a unfootnoted tease. CWL hopes that Nelson expands the article and North and South Magazine publishes it.