News: Photograph of Confederates on Campaign in Frederick, Maryland--Septermber 1862 or June 1864?

History Mystery: Sharper Focus Uncovers Truth Behind Famous Civil War Photo, Karen Gardner, Frederick [Maryland] Magazine, April 22, 2019. 

The slightly blurred, black-and-white image is one of the iconic photographs from Civil War-era Frederick. Confederate soldiers are marching down a Frederick thoroughfare, believed to be Patrick Street, as the rebels march toward a fateful meeting with Union soldiers at Antietam Creek near the town of Sharpsburg.

Two history buffs, however, are turning the tables on the accepted story behind the photo.

Erik Davis, of Frederick, and Paul Bolcik, of Rockville, aren’t historians. But they are tenacious researchers, and after two years of careful investigation, their findings have punched holes in the accepted story surrounding the photo. The two have unearthed a trove of information about the photo and they are now certain it was taken on Market Street. They are also fairly certain the soldiers were marching south to what would be known as the Battle of Monocacy in July 1864, not west toward Sharpsburg in September 1862.

The photo matters not only to those interested in Frederick history, but also to Civil War buffs and people who study the history of photography. That’s because it’s the only known photo of Confederate soldiers marching in Union territory, Davis says.

The photo, first published in Civil War Times Illustrated in April 1965, shows Confederate soldiers marching past a sign that read, “J. Rosens[tock] Dry Good & Cloth[ing Store].” It’s that sign that led generations of historians to conclude that the photo was taken on Patrick Street. But the photo gave Davis, a geographer by profession, and Bolcik, a landscaper, valuable clues that led them to determine it was actually taken from the third floor of a building where Hunting Creek Outfitters now sits at 29 N. Market St.

“I like history and mysteries about history,” Davis says during a tour of Downtown buildings. His work creating maps for car navigation systems gives him access to many street photos. In 2015 he got the idea to re-create the historic photo from the same vantage point, showing the area as it is today. “It would be a then-and-now,” he says. “I seriously thought it was here on Patrick [Street].” A historical marker, still on East Patrick Street, backs up the common story.

Davis and Bolcik, friends and members of the Center for Civil War Photography, got to work on their project. Their first task was to match up Patrick Street buildings with the images in the photo. But there was no match, so they decided to do a little digging. “Once I started researching, I realized that wasn’t the place,” Davis says.

Davis and Bolcik went to the Maryland Room at the C. Burr Artz Library, where manager Mary Mannix supplied them with old news clippings from the era. “We stumbled upon a newspaper article that showed J. Rosenstock Dry Goods opening on Market Street,” Davis says. “We knew if we could find this guy’s business, we could find the location.” Property records showed the Rosenstock building on Patrick Street, which served as the home to Rosenstock’s department store for much of the 20th century, didn’t open on East Patrick Street until 1868. Newspaper ads showed Rosenstock opened his first store in April 1860 at what today is 25 N. Market St. Today, that building houses The Perfect Truffle.

ORIGIN OF A LEGEND

Most historical accounts say that Frederick photographer Jacob Byerly took the photo, and on that point Davis and Bolcik agree. Byerly’s studio at the time was on North Market Street, next to the original Rosenstock’s store. It’s out of this studio where the photo was taken, with caution.

During his tour, Davis notes the many architectural features in the photo that match the North Market Street location, including hatchway cellar doors, a dip in the sidewalk and the family home of George Murdock Tyler, identified by fuzzy awning poles.

In the photo’s upper left, across from the marchers, is a darkened building. Later demolished, it’s where Cacique Restaurant is today. To the left, just out of camera range, was the Fredericktown Savings Institution, now home to the Frederick County Treasury Department. The bank told another part of the story.

“This was the bank that had just coughed up [$64,000] for the ransom,” Davis says. In 1864, Confederate Gen. Jubal Early, who had pillaged Hagerstown and Middletown, demanded that Fred-erick pay him $200,000 to prevent his troops from burning and looting Frederick. Local businesses and residents agreed because they feared the Confederates would follow through on their threat. Several banks joined together to pay the ransom.

Whether the photo was taken in 1862 or 1864 is less certain, however. Still, there are some clues in the photo itself, Bolcik says. There are several wet patches in the photo, indicating possible rain. Weather records show it didn’t rain during the Confederate visit in 1862, but it did rain overnight July 8-9, 1864. Another clue is that many of the soldiers appear bedraggled, as though they had been fighting for years, Davis says.

“The situation on July 9 [1864] was different,” Bolcik says. Frederick banks were trying to come up with the ransom, but outside, downtown was almost deserted, except for the soldiers.

“It was a crisis situation in Frederick,” he says. Byerly was probably holed up in his third-floor studio at the time, hoping to save it from the invaders. Nineteenth-century photographers typically located in the top floor of a build-ing, carving out skylights needed to provide natural light for photos.

Curiously, it was the economic depression created by the ransom payment that drove Rosenstock to close his North Market Street store in 1865.

AFTERMATH

There are no known original prints of the Confederate march photo. The now-famous photo is a copy of a photo from Albert Brown, who inherited three prints from his father, Benjamin Brown, a suspected Con-federate spy. Albert made the photos available to Ben Rosenstock, who had them copied by the Edmonston Studio, which operated in Frederick from 1925 to 1934. The original photos seem to have disappeared, although Bolcik and Davis hope one is eventually unearthed.

The photo likely didn’t measure up to Byerly’s standards, Bolcik says. Byerly used a portrait, not a landscape, lens, probably because he didn’t have much time to set up his equipment after seeing the soldiers. There’s a thumbprint in one corner of the glass. “This photo’s out of focus,” he adds. “And he probably thought no one would want to buy a photo of the bank robbers.”

Frederick tourism officials are looking into changing the sign to reflect the new research. The revelations about the photos are not surprising, according to Mannix of the Maryland Room. “History’s always open to interpretation,” she says. The pair did an enormous amount of old-school research, using newspapers and property records, she adds. “Erik and Paul read this stuff, and this is the result.”

Full Text and Image Source: Frederick Magazine

New and Interesting: Confederate Capital Punishment

Confederate Death Sentences: A Reference Guide, Thomas P. Lowry and Lewis Laska, BookSurge Publishing, paperback, 86 pages, $12.99.

The Confederate armies maintained discipline by flogging, branding, tattooing, hanging, and shooting their soldiers. The disruptions of 1865 scattered and/or destroyed most the records of rebel military justice. The authors have assembled, from many sources, the most complete record of Confederate death sentences ever published. In addition to individuals facing a firing squad, there were mass executions, brothers shot together, fathers and sons shot together, and wives watching their husbands being shot. These vignettes, together with tabulated lists, tell of a hard and unglamorous war, and will be a guide for future writers.

About the Author
Thomas P. Lowry received his medical degree from Stanford in 1957, treated patients for forty years, and was a clinical professor of psychiatry. He has written a dozen history books, covering Lewis and Clark, World War II, and the Civil War. He now lives in Virginia. His co-author, Nashville attorney Lewis Laska, is an authority on 200 years of legal executions in Tennessee.

Text Source: Amazon.com

Forthcoming: Memoir of a Confederate Canoneer in General Lee's Army

Where Men Only Dare to Go Or the Story of a Boy Company, C.S.A., ,Royall W. Figg, Foreword by Robert K. Krick,Louisiana State University Press,272 pp, 1 photograph, $19.95, October 2008.

First published in 1885 and long out of print, Where Men Only Dare to Go by Royall W. Figg remains a classic memoir of Confederate service. This updated edition, with a new foreword by historian Robert K. Krick, brings Figg's captivating narrative back into print. Figg tells the story of Captain William W. Parker's Virginia battery, a significant Confederate unit that participated in every important engagement fought by the Army of Northern Virginia. Comprised mainly of young men, it became known as "Parker's Boy Battery." Figg joined the company at age twenty as a charter member at the battery's initial muster on March 14, 1862. He appears on each of the battery's fourteen bimonthly muster rolls from March 1862 to February 1865—an unusually devoted service record. His devotion is evident in the detailed accounting he provides of the battery's history, a vivid and engaging record of the experiences of a Confederate artillerist providing a rich blend of bravery, rascally behavior, and drollery.

J. Thompson Brown, the last commander of Parker's Virginia Battery, described Figg as "a fair representative of our Company, an intelligent fairly educated boy. . . . He was a truthful and Christian gentleman. . . . I believe what he says, as no man could doubt Royal W. Figg's statement." The reappearance of Where Men Only Dare to Go after so many years offers a new generation a chance to read the eyewitness report of this bright, observant young soldier who fought through the famous battles in the eastern theater. Royall W. Figg was a member of Parker's Virginia Battery in Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.

Robert K. Krick is the author of numerous books on the American Civil War, including Stonewall Jackson at Cedar Mountain and Conquering the Valley: Stonewall Jackson at Port Republic.

Text: From Publisher

Research Request---How Many Virginia Troops Were Literate?

Marshall University graduate student James Thomas Knight is looking into the research question 'How Many Virginia Troops Were Literate?' Culled from H-Net's American Civil War discussion group's June posting is his report and request.

"I am a graduate student in history at Marshall University writing my
thesis on the extent of illiteracy among Virginia Confederate Soldiers.
I have done nearly all the research and written, I think, just under
half of the actual thesis. To arrive at the extent of illiteracy I
studied muster and pay rolls, clothing rolls, powers of attorney,
basically anything that soldiers had to sign. This search at the
Brockenbrough Library, Virginia Historical Society, Library of
Virginia, Virginia Tech and the West Virginia State Archives yielded
358 usable rolls from 192 different companies from all three branches
of the service with about 8,000 individuals from each region of the
state. I am using this sample, along with the appropriate secondary and
other primary sources, to gauge illiteracy by year, region and branch.

I would be grateful for any thoughts or concerns from anyone on the
list to do with this study.

Very truly yours,
Jim Knight
mailto:knight58@marshall.edu"

CWL: To join University of Michigan's H-Net American Civil War Discussion group, go to H-Net: Humanities and Social Sciences Online and apply.

New--Diehard Rebels: The Confederate Culture of Invincibility

Diehard Rebels: The Confederate Culture of Invincibility, Jason Phillips, Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2007. ix + 257 pp. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index. $34.95 (cloth), ISBN 0-8203-2836-7.

Reviewed for H-War by Susannah Ural Bruce, Department of History, Sam Houston State University

Why They Fought On: New Interpretations of Confederate Soldier Ideology

After the overwhelming Confederate defeats at the battles of Franklin and Nashville in 1864, Union General John Schofield puzzled over the determination exhibited by the Southern forces so late in the war. Years later, he reflected, "'I doubt if any soldiers in the world ever needed so much cumulative evidence to convince them that they were beaten'" (p. 115). It is this astonishing resolve that inspires Jason Phillips's Diehard Rebels. Part of the work is grounded in classic soldier and combat ideology studies, like Gerald Linderman's Embattled Courage: The Experience of Combat in the American Civil War (1987), Reid Mitchell's Civil War Soldiers (1988), and, more recently, James McPherson's For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War (1997). But, Phillips argues that scholars need to approach the subject differently if we are to understand "why thousands of men continued to fight for cause and comrades despite the long odds of 1864 and 1865" (p.3). Phillips sees the essential question as not "what they fought for" but rather "why they fought on" (p. 3).

In fairness, Linderman, Mitchell, and McPherson recognized the difference between these issues, but Phillips, offers something new. He does this by narrowly focusing his study on the years from 1863 through 1865, and restricting himself to wartime correspondence to avoid any false postwar memories or motivations. Within these tight confines, Phillips packs a wealth of source material. He admits that his study favors literate officers, but Phillips insists that their convictions were quite similar to those of the enlisted men. He clarifies, though, that diehard rebels were not typical Southerners. Rather, "They were often more privileged, more educated, and more attached to slavery than their fellow citizens were" (p. 4). Phillips compensates for these limits by incorporating a broad swath of material from soldiers serving in the Army of Northern Virginia, the Army of the Tennessee, and the Army of the Trans-Mississippi.

Diehard Rebels follows a thematic rather than chronological path with each chapter focusing on a key to Phillips's explanation of Confederate "culture of invincibility." Born during the Second Great Awakening, these soldiers, like the South, Phillips argues, were defined by their Protestant faith and their confidence that God smiled upon them and the Confederacy. That faith sustained the men and clarified the often incomprehensible. As Phillips explains,"triumphs proved God's favor and presence among Confederate legions; defeats confirmed God's love by chastening Rebels for their sins" (p. 187). Through it all, the Confederates' will to fight was sustained by their faith in God and their trust in God's faith in them.

In chapter 2, Phillips contends that the Confederate dehumanization of federal forces and Northerners in general also sustained their fighting spirit. While this tool is not unique to Southern soldiers, Phillips still proves its effectiveness for Confederate troops, and argues that their images of the enemy may have been more extravagant than most. Blending newspaper cartoons and popular songs with poetry from letters and diaries, Phillips shows how "many Confederates considered total war campaigns and the proliferation of black troops' evil portents of the South's future should the rebellion fail" (p. 74). The result, he argues, was a belief that anything, including death, was better than surrendering to such a foe.

Chapter 3 explains how the environments of camp and battlefield sustained the Confederate will to fight. Even in the face of defeat, Phillips's diehard rebels pointed to large numbers of Union dead as evidence of their ability to continue the war. Phillips cites strong combat leadership and close bonds forming in the intensity of conflict as additional factors that led Confederates to misrepresent casualties in letters, and maintain a blind faith in their best officers. Chapter 4 builds on this concept with an analysis of camp rumors that soldiers readily believed. Phillips shows how "during the nadir of Confederate morale, diehards intoxicated each other with gossip of improbable victories, northern disasters, and foreign intervention" (p. 117). This theme of faith and reliance on illogical outcomes continues through chapter 5, which studies Confederate soldiers in the final four months of the war and into the period of Reconstruction. In some ways, the themes of all previous chapters converge here as religious faith, negative caricatures of the enemy, rumors, and the bonds between soldiers sustained Confederates in early 1865. Quotes echo Sergeant Marion Fitzpatrick's pledge to his wife in Georgia that "'Yankees may kill me but will never subjugate me'" (p. 153).

It was this determination, a blend of all of the motivations outlined in Diehard Rebels, that carried Confederates into the period of Reconstruction. Phillips concludes that the Southern soldier "did not come home victorious; he did not come home humbled. Johnny came marching home with a loaded pistol. He came home an unconquered loser, armed with wartime convictions that shaped his postwar identity, ideology, and actions" (p. 179). These values and attitudes guided diehard rebels through the remainder of 1865 and in the years that followed. They helped Southerners to introduce and sustain the myth of the Lost Cause and allowed Confederates to win the peace that defeated Reconstruction, created Jim Crow, and defined the New South.

There are some minor weaknesses to the work. While there is a certain timelessness to the soldier experience, it is dangerous to compare the ideology of American soldiers in World War II with those of Confederates. At one point, Phillips does this to underscore the concept of diehard rebels fighting, at least in part, for their fellow soldiers. More perplexing, though, is Phillips's decision to prove this by quoting a WWII veteran speaking long after that conflict (just as he did General Schofield in the example that opens this review). One could make the case that scholars have tossed out valuable sources in the trendy animosity toward memoirs, but Phillips has already insisted that "postwar accounts cannot answer wartime questions" (p. 4). Clearly opposed to the evidentiary use of postwar memories, he cannot now cite one to support an argument. On a different theme, Phillips argues at several points that readers must resist the temptation to view Confederates' determination as "absurd or a mystery," and he insists that "Diehard Rebels were not insane, delusional, or bombastic" (pp. 189, 4). Phillips may be creating a bit of a straw man here. Surely scholars are well past such warnings about the Confederacy and Confederate ideology.

But these points are minor. Phillips succeeds brilliantly in accomplishing his goal to "tell us more about southern culture and warfare in general than about Confederate defeat," though I think he has done that nicely as well (p. 4). Diehard Rebels will make an outstanding addition to any course on the American South or the U.S. Civil War era.

Source: H-NET BOOK REVIEW, Published by H-CivWar@h-net.msu.edu (May 2008) www.h-net.org/~civwar/

Copyright (c) 2008 by H-Net, all rights reserved. H-Net permits
the redistribution and reprinting of this work for nonprofit,
educational purposes, with full and accurate attribution to the
author, web location, date of publication, originating list, and
H-Net: Humanities & Social Sciences Online

Photo: Library of Congress, Battle of Antietam, Hagerstown Pike, Confederate Dead

Classics Reprinted---Whistling Dixie: Southern Railroading Before the Rebellion and Black Virginians in Rebel Camps

Travel on Southern Antebellum Railroads, 1828-1860, Eugene Alvarez, University of Alabama Press, illustations, maps, notes, bibliography, index, 240 pp paperback $19.95

The matter-of-fact descriptive title of this interesting little volume on railroading in the pre–Civil War South does not do justice to Alvarez’s coverage of the subject. Along with his full account of trains and train accommodations,
he manages to encompass a number of social, political, and even ideological subjects.

“Here is a carefully researched account of all aspects of railroading—engines, cars, life aboard, perils of the road, stations—with much contemporary
flavor from this boisterous era.”-- Anniston Star

“A charming and informative examination of the early years of railroads. It is also history of the kind I like best: a study not of great events or momentous trends, but of how people lived.” — Jonathan Yardley, Miami Herald

“Excellently and extensively illustrated and can be recommended to all interested in trains and southern social history.” — Journal of Southern History

The Confederate Negro Virginia’s Craftsmen and Military Laborers, 1861–1865, James H. Brewer, University of Alabama Press, 240 pp, illustrtions, notes, bibliography, index, paperback, $29.95.

“Brewer has brought to light creditably the little known contribution of the Virginia Negroes, free and slave, to the Confederacy. In so doing, he corrects a serious historical omission while delivering a telling blow to the destruction of the stereotyped southern Negro during the war. . . . A milestone in the history of the period and essential to any serious study of the Civil War, the Negro, and the South.” — Journal of American History

“Brewer forcefully presents his main theme that the Virginia Negro ‘contributed a sustaining eff ort to the War for Southern Independence and an impressive mass of facts and statistics demonstrates that the Old Dominion’s more than half a million blacks made a vital contribution to the rebel cause. . . . Professor Brewer makes his point effectively and, in the process, adds a new dimension to the measurement of the Confederate war effort. No historian of the Civil War era can afford to ignore this book, which sheds so much new light.” — Journal of Southern History

A Gettysburg College “Top 200 Civil War Books” selection, Mayflower Award Winner for 1970

Source: text from publisher

CWL---Simple Story of a Soldier Intrigues and Awaits Further Research

Simple Story Of A Soldier: Life And Service in the 2d Mississippi Infantry, Samuel W. Hankins, John F. Marszalek (Introduction), Fire Ant Books, an imprint of the University of Alabama Press, index, 96 pp. 2004, $12.95

In 1905, Samuel W. Hankins wrote and serialized his memoir in Confederate Veteran magazine. Living in a home for Confederate Veterans located in Gulfport, Mississippi, the 65-year later published his story as a pamphlet in 1912. From northeastern Mississippi, Hankins joined the Confederate army in 1861 when he had just turned 16. His father, not a supporter of secession, joined the Confederate army and ordered is son to stay with his mother. Samuel refused and father accepted him as a comrade in arms in the 2nd Mississippi regiment.

Drill was impossible for some in the 2nd Mississippi; they did not know their right from their left. Hankins describes his train ride to Virginia while riding atop the cars and his encounters with tunnels. Ordered to Jackson's small army, the 2nd Mississippi occupied Harpers Ferry, drilled, bought pieces of rope that had been used to hang John Brown and engaged in gambling. Nothing is mentioned of moving the locomotives down the Valley Pike but the soldiers' narrow eye view of the battle of Manassas is given.

Hankins neglects telling events from July 1861 to April 1862, at which point the 'war begins in earnest.' The soldiers are very soggy. One has a premonition of death. An artillery piece fires at a balloon; the ropes are cut and the balloonist falls to his death. In 1902, while in Corinth finds a former Union soldier who also witnessed the balloonist's fall. The 2nd Mississipi' place at Malvern Hill is in support of the artillery.

The battle of Sharpsburg comes and passes quickly. Hankins describes the Suffolk campaign as it was lived by the privates. Soaked uniforms, lousy clothes, rotting shoes, despicable food. Hankins relates that he was a half an hour from freezing to death while on picket duty; two of his comrades sling him between themselves and force him to walk. He recovers slightly. Readers will painfully accept the conditions of the winter of 1862-1863 and wonder how the 17-year old ever made it through.

Gettysburg comes quickly in the memoir; Hankins is wounded in the foot at the Railroad Cut and to captured. For the reader, the details of this event are very descriptive. Shipped to NYC, then to Fortress Monroe, then to City Point, Virginia, Hankins is exchanged and sent to Mississippi to recuperate. He does and joins other wounded veterans in forming a partisan band of cavalry who roam Mississippi and Alabama in search of a Confederate army to join. They are skilled in staying out of Yankee hands and avoiding combat altogether. The trek nearly destroys their horses and fortunately, a doctor locates a still and reinvigorated the flagging bodies and spirits of the troop.

The Mississippi cavalry battalion takes part in a portion of the Atlanta campaign and then is ordered to Mississippi, back to Alabama, and then back to Mississippi. Learning of the news of Lee's surrender, the unit disbands.

Though meager in the amount of detailed descriptions Harkins offers, those episodes he covers are expressive and from the privates point of view. The captain is the most important man in the memoir. Hankins never meets a general. His personal experience is at the center of this book and rewards the reader. Yet, Marszalek only introduces the pamphlet; there are no notes or annotations in the book. Hankins' memoir awaits a graduate student's efforts. An explanation of the 2nd Mississippi's role and conduct at Manassas and Glendale would be helpful. Hankins' reporting of the death of the balloonist is minimal. Medical care and the lack thereof is important in the memoir and needs to be expanded. The partisan cavalry battalions of Mississippi need to be explained. CWL enjoyed reading Hankins' memoir but wishes to have a fuller picture the privates, corporals, sergeants and captains of the 2nd Mississippi. Long Live Bell Irwin Wiley!

Other Voices---Early Review of Noswothy's Roll-Call to Destiny

Roll Call to Destiny: The Soldier's Eye View of Civil War Battles , Brent Nosworthy, Basic Books, 336 pages, March 2008, $27.95.

Reviewed by Bruce Trinque, Amston, CT on Civil War Discussion Group, Yahoogroups.com

Although in some ways Brent Nosworthy’s new Roll-Call to Destiny: The Soldier’s Eye View of Civil War Battle can be viewed as a companion to his previous, ground-breaking The Bloody Crucible of Courage: Fighting Methods and Combat Experience of the Civil War, fundamentally Roll-Call to Destiny is independent of that earlier volume, written from a quite different perspective. Thoroughly grounded in firsthand accounts, Roll-Call to Destiny provides a vivid examination of combat during the American Civil War: infantry, cavalry, and artillery (and even naval, or at least riverine, action), from the beginning of the war until nearly its end, both Eastern and Western theaters, Union and Confederate.

The focus is not principally upon the experiences of individual soldiers, but rather upon the activities of “small units” (usually, regiments or batteries, but also brigades or larger organizations, where appropriate) at several different battles, including First Bull Run, Gettysburg, and Missionary Ridge, but also lesser-known actions such as Arkansas Post and Darbytown Road. The author does not attempt to provide detailed accounts of the whole battles, but rather focuses upon one or more selected small units at those actions to illustrate numerous facets of Civil War warfare. He is particularly careful to link the theory and practice of such American combat to European military history and technical developments, showing how the American experience fit into a broader picture and that it is impossible to really understand the battlefields of 1861-65 without taking that broader picture into account. In several cases, the author challenges conventional wisdom and provides convincing new answers to old questions.

Besides this innovative and insightful assessment of Civil War combat, Roll-Call to Destiny offers plenty of more traditional military history in the form of stirring narratives of dramatic episodes peopled by soldiers whose courage and skill rose to the occasion – or sometimes did not. This is a book that should be of great interest and value to anyone seriously interested in the real nature of fighting during the American Civil War. Even those who think that they have already read everything there is to be said on the subject will come away with new information and ideas. This is definitely a book that deserves a strong thumbs-up.

Source: cwdg@yahoogroups.com

CWL---The Confederates, The Crater, and Their Recollections

Is Not The Glory Enough To Give Us A Share?: An Analysis of Competing Memories fo the Battle of the Crater, Kevin M. Levin, in The View From the Ground: Experiences of Civil War Soldiers, Aaron Sheehan-Dean, editor, University of Kentucky Press, 2007, pp. 227-248.

On July 30, 1864 four divisions of the Federal 9th Corps assaulted a crevasse that was 200 feet long, 60 feet wide and 30 feet deep that had been created by the explosion of 4 tons of gunpowder under a Confederate fort in the Petersburg, Virginia line. Their assault was countered by a brigade of South and North Carolinians and three brigades of Virginians. The Rebels won the battle and the Virginians won the history.

In 1936 the National Park Service acquired the Crater's site and relied upon the Virginians' accounts to tell the story of the battle. The debates between the Carolinians and the Virginians were part of the collective debate among veterans over the causes and the glory of the war. A national narrative that ignored the importance of slavery and emancipation and elevated the brotherhood of war was constructed from the 1870s through the 1940s. The Southern veterans argued over their battlefield accomplishments and revolved around the states since their CSA had dissolved. State and local history were developed by the frictions of state rubbing against state for domination of the process of memorializing, history writing, and memory construction of the war.

The earliest interpretations of war were authored by the veterans. Personal, unit, and state pride were developed and, to a degree, historical accuracy was sacrificed. Edward Pollard, wartime editor of the Daily Richmond Examiner, produced The Lost Cause in 1866. The Southern Historical Society Papers, first issued in 1876, gave those outside of Virginia a forum for marking their place in the War of the Rebellion. The Confederate Veteran appeared in 1893 and a wedge between Virginians and other Confederates were again driven between Confederate veterans.

Kevin Levin, who offers the weblog Civil War Memory, develops these themes through a discussion of how the Battle of the Crater has been written and rewritten in the course of the 150 years since the end of the war. His essay is a case study of Civil War memory that, in the past decade, has been addressed by David Blight, Fritzhugh Bundage, David Goldfield, Carol Reardon and others have developed. Kevin Levin's weblog is located at http://civilwarmemory.typepad.com/civil_war_memory

CWL---Popular Sovereignty Among the Privates! The Texas Brigade Tosses Officers Out of Camp!

Popular Sovereignty In The Confederate Army: The Case of Colonel John Marshall and the Fourth Texas Infantry Regiment, Charles E. Brooks, in The View From the Ground: Experiences of Civil War Soldiers, Sheehan-Dean, Aaron, editor, University of Kentucky Press, 2007, pp. 199-226.

Texans, like many soldiers South and North in 1861, voted for their regimental officers. Hood's Texas Brigade compiled an impressive record of driving Yankees and their own Richmond appointed officers off the field. Brooks cites several instances of Texas regiments dismissing their officers from their commands. 'Popular Sovereignty' a 1850s political sentiment that held that local voters should choose whether their territory or state would institute slavery, also applied to the selection of officers.

Colonels, lieutenant-colonels, captains, surgeons and chaplains served at the pleasure of the rank-and-file; those officers who were placed over them by the governor or central government had be be accepted by the troops or they would be dismissed by the privates, corporals, sergeants and captains. The 1st, 4th and 5th Texas infantry regiments and the 13th Texas cavalry regiment sought to dismiss officers by a variety of means. Written petitions, shaving the commander's horse's tail, cutting saddle parts, hooting and jeering, walking away from drill were used to show the rank-and-file's sentiment. One regiment went so far as to grab an officer, hoist him on to his saddled horse, lead it out of camp and then set it off at a gallop.

As volunteer regiments organized, soldiers held a distinct spirit of democratic sovereignty. A volunteer had right to pick officers and had a right to 'secede' and transfer out of one company or regiment and join another if they were unhappy is the current officer. Non-slaving holding enlisted men fought loyally in the slave-holders' war. In the movie Gettysburg the question is asked, "What are you Rebs fighting for?" The answer is "My rights (rats)." The fundamental issue of selecting local leaders were among the rights for which the CSA enlisted man was fight.

Above is a photo of the memorial to Texas Civil War soldiers that is located in Dallas, Texas.

Forthcoming: Louisiana Tigers

First Louisiana Special Battalion: Wheat’s Tigers in the Civil War, Gary Schreckengost, McFarland Publishing, photos, maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index,$45, Available Fall/Winter 2007

The author Gary Schreckengost reports that he has chosen to move his manuscript from White Mane/Burd Street Publishing to McFarland Publishing. Once scheduled for late 2006, his work on Wheat's Louisiana Tigers will now be coming out late 2007.

The cover above is from the White Mane/Burd Street Publishing of the unreleased book. The following is text supplied by McFarland Publishing.

From the little-known Filibuster Wars to the Civil War battlefield of Gaines’ Mill, this volume details the fascinating story of one of the South’s most colorful military units, the 1st Louisiana Special Battalion, aka Wheat’s Tigers. Beginning with a brief look at the Filibuster Wars (a set of military attempts to annex Latin American countries into the United States as slave states), the work takes a close look at the men who comprised Wheat’s Tigers: Irish immigrant ship hands, New Orleans dock workers and Filibuster veterans. Commanded by one of the greatest antebellum filibusterers, Chatham Roberdeau Wheat, the Tigers quickly distinguished themselves in battle through their almost reckless bravery, proving instrumental in Southern victories at the battles of Front Royal, Winchester and Port Republic. An in-depth look at Battle of Gaines’ Mill, in which Wheat’s Tigers suffered heavy casualties, including their commander, completes the story. Appendices provide a compiled roster of the Wheat’s Tigers, a look at the 1st Louisiana’s uniforms and a copy of Wheat’s report about the Battle of Manassas. Never-before-published photographs are also included.

About the Author
Author and historian Gary Schreckengost lives in Elm, Pennsylvania. An infantry officer in the Army Reserves, his work has been published in American Civil War Magazine, World War II Magazine, Field Artillery Journal and Armor Magazine.

Text supplied by author and publisher with edits by The Civil War Librarian.

CWL --- Elephants at Shiloh

Seeing the Elephant: Raw Recruits at the Battle of Shiloh, Joseph Allan Frank and George A. Reaves, 215 pp., paperbound, bibliography, index, chapter notes, citations in text, University of Illinois Press, 2003. $14.95

The authors have created a marvelous study of the 90,000 soldiers who saw combat on April 6th and 7th, 1862 in western Tennessee, a few miles north of Corinth, Mississippi. Like First Manassas, Shiloh taught the citizens of the Union and Confederacy something unexpected. First Masassas taught that the war would not end in 90 days. Shiloh taught that the war would be extremely bloody. With 23,000 in two days fighting, Shiloh ranks with Antietam as one of the costliest battles in the briefest amount of time.

The authors' Introduction sets the tone by immediately presenting three soldiers' view of their experience of combat: drama, trauma, and matter-of-fact. They offer seven categories for how a raw recruit is prepared to preceive combat. A soldier's moral is conditional upon: tactical preparation, political attitudes, logistics, leadership, espirit de corps, comradeship and officier competence. Also, the authors present a bibliographic review of other writings on 'seeing the elephant.'
Studies of heroic romanticism, training and leadership, and combat morale are briefly discussed and the literature in the field is outlined succinctly.

The method of reseach is described and impresses the reader. The authors used 450 diaries and letter collections from 160 regiments and batteries that had not seen combat until Shiloh. Of the 450 soldiers' papers, Reaves and Frank retained 381 soldiers' works that contained enough information to be placed in a data set. Of course, the material was inchoate, spread among letters, diaries and reminiences.
The authors approached this material with 76 questions. If answers to 10 of these questions were found in the soldiers' material, then the source documents were admitted to the data set. The vast majority of the material in the data set was created during the first year of the war.

At the very beginning, the authors set aside "one-dimensional approaches emphasizing, for example, a Victorian heroic ethos or a single factors such as comradship." Reaves, a National Park Ranger serving at Shiloh National Battlefield Park, and Frank, a academic historian, offer an exemplary work of history.