American Civil War 1861-1865

The Lt. John A. Clark's Antietam battlefield grave. Clark (born 1841) was killed in action near the West Woods on the morning of 17 Sept 1862. Near, you see a dead Confederate, and a destroyed fence who provide evidence of war's fury. Pic of Sept. 19, 1862.
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Antietam, the deadliest one-day battle in American military history….
…23,000 soldiers were killed, wounded or missing after twelve hours of savage combat on September 17, 1862.

The battlefield is well preserved and is part of the National Park Service.
We toured there many years ago and it’s in a picturesque part of western Maryland.
It's very hard to picture the carnage that took place here.

For instance, part of the battlefield is called the Bloody Lane.

“At the end of the day looking east across Bloody Lane. The center of Lee's defensive line—an 800-yard-long sunken road later called Bloody Lane—as it appeared following the midday battle. By 1:00 p.m., some 5,000 killed and wounded troops of both sides lay along this farm road.”

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www.nps.gov

Antietam National Battlefield (U.S. National Park Service)

www.nps.gov www.nps.gov
 
April 9, 1865, Generals Robert E. Lee (1807/1870) and Ulysses S. Grant (1822/1885), sign the surrender of Lee's army in the McLean House near Appomattox, Virginia.

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On April 9 1949, eighty four years after the historic meeting, the McLean House was opened by the National Park Service for the first time to the public. At the dedication ceremony on April 16, 1950, Major General U.S. Grant and Robert E. Lee IV, direct descendents of Robert E. Lee and Ulysses Grant, cut the ceremonial ribbon. The event was attended by an audience of approximately 20,000.

"...The farmhouse represents the historical style of construction in Piedmont Virginia of the mid-nineteenth century. The current building is a reconstructed form of the original using the original materials. It was carefully deconstructed in the 1890s for shipment and display in Washington, D.C., but those plans fell through, and the materials remained on site. In the 1940s, it ended up in the hands of the National Park Service and was reconstructed on its original foundation, opening to the public in 1949..."
 
Today I read...

"...It is one of Antietam’s most memorable stories on Sept 1862. After two unsuccessful tries to seize the Lower Bridge, Union Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside (1884/1981) turned to one of his 9th Corps brigade commanders Col. Edward Ferrero (1831/1899) and—through an orderly—told him to “take the two 51sts” and seize the bridge (“the two 51sts” were the 51st New York and 51st Pennsylvania Infantry regiments). “It is General Burnside’s special request,” Ferrero yelled to the two regiments, “that the two 51sts take that bridge. Will you do it?”

The cynical silence that followed was broken when Corporal Lewis Patterson shouted from the Pennsylvania ranks, “Will you give us our whiskey, if we take it?” (The PA 51st had had their whiskey rations cut due to misconduct on the march).

Eyes alit at the opportunity, Ferrero wheeled around and exclaimed, “Yes, by God, you shall all have as much as you want, if you take the bridge!”

Sure enough, they did, and the men of the 51st Pennsylvania got their whiskey back..."

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"Will You Give Us Our Whisky Now?” a paint by Don Stivers (1926/2009)

The bridge, on this days.
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Was just over at the “Schienenwolf (Railroad plough)” thread showing how the Germans tore up the railroads made me think of how the Union destroyed Confederate railway lines during the Civil.
They would heat the rails and then bend them around a tree making them unrepairable and useless.

"Sherman's neckties were a railway-destruction tactic used in the American Civil War. Named after Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman of the Union Army, Sherman's neckties were railway rails destroyed by heating them until they were malleable and twisting them into loops resembling neckties, often around trees. Since the Confederacy had limited supplies of iron, and few foundries to roll the rails, this destruction was very difficult to repair. They were also called Sherman's Bow Ties, Jeff Davis's Neckties, and Sherman Hairpins."
- Wikipedia

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en.wikipedia.org

Sherman's neckties - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org



“Today, there is a local Civil War Trail of Meridian Mississippi and its vicinity. Each stop details various aspects of the town’s involvement in the conflict. One of the stops is devoted to Sherman’s raid in 1864 and is located off Front Street behind the Railroad Museum. It is titled “Sherman’s Bow Ties” and consists of a tree stump with iron rails wrapped around it.”

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emergingcivilwar.com

Sherman's Bow Ties - Emerging Civil War

During our tour of the Western Theater last month, Chris, Steph and I stopped in Meridian, Mississippi. Located in the eastern part of the state, the town was the junction of the Mobile and Ohio and the Jackson and Selma Railroads and a logistical center for the Confederates. In February, 1864...
emergingcivilwar.com emergingcivilwar.com
 
(Colourized) The then Union Captain -future Union Brevet Brigadier Gen.- James William Forsyth (1834/1906), overseeing a shipment of bread during his time as Provost Marshal. Photo taken in 1863.
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