Civil War History – Page 4 – Old Magazine Articles

Weapons and Tactics at Gettysburg
(National Park Service, 1954)

The weapons and tactics used at the Battle of Gettysburg were in no way different from those brought into use during other parts in the war. Just as war has always been practiced, weapons influence tactics and this article lists a variety of Civil War rifles and artillery pieces that were put to use during that three day battle. The author also goes to some length describing the manner in which Civil War regiments and brigades marched into battle and the deployment of their supporting artillery batteries.

The Battle of Gettysburg: Day Three
(National Park Service, 1954)

A clearly written piece which sums up the climactic third day of the Gettysburg battle:

Night brought an end to the bloody combat at East Cemetery Hill, but this was not the time for rest. What would Meade do? Would the Union Army remain in its established position and hold its lines at all costs?

‘Beginner’s Guide to the Civil War”
(Pageant Magazine, 1958)

As the one-hundredth anniversary of the War Between the States grew ever nearer, a Pulitzer Prize winning Civil War Historian, Bruce Catton, wrote the attached article concerning the overwhelming popularity that the nation was finding in their study of that remarkable contest:

The requirements for becoming a Civil War Buff are very simple. All you need is a desire to join. If you are interested in the Civil War, you’re in… You may get to the point where you want to join a Civil War Round Table. [Overtime] commonplace words like Appomattox and Antietam and Perryville take on a new meaning for you; a good deal of the monotony and routine of modern life somehow evaporates, as you escape into a period of profound and haunting significance.

All in all, it’s quite an experience.
Welcome to the Army!

Impressions of John Brown
(Literary Digest, 1897)

This article from 1897 is a digest of Cheerful Yesterdays, a longer piece by Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson (1823 – 1911) originally appeared in The Atlantic Monthly. Having served actively in the anti-slavery movement during the days leading up to the Civil War, Higginson put to paper his memories of famed abolitionist John Brown, wishing to banish all thoughts that the man was mad.

Mathew Brady at Antietam
(NY Times, 1862)

An anonymous reviewer tells his readers about the mournful spirit that dominated each room at the Matthew Brady Gallery where he attended a unique exhibit of the photographer’s Civil War pictures:

At the door of his gallery hangs a little placard ‘The Dead of Antietam’. Crowds of people are constantly going up the stairs; follow them…there is a terrible fascination about it that draws one near these pictures, and makes you loath to leave them. You will see hushed, reverend groups standing around these weird copies of carnage, bending down to look in the pale faces of the dead, chained by the strange spell that dwells in dead men’s eyes.

It was on the first day at Gettysburg that the Confederates made a terrible mistake. Read about it here.

‘Boy Soldiers of the Confederacy”
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1922)

The two page article attached herein served to alert the 1922 subscriber-base of Confederate Veteran Magazine that Boy Soldiers of the Confederacy (1905) – was no longer in print and isn’t that too bad and just in case no one shared the reviewers feelings on this matter, she recalled some of the Civil War experiences of the boys who fought throughout that war.

Read about a boy who fought for the Union…

The Bad Generals
(Pageant Magazine, 1958)

Attached herein is a list the five lamest Generals of the American Civil War.

This two page compilation is made up of thumbnail descriptions outlining just how far from awesome these men were, and why, one hundred years later, they continue to be recognized as failures to the succeeding generations of Civil War historians.

The Rebel Conscription Problem
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1918)

It has been said that the Confederate States passed the most drastic conscript law on record, which may be true; but it is a mistake to suppose that this law was successfully executed.

The [Conscription] act, April 16, 1862, embraced men between eighteen and thirty-five years; the second, of September 27 1862, men between eighteen and forty-five; the third and last, of February 17, 1864, men between seventeen and fifty.

Click here to read about the American South during the Great Depression.

The Myth of Lee’s Sword
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, , 1922)

Responding to the old tale that General Lee offered his sword in surrender at Appomattox, and that the magnanimous General Grant, flush with victory, kindly refused this gesture of humiliation – this anonymous contributor to Confederate Veteran Magazine penned an article that exposes the old saw to be incorrect:

And General Grant says specifically in his memoir (Volume II, Chapter 25, pages 344-346): ‘No conversation, not one word, passed between General Lee and myself either about private property, side arms, or kindred subjects. The much talked of surrendering of General Lee’s sword and my handing it back, this and much more that has been said about it, is pure romance.’

The Lot of the Fighting Man
(Pageant Magazine, 1958)

Both Northern and Southern armies were composed predominantly of very young men. Almost all the generals were highly bewhiskered, but the enlisted men were almost all too young to shave.

Both sides carried a muzzle-loading rifle, cumbersome by modern standards, but nevertheless a highly effective weapon. It would kill at more than half a mile, and was deadly when used by veterans…

‘How Did it Feel to be a Soldier?”
(Outing Magazine, 1917)

This collection of Civil War letters, written by one of the younger members of an Illinois regiment, was printed in a men’s magazine at a time when the U.S. was gearing-up for it’s first military adventure in Europe. The editors wished only to impart to their younger readers what a soldier’s life is like:

I will try to give you some of the particulars of soldier life so far as I have tried it…We don’t have more than half enough to eat…Health is good, with the exception of dysentery.

Corn and the 1st Arkansas Regiment
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1918)

Appearing in the pages of Confederate Veteran Magazine some forty-three years after the bloody end of the American Civil War was this reminiscence by a Confederate veteran recalling the important roll that corn played during the war and throughout American history:

I am an old Southern planter, past eighty-five years of age, in perfect condition as to mind and health, have lived on cornbread all my life, and feel that I can speak intelligently on the much-mooted cornbread question.

During the war I commanded the 1st Arkansas Regiment, consisting of twelve hundred men, and during the four years we never saw a piece of bread that contained a grain of wheat flower. We lived entirely on plain corn bread, and my men were strong and kept the best of health…

Antietam
(Famous Events, 1913)

A thumbnail description of Lee’s gamble in the North: the Battle of Antietam:

Lee repeatedly broke and drove back the advancing Union armies. Then in the summer of 1862, he took the aggressive and invaded the North. His eager and victorious soldiers hoped to sweep successfully over the entire country. But they were met in Maryland at Antietam Creek by the Union army commanded by General George McClellan. The battle that ensued was the bloodiest and the most costly single day of strife in all this awful war.

The American Civil War and the Unity it Created
(The Sewanee Review, 1913)

Written at the time when the United States was marking the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, Dudley Miles, a Professor of History at Columbia University, wrote this appreciation concerning one of the lasting virtues of the American Civil War:

The torrent of natural life has swept away the bitter memories of brother struggling with brother. In both North and South faces are turned from the past, and hearts are filled with pride and hope and aspiration for the future of the republic….The magnanimity which Grant displayed at Appomattox, the restraint which even political temper displayed during Reconstruction, stopping short of confiscation of property and the execution of prominent leaders…these things furnish a new chapter in the history of victor and vanquished.

Two Civil War Poems
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1922)

Looking back on the American Civil War from a vantage point of fifty-seven years, these two versifiers, both highly schooled in Southern lore, penned these Dixie ditties for their South-land readers of Confederate Veteran Magazine.

Read an article about how Victorian fashion saved a life during the Civil War.

Rebel Victory at Secessionville
(Confederate Veteran, 1930)

Nathan George Shanks Evans (1824 – 1868) was the Confederate general in charge of the rebel forces at the Battle of Secessionville, South Carolina. Attached you will find his two page report written upon the conclusion of that battle on June 19, 1862.

This battle marked the first major attempt by the Union Army to take the Rebel city Charleston, South Carolina.

Click here to read about the heavy influence religion had in the Rebel states during the American Civil War.

How the Confederacy Armed Themselves
(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1922)

This two page article will answer some of your questions as to how the South was able to procure the necessary weapons needed to sustain their army as long as they did:

The Southerners were a ‘gun-totting race, so that there were enough firearms for the first round of the struggle at Bull Run.

Click here to read a similar article on this subject.

An Important Factory Town in the South(Confederate Veteran Magazine, 1922)

In response to the article posted above, one of the readers of Confederate Veteran Magazine…

wrote to the editors to point out an over site that was made concerning an important center of military production for the Confederacy. The reader wished to remind all concerned that Columbus, Georgia was home to numerous manufactories that served the rebels well in so far as the production of swords, brass cannons, harnesses, revolvers and rifles as well as wool and leather goods for the infantry.