introducing Woodbury Historical Tours

Lee's Retreat, and the Surrender at Appomattox
August 7 and 8,
with Ron Wilson and Patrick Schroeder
2 days of tours, includes lunch, and Saturday dinner with speaker $250 : 20 seat limit : HQ: Farmville, VA
See more info and itinerary HERE:

Unseen Appomattox
August 22, with Patrick Schroeder
includes lunch $125 : 20 seat limit :
HQ Appomattox, VA
See more info and itinerary HERE:

[photo above: former and current Appomattox National Historic Park chief historians Ron Wilson, left, and Patrick Schroeder]

friday road notes

Two experiences in Virginia Civil War history on the same day illustrate two ends of a spectrum. We got out our box lunches near some markers at the heart of the Rutherford's Farm/Stephenson's Depot battlefield. These markers are on an island between the highway and the new Lowe's parking lot. It is a sea of striped blacktop now. By contrast, the visit to the Cool Spring battlefield was a bucolic walk through a pristine pasture, to the banks of the Shenandoah. Favorite stop of the day: the 1854 Pritchard House on the Kernstown battlefield. All praise due to the Kernstown Battlefield Association. Photos to follow. The evening was capped off nicely with a very entertaining and informative talk by Stevan Meserve on Tom Rosser.

thursday road notes

A rainy day in Winchester and environs. At noon, about 20 of us carpooled over to Charles Town, West Virginia for a stop at the Jefferson County Museum -- they've got quite an impressive collection, including some nice Civil War material, and John Brown-related artifacts. Perhaps most impressive is the wagon that carried Brown to the gallows.

Following historian Steve Meserve, we walked past the prosecuting attorney's home to a slightly newer iteration of the old court house where Brown was tried. Then we drove to the gallows site, and finally passed through lovely forlorn Harpers Ferry to the Kennedy Farm, where Brown gathered his weaponry and plotted his holy insurrection.

Back at Winchester it was time to greet old friends and meet some new ones in the Lord Fairfax Room. Guide and speaker Scott Patchan made his appearance, and after all enjoyed a hearty repast, Scott set the stage for the next two days of tours, helping us get our minds around the expansive, overlapping operations of that bloody 1864 Shenandoah summer.

Time to get some zzz's now. The trouble with flying from the West Coast to the East -- for night owls like me -- is that even if you go to bed early, it's still way too late. It was worth it, though. As I was typing this I got to see the Baby Ruth scene from Caddyshack one more time.

13th Civil War Forum Battlefield Conference

THE 1864 SHENANDOAH VALLEY CAMPAIGN

We have 43 people signed up for what promises to be another deeply informative and memorable series of tours and talks later this month, headquartered in Winchester. There are still several seats available, if you're interested in attended. It's a fun group of people—many who have been to most or all of the past conferences, some who signed on in recent years, and always a handful of welcome first-timers.

It's a great deal: $275 for two full days of bus tours (with box lunches), two half days of tours by carpool, and three evening buffet dinners with after-dinner presentations by our historians Scott Patchan and Stevan Meserve. The Civil War Forum continues to sponsor the best tours, with the best guides, for as low a cost as possible. Anything left over goes to The Civil War Preservation Trust.

Among other sites, we'll spend much of our two days of bus tours with Scott visiting Cool Spring/Snickers Gap—including a walk down to the river and a visit to the Parker House; 2nd Kernstown Battlefield, 3rd Winchester Battlefield, Fisher’s Hill and Tom's Brook. On Sunday morning we'll finish up with four hours at Cedar Creek.

For early arrivals, we have an optional 4-hour outing planned for Thursday afternoon to Charles Town, WV to visit John Brown-related sites, including the Kennedy Farm, where Brown and his men hid out while preparing their raid, the Jefferson County Museum—whose collection includes the Stuart Horse Artillery flag, John Brown pikes and memorabilia, and the wagon that took Brown to the gallows—the courthouse where Brown was tried, and the gallows site, plus a walking tour of the town. Our guide for Thursday will be Stevan Meserve, whose stellar research isn't limited to Loudoun County, the subject of a nice Civil War history he published last year.

For registration information and updates, click here.

Some years back, in 1066, William the Conqueror defeated the British at the Battle of Hastings.

Today, nine-hundred and forty-one years later, visitors can still see some of the actual battlefield, and visit the ruins of Battle Abbey. One English Heritage site invites you and me to "enjoy the new audio tour of the 100-acre battlefield, stand on the very spot where King Harold was slain and explore the ruins of the atmospheric abbey, built by William the Conquer to commemorate the thousands who died."

By contrast, probably the most dramatic surviving remnants of the nearly 144-year-old fighting around Atlanta in the American Civil War are a handful of partial "Shoupades," innovative earthworks designed by Francis Shoup as part of Joe Johnston's Chattahoochee River Line—now fenced-in mounds practically in the side yards of massive, cookie-cutter suburban homes.


The Battle of Peachtree Creek, the Battle of Atlanta, Utoy, Ezra Church, Jonesboro—all were critical battles in a critical campaign in the war that ultimately determined the future of the nation. But one gets the distinct feeling that there's more battlefield to see at Hastings than there is in Atlanta. And but for groups like the Georgia Battlefields Association, there would be even less.

Spending a day visiting Civil War sites in Atlanta is an exercise in imagination. One must imagine battlefields where townhouses, factories, golf courses, and shopping centers now stand. Of course that is true of many other areas in the country, but few cities have been more diligent and comprehensive in their destruction of all-things-Civil War than has the city of Atlanta. Here are a few photos of our visit. Charlie Crawford, President of the GBA, led the way, starting off with the visit to some surviving Shoupades [click on images to enlarge].




These remaining photos will give you a good feel for what I'm speaking of. The death sites of Generals Walker and McPherson in the Battle of Atlanta are in a busy intersection (Walker) and a residential area (McPherson). The headquarters marker where Johnston handed over command to John Bell Hood is in an industrial parking lot. The Andrews marker is on a downtown street corner. The last image is of the Texas, situated in the Atlanta Cyclorama, the locomotive that went in pursuit of Andrews Raiders.

For two hours, we had the Southern Museum to ourselves.

Upon entering, we hightailed it straight to the auditorium where the two most popular people of the weekend were holding court, the caterer Adriane Larson and her assistant Gail. In 12 years of putting these conferences together, it has become clear that the most indispensable components are good guides, a reliable bus, and good food. Some of those things can be overcome or mitigated if they fall short—I often have multiple guides and speakers, mostly known entities with veteran track records. Some bus problems are unavoidable, but a tour organizer can take steps to minimize the chances of that. The food is a little trickier. People will forget a poor speaker, or a malfunctioning bus, but if the food is subpar you may hear about it for years to come. At our Shiloh conference about six years ago, we were compelled to use the in-house kitchen at Pickwick Landing State Park and from time to time, someone makes an effort to remind me of those all-but-inedible meals.

By the same token, really good food is remembered with a fondness that grows in memory. It's no exaggeration to say that our evening meals and box lunches from Adriane's Delectables in Marietta were the best we've had on our annual outings, and now the bar is set high for subsequent conferences.

After dinner, we gathered next to the General herself for one of the highlights of the trip, a brief history of the Great Locomotive Chase and a fleshed-out timeline on the fascinating, all-the-way-to-the-Supreme Court battle between the states of Georgia and Tennessee over the rights to the famous steam engine. Author Russell Bonds and Southern Museum historian Harper Harris told some tales (photo at top shows Russell, left, and Harper), and Russell even rang the General's bell for the enthralled throng. All readers are encouraged to read Dimitri Rotov's 2-part interview with Russell Bonds here, and here.

Not yet satisfied with having run the conference attendees ragged on a non-stop, 13-hour day, we capped the night off with a presentation on the fighting at Kennesaw by Assistant Professor John Fowler, a young, energetic and well-spoken fellow who promises to be a presence in the world of Civil War historiography for a long time to come. His regimental history of the 19th Tennessee Infantry, CSA, Mountaineers in Gray, is a new model for unit studies. It's an exceptional work, and we'll all do well to keep an eye out for Fowler's future contributions.
(Gail, left, and Adriane: best food ever)

I've been to Kennesaw, Georgia twice now.

The first time was in the mid-90's when I was traveling around the Atlanta area trying to get bookstores to carry copies of a book on the Atlanta Campaign.

At the time, Kennesaw was most famous for a 1982 city ordinance making it mandatory for every head of a household to own a firearm with the right kind of ammo. I was there because I wanted to see the General, and because I'd heard of a store there that sold Civil War books, Wildman's Civil War Surplus and Herb Shop.

I knew nothing about Dent "Wildman" Myers before my visit, but this description on a flickr page captures the flavor of his establishment: "a fascinating and horrifying shop specializing in Confederate Civil War memorabilia and southern white supremacist paraphernalia." The wild man, wearing two revolvers in a Wild West holster, was in the shop when I stopped by (photo and profile here, write-up by the Southern Poverty Law Center here). It was pretty much as described in those articles. My main memory of the place was that it filled to the rafters with all manner of random stuff, like a surreal curio shop in some African-American nightmare. The store and its proprietor make for a deeply weird and unsettling anachronism—an unwitting museum with an out-of-time caretaker.

Across the street was the Big Shanty Museum, an old cotton gin housing the locomotive from the "Great Locomotive Chase." I spent the rest of my brief stay in Kennesaw admiring the great engine, and the quaint museum's assemblage of relics. I love railroad history, and Kennesaw is a railroad town. It's gratifying to see they have an active historical society—check out the Kennesaw Historical Society website here. Of special note are links to some pretty thorough driving tours, one on retracing the route of the General, and one on the route of Sherman's armies in the 1864 campaign (both written by Robert C. Jones).

Fourteen or so years later, I returned to Kennesaw in company with the good folks of the Civil War Forum. I'm here to report that Wildman's store is still standing, and apparently still in business (I assume under the same ownership). And happily, the old Big Shanty Museum is now the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History, with a large, modern addition built to look like part of the original gin. The change is fairly dramatic. What had been, essentially, a locomotive in a barn has been transformed into a signifiant museum with three permanent exhibits and space for rotating shows, a library and archives, and all still anchored by the General. In 2001, the museum became part of the Smithsonian Institution's Affiliations Program, making it a stop for traveling Smithsonian exhibits.

I wonder if Dent Meyers will cross the street this summer to take in the new Liberty on the Border: A Civil War Journey in Time exhibit (running through September 7th). According to the museum's web site, the exhibition "explores the differing attitudes of Americans on slavery leading up to the Civil War, the dilemmas faced by African Americans during the war, and the lasting impact slavery had on the struggle for human rights."

Tomorrow: a night at the museum, and a day in the city

Sometime right after breakfast, I will endeavor to dispense with the final recaps from my recent Atlanta adventure

—picking up after Kennesaw, and moving on to dinner at the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History, there to see a locomotive as famous as any I can think of, and finishing off with a short narrative of our final day in Atlanta, where apparently all pre-Coco Cola, non-locomotive history has been relegated to roadside markers.

Clearly I'm going to have to pick up the pace here. Kevin Levin over at Civil War Memory has posted twelve entries since my last one, and that was after he quit for the summer (Kevin, I don't think I'm the only one who thought your little sabbatical sounded a bit too ambitious, given the passion and energy with which you attack your blogging habit—though I figured you were good for at least a month).

Beyond the Atlanta travelogue, I also have a hopper full of announcements I'm anxious to post here, mainly about a series of unique battlefield tours I will be coordinating this summer and fall, beginning with Unseen Appomattox on August 2nd. Stay tuned.

Down the road at Kennesaw, things were really cooking.

One glance at the Visitor Center parking lot and you could see that here was a major battlefield that tourists and locals alike had discovered. It is a good place to hike, and a good place to walk the dog, but the Visitor Center itself was relatively empty. I had heard or read that, like Chickamauga and some other battlefield parks, Kennesaw is visited more by outdoor enthusiasts than by history buffs in solemn reflection of the heroic and tragic history of that ground. It's not surprising—the park offers nearly 3,000 acres of green space within an ever-tightening circle of development.

After leaving the hotel in Atlanta at an early hour, driving to Resaca, then down to Pickett's Mill and Pine Mountain, we were running pretty late by the time we reached Kennesaw. Still, we had time to fit in the highlights. First stop, the gift shop/bookstore, where a couple of things caught my attention. With respect to the gifts, souvenirs, and so on, I can't remember seeing such a product selection geared toward little kids. It may be that I've simply lost touch with what's being stocked in battlefield parks now, but clearly there are a lot of families passing through. It was the first time I'd seen a U.S. Grant doll, and no puny action figure either, but one easily knee-high to a five-year-old.

On the book side, I was impressed by the wide selection of titles on the Atlanta Campaign, including small press or effectively self-published works you would not easily find elsewhere, like the various William Scaife books with his beautifully drawn "architectural" overlays of troop movements on modern topo maps.

With the souvenirs bagged, Park historian Willie Johnson, our guide for the afternoon, herded our pack into the theater to view the park's video production—a 20-some minute film that would set the stage for and interpret the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain. We've all seen a bunch of these at various parks, and oftentimes the film itself is a historic artifact. The Kennesaw Visitor Center film is fairly new, but I thought one thing was odd.

It's possible that I'm wrong about this, but I don't think so, since I'm very tuned in to how the National Park Service treats the causes of the Civil War. It's always interesting to me to see how various films deftly craft a condensed summary of the lead-up to war, and the war to the point featured at their particular park. The Kennesaw film began as might be expected, outlining the sectional differences of the antebellum era. The Industrial Revolution was named as a driving force in the inescapable regional friction. I was curious to know when they were going to slip in talk of that other thing—the thing about an involuntary labor force.

On and on it went without mention of the "S" word. At one point, I actually leaned over to my sister and whispered, "do you think they'll say the word?" I'm fairly certain they didn't. I say "fairly certain," because even though I listened to it closely, I still can't believe the Park Service produced a film giving the background to the Civil War without mentioning the thing that literally divided the nation along slave and free soil lines.

Following the film, we went up to the top of Big Kennesaw for some spectacular views, and a talk by Willie. The next stop, at Cheatham Hill—the Dead Angle—was the highlight of our Kennesaw visit. There, Greg Biggs, standing before the Illiniois monument, read a powerful passage from Sam Watkins's account of that very struggle—the close-in lodgment of U.S. soldiers in front of the Confederate line, and the C.S. efforts to dislodge them.

[photo at top: Willie Johnson at Cheatham Hill; two middle photos of Sherman and Johnston are from the Visitor Center exhibits; photo at bottom: the Illinois monument, Cheatham Hill]

Next: the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History.

From Pine Mountain to Eternity. . .

Atlanta Campaign continued: after a vigorous hike at Pickett's Mill, we boarded the bus again and headed more or less due east on the Due West Road, a wartime route, making our way to the death site of Bishop Polk on Pine Mountain. There, Stealing the General author Russell Bonds, who wrote a nice piece on Leonidas Polk, posted here (originally published in the May 2006 issue of Civil War Times magazine), gave a concise summary of the fateful day, June 10, 1864, when generals Johnston, Hardee, and Polk made themselves conspicuous on Pine Mountain, in full view of Yankee artillerists. Bonds explains in his essay, "Pine Mountain is hardly a mountain at all. Rising no more than 300 feet above the surrounding countryside, the unimpressive little ridge—which is heavily wooded today but had been cleared of timber in the summer of 1864—is referred to in official reports and diaries as Pine Knob, Pine Hill, Pine Mount or Pine Top."

Call it what you will, it was the end of the trail for the fighting clergyman when a Hoosier battery lobbed some shells in his direction.

A Confederate veteran placed a monument to Polk in the near vicinity of the place where that Federal artillery round nearly split the Bishop's mortal coil in twain. Today this weathered yet substantial memorial sits on (or is surrounded by) private property, accessible from the road by a short path. I appreciate that the homeowners in this neighborhood are devoted to preserving the site. One neighbor from across the street, Melvin Dishong, came over to introduce himself, and to pass along his card offering "Pine Mountain Civil War History Tours" for no charge. Nice to see some property owners trying to promote the historical significance of their holdings, rather than bulldozing it to dissuade pesky tourists.

From Pine Mountain, it's only a handful of miles to the highest peaks in the area, Kennesaw and Little Kennesaw Mountains. According to the NPS, "Kennesaw is derived from the Cherokee Indian 'Gah-nee-sah' meaning cemetery or burial ground." Leave it to my Pale Face brethren to ram that meaning home with volume and efficiency.

Next blog entry: Kennesaw Mountain, and the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History.

Georgia Sojourn Continued

More than any other place on the CW Forum's Atlanta Campaign itinerary, I was looking forward to my first visit to Pickett's Mill. Driving from Resaca, we arrived around mid-day (last Friday). The caterer met us there with some delicious box lunches, and after a quick repast, we met up with State Historian James Wooten (pictured at right), portraying a Confederate soldier.

He guided us on one of the park's numerous trails—in this case a hike along the Confederate side of the fateful ravine, down to the Pickett's Mill Creek and mill site, and back up to view the impossible topography from one of the Federal jumping off points.

There are no monuments at Pickett's Mill, no distracting signage beyond color-coded trail markers. Just trails in the woods. To me personally, this kind of park facilitates the most transcendent experience for the visitor. There's nothing there but the landscape. That's not to say that the great memorial parks at Vicksburg, or Gettysburg are not deeply moving, but one gets the sense at Pickett's Mill that this is as close to what it looked like as we're ever going to be able to imagine. The same holds true for Port Hudson, another state park, and one of my favorites.

The Pickett's Mill visitor center is situated a short walk from the Cleburne side of the ravine, so within moments the visitor is standing more or less in the heart of the battlefield. I have read a great deal about this battle over the years, even worked on maps of how it all unfolded to accompany an essay by Jeffrey Dean, who plotted out the trails there, and whose research laid the groundwork for the state's interpretation of the site. So I had a pretty good picture in my mind of what to expect. Nevertheless, it was something of a shock to see the severity of the depression—the steep grade of the ravine—across which the Federals attacked Cleburne's men, the last troops in the Army of Tennessee one would wish to assault under even the best of circumstances. One reads of the inordinate number of head wounds among the Federal casualties in this battle, and standing where Cleburne's men stood that day, there's no mystery to that gruesome detail.


There's no substitute for walking the ground to spark a better understanding of what the soldiers recorded. But even beyond settling matters of historical accuracy, there's something to be gained by simply visiting the scenes of valor and sacrifice, which are also, necessarily, the scenes of fear and horror marking the experience of ordinary men in extraordinary circumstances.

[photo above: Pickett's Mill Creek; below: the ravine from the Federal side, looking up to where Cleburne's veterans were waiting—click on images for enlarged view]

Resaca

I had planned to knock out a quick travelogue of each day of my recent sojourn in Georgia, which would have required some fairly quick summaries at the end of some very long days. Instead, I've decided to take a little more time to recount the various events, and to give due coverage to the highlights.

When I left off, we had enjoyed a presentation by Gordon Jones at the Atlanta History Center on Thursday afternoon—one week ago—and a talk by Steven Woodworth Thursday night. Come 7:45 a.m. Friday our bus, with 40 hearty souls, departed the hotel for the 90-minute ride to Resaca. It killed me to trim Rocky Face Ridge and Dalton off the itinerary, but even as it was, I probably bit off more than we could chew in a day (indeed, I ran them ragged that day, not returning to the hotel until close to 10:00 p.m.).

On the drive up, one of our Dalton/Resaca locals regaled me with a spectacular tale of his classmate, Marla Maples, one-time Homecoming Queen (not to mention, former Miss Resaca Beach, 1983—you'll have to Google that one yourself) returning for her 10-year high school reunion by landing in a helicopter at the 50-yard-line. Probably the same way you returned for your 10-year reunion.

Once in Resaca, which has no beach, we hooked up with Ken Padgett, president of the Friends of Resaca, which group has begun to pull off an admirable feat, qualifying for green space funds to save some relatively pristine Confederate defensive works overlooking the crossings of the Oostanaula River. See some views of Fort Wayne here, and a master plan for what will be a county park here.

To grizzled veterans of Civil War Forum tours, the hospitality of the Friends of Resaca was unprecedented, even by southern standards. Out in the woods, in the middle of nowhere, they had set up some tables with coffee, bottled water, and an endless array of donuts to treat our group to mid-morning refreshments. That was a first.

The Friends are going to need a lot more cash than they were able to secure through green space monies. Readers of this blog are encouraged to lend a hand, or at the very least, purchase a modest membership (email civilwarforum@mac.com for details). They have also done up a nice driving tour of the Resaca Battlefield (all private sites at this time). You'll need their driving tour brochure, or local assistance, to find what you're looking for. While you're at it, look at this richly substantive site on the Resaca Battlefield.

After leaving Fort Wayne, we made a stop in the vicinity of a future state park devoted to Resaca (preservation is alive and well in this small town), and to the eastern end of Snake Creek Gap. My only regret is that we did not have time to drive up the gap a few miles to view the terrain. Instead, we hurried over to the north end of the battlefield, and later did a drive-by of what is reportedly the oldest Confederate cemetery, seen here.

When computer-literate Civil War Buffs come to town, you'd best alert the media. Check out this article in the Calhoun Times. Pictured in the article are Ken Padgett of the Friends of Resaca, Rudy Perini of New York, and Greg Biggs of the Clarksville, TN Civil War Round Table, who also served as one of our guides that day.

One experiences clarification, and often revelation, when finally visiting the topography previously imagined only in books and in two dimensional maps. Resaca was a deathtrap for Joe Johnston's army. Even putting aside the controversy over which army Sherman should have sent through Snake Creek Gap, and McPherson's seemingly over-cautious advance, one wonders how the entire Army of Tennessee got across the Oostanaula with Sherman's guns in range of the bridge.

After the cemetery drive-by, it was already after 10:00 a.m.—time to hurry south with Johnston's and Sherman's armies into the Hell Hole.

[photo at top: Oostanaula River at Resaca. Fort Wayne is in the trees in the center of the image]

Not much time for an entry tonight. We'll be on the road at the crack of nuts tomorrow, 6:45 a.m.

which of course, is 3:45 a.m. back home in the Trans-Sierra. What a day. We spent about four hours at the Atlanta History Center looking over their amazing artifacts. Gordon Jones pulled out some highlights from the Wray collection -- at least the more portable ones -- and told some fascinating tales about their background, and provenance. Unless they're being aimed in my direction, I am not a person who gets overly excited by firearms. But some of the pieces Wray collected are pretty spectacular. Besides having an example of virtually every rifle and revolver used during the war, there are the rare prototypes, and crowd-favorites like a Whitworth with a side scope. Looking back, I was most excited to see one of the logbooks of the C.S.S. Shenandoah. I have read about this item here and there, and was excited to see it on display. The place is a treasure-trove, and the exhibits, both in conception and presentation, are impressive. The AHC is fortunate to have Jones as curator. His passion for his work was infectious.

Fourteen years ago, when Ted Savas and I published The Campaign for Atlanta & Sherman's March to the Sea, vols. I & II, two of the historians who made that publication worthwhile were Steven Woodworth ("A Reassessment of Confederate Command Options During the Winter of 1863-1864") and Stephen Davis, "A Reappraisal of the Generalship of General John Bell Hood in the Battles for Atlanta"). Tonight, all these years later, I met both men for the first time. Dr. Davis gave a stirring and humorous introduction of Dr. Woodworth, after which Woodworth gave a great talk touching on many of the themes sounded out in the essay named above. Can't wait to hear Davis speak Saturday night on Johnston and Hood. I also met author Russell Bonds for the first time, and reconnected with Greg Biggs, reminiscing about memorable West Coast CWRT Conferences of days gone by, in particular an especially successful one themed "Hollywood in the Civil War," hosted by the Long Beach CWRT many years ago. Much spirited repartee followed Woodworth's talk, as he earnestly tried to make good on a promise to insult just about everyone's favorite general officer at one point or another before the evening was out.

Tomorrow: Resaca, Pickett's Mill, Kennesaw Mountain

"Well you can drop me off on Peachtree I got to feel that Georgia sun"

. . . .

Oh Atlanta, Oh Atlanta!

Flew into William B. Hartsfield on Wednesday afternoon, caught a ride with my sister and brother-in-law all the way across town to the hotel, had a steak for dinner, and am now settled in to a comfy room with a refrigerator and a high speed internet connection. The records indicate that Uncle Billy burned this city to the ground, but as my friend Steve says, apparently "it didn't take." The city goes on forever in every direction.

Thursday afternoon we kick off our annual meeting at the Atlanta History Center where Gordon Jones will pull out some select items from the George Wray Collection, which is not yet on exhibit. More on that in the next entry. Thursday night Steven Woodworth will give a talk. He is en route from TCU to Lynchburg, Virginia for a seminar there, but agreed to add a third leg to his air travel and stop over in Atlanta for one night.

BLOGGING LIVE FROM THE 12th CIVIL WAR

FORUM BATTLEFIELD CONFERENCE

I intend to post a blog entry each night for the rest of this week, recapping the day's events and some highlights as we work our way down from Resaca on Friday, and finish off with the Atlanta Cyclorama on Sunday morning. Unfortunately I forgot to pack the cable for downloading photos from my camera, so the slide show will have to wait until next week.

Beginning one week from tonight, the Civil War Forum will hold its annual conference/battlefield tour in Atlanta.

 A handful of seats remain. See the previous blog entry for the bird's eye low-down.

Atlanta, Ga., Soldiers on boxcars at railroad depot, 1864
George N. Barnard, photographer

Atlanta, Ga., Atlanta Intelligencer office by the railroad depot, 1864

Sherman’s 1864 Campaign for Atlanta

12th Civil War Forum Battlefield Conference
March 27-30, 2008

There’s still time to get one of the remaining seats on the bus for the Civil War Forum’s annual gathering (as of this post, two weeks to go, and ten seats open on a 55-passenger bus).


This year we have another stellar lineup of guides and speakers to cover one of the war’s critical campaigns. Civil War Forum conferences remain an unparalleled bargain—the most authoritative guides, two full and two half days of tours, three dinner presentations, and two lunches—for significantly less than for-profit tours (see registration info below).

Contact: David Woodbury: civilwarforum@mac.com http://community.netscape.com/civilwar

EVENING EVENTS: As repeat attendees know, and newcomers will discover, we begin gathering in the hotel conference room each evening (Thurs., Fri., Sat.) for an informal reception between 6:00-7:00 p.m. This is a great time to have a glass of wine or Rebel Yell, mingle with your fellow attendees, check out the donated raffle items, and study maps of the forthcoming tours. At 7:00 p.m. we’ll sit down to a catered buffet, before enjoying a talk by one of our featured speakers.

EVENING SPEAKERS:
-> Thursday: Dr. Steven Woodworth of Texas Christian University, author of Decision in the Heartland: The Civil War in the West, Jefferson Davis and his Generals: The Failure of Confederate Command in the West, and many other important Civil War studies.
-> Friday: Dr. John Fowler of Kennesaw State University, author of The Confederate Experience Reader, and Mountaineers in Gray: Nineteenth Tennessee Volunteer Infantry Regiment, C.S.A.

[Friday will also feature a special presentation by Russell Bonds, author of Stealing the General, during our visit to the Southern Museum to see the General —the locomotive stolen by Andrews’s Raiders in the “Great Locomotive Chase”]

-> Saturday: Dr. Steven Davis, noted Atlanta Campaign historian, author of Atlanta Will Fall: Sherman, Joe Johnston and the Yankee Heavy Battalions, and numerous articles and essays, and long-time book review editor of Blue & Gray Magazine.

TOURS:
Thursday afternoon, March 27: 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m: (via carpool) Atlanta History Center. For the first hour, Director Gordon Jones will give us a private presentation in the auditorium with a display of some of the treasures from the spectacular George Wray collection, then will turn us loose to view the Turning Point gallery—he'll remain on hand to answer questions. The Wray and Turning Point collections rank with the best collections of Civil War artifacts in the nation.

Friday, March 28: 7:00 a.m: —Reseca to Kennesaw—First of all, a word of warning: this will be the longest day of the weekend. I have tried to strike a balance between seeing the critical fields of this campaign, and not running everyone ragged. That morning we'll board the bus bright and early and head straight for the battlefield at Resaca, there to meet up with local volunteers for interpretation, including Ken Padgett, president of the Friends of Reseca. We'll see the earthworks at Fort Wayne where the first shots of the battle book place, get an overview of the proposed park, and visit Snake Creek Gap—the subject of innumerable, and interminable internet arguments between detractors and defenders of Sherman and Thomas. Most of the preserved 550-acre Resaca battlefield site is un-improved, without even roads, and to see the entrenchments requires a half mile walk followed by a vigorous climb through heavy woods. Next time we visit, hopefully the access will be improved. From there we'll work our way to Pickett's Mill to see one of the most pristine Civil War battlefields in the country, and the scenes of savage slaughter. State Park historian James Wooten will be our guide for the Pickett's Mill portion of the morning. We'll have lunch at the picnic area there.

After lunch, we'll follow one of the main historic routes, heading east on Due West Road toward Kennesaw Mountain, pass Gilgal Church, and make a stop at Pine Mountain for a few words at the site of the death of Lt. Gen. Leonidas Polk. Soon after we'll stop at the Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park Visitor Center, there to see a very good (20-min.) interpretive film, and spend about 45 minutes looking at what Ed Bearss says is the finest Civil War museum at any of the National Park sites. You'll be able to satisfy your bookstore fix here as well. National Park Service historian Willie Johnson will guide us for the rest of the afternoon. The museum exhibits contain a lot of text, and the majority of the artifacts on display are site related, many ID'd to participants in the battle, so we'll take our time with that. From there, we'll bus to the top of the mountain to get an understanding of the terrain, before heading over to Cheatham Hill and other points.

Saturday, March 29: —Chattahoochee River Line, Battle of Peachtree Creek, Battle of Atlanta—We are fortunate to have Charlie Crawford, highly regarded tour guide, and president of the Georgia Battlefields Association, as our guide for the full day on Saturday. Steve Davis and Gordon Jones will also be on the bus to add color commentary. Our rough itinerary for the day: we'll begin with the Fort Drive Shoupades or Vinings Hill, from which Sherman first saw the church spires of Atlanta, and visit at least one of the Chattahoochee crossing sites: Paces Ferry or Powers Ferry. We'll do a drive-by of some of the Confederate Outer Line (Loring Heights, which was part of the starting position for the Peachtree Creek assault), and also drive through Brookwood Hills to see the Confederate initial advance, then follow 28th Street to see the Stevens marker, and stop at Tanyard Creek Park for the bulk of the commentary about Peachtree Creek. Later, in the Battle of Atlanta area, we'll see the Walker monument, and stop at the McPherson monument to explain the struggle for Leggett's Hill. We'll also stop at the Carter Center and walk to the site of the Confederate breakthrough on the afternoon of 22 July 1864.

Sunday, March 30: (via carpool) Optional outing to 1) historic Oakland Cemetery to see the graves of several notable residents, including that of General John B. Gordon, and Margaret Mitchell. From there we'll head to 2) the Atlanta Cyclorama for a guided tour (including the Cyclorama painting, and the locomotive Texas – the locomotive that chased the General in the Great Locomotive Chase). At this last stop, I'll need people to pay their own entrance fee: for our group, it will be $6 per person [entry fees at Pickett's Mill, Kennesaw NBP, Southern Museum, and Atlanta History Center are including in your registration]. At approximately noon, we'll call it quits until next year.

HEADQUARTERS: Comfort Suites Hotel • Perimeter Center 6110 Peachtree Dunwoody Atlanta, GA 30328 Tel: 770-828-0330 http://www.atlantacomfortsuites.com/ Cost: $250: includes all tours, three evening dinner presentations, two box lunches, entrance to all parks and museums (except Cyclorama on Sunday morning). Does not cover your lodging.

Registration can be made by PayPal (request an invoice: civilwarforum@mac.com), or by check or money order to David Woodbury, P.O. Box 19130, Stanford, CA 94309.

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The following books by our featured speakers can be pre-ordered by email (civilwarforum@mac.com), and picked up and paid for at the conference. Authors will personally inscribe your copies. Save on shipping, get a signed copy, and enjoy the opportunity to engage the authors in discussion.

Atlanta Will Fall: Sherman, Joe Johnston, and the Yankee Heavy Battalions (American Crisis Series, No. 3), by Stephen Davis: $24.95 (pbk)

Mountaineers In Gray: The Nineteenth Tennessee Volunteer Infantry Regiment, C. S. A. by John D. Fowler: $34.00 (hardcover)

Decision in the Heartland: The Civil War in the West (Reflections on the Civil War Era) by Steven E. Woodworth (2008): $40.00 (hardcover)

Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the First Medal of Honor, by Russell Bonds: $30.00 (hardcover)
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Some interesting resources:
Pickett's Mill State Historic Park
Ambrose Bierce on The Crime at Pickett's Mill
Russell Bonds article on Bishop Polk
Georgia Battlefields Association
Mr. Shoup's Ingenious "Shoupades"
Atlanta History Center

Edwin C. "3 Rugs" Bearss, High Private 17th Virginia "Wildcat" Cavalry

To prevent the good folks at Civil War Interactive from reporting that I went a week without updating my blog, here are a few random photos from past Civil War Forum battlefield conferences. This first image, above, was from the 2007 gathering at Appomattox, and is an exclusive—I'm confident that I have scooped all other Civil War blogs with this unpublished image of one of Ed Bearss's lesser-known Civil War ancestors. Ed was one of our three guides that day, and at the close of the tour, Appomattox NHP historian Patrick Schroeder surprised us by arranging for this rare photo (and one of historian Ron Wilson's ancestor as well) to be mounted in the exhibit area. It probably was not intended to be committed to the internet—effectively until the end of time—but maybe this exceptional image will lead to the discovery of other fighting rug portraits.


Below, the aforementioned Appomattox historians Ron Wilson, left, and Patrick Schroeder.















Here was fought the Battle of Sutherland's Station, April 2, 1865.
In the photo, Ed Bearss and his backup singers.















Jumping now from Virginia to Tennessee, the grave of Sam Watkins, Company Aytch, Zion Presbyterian Church Cemetery.















The one and only Jim Ogden, historian at Chickamauga & Chattanooga National Military Park, in this instance photographed at Stones River. Non-regulation tie.















My kitchen counter. Did someone say pitchers and catchers will be reporting soon?

Odds and Sods

A number of the Civil War blogs listed in the lower right column covered the interesting discovery of what appear to be glimpses of Abraham Lincoln amidst the crowd in some 1863 Gettysburg photos. Here's one newspaper report of the story (USA Today) with close-ups of the new views, along with the more familiar head shot sifted out of the crowd in 1952.

WHAT THE ?!


















Another Lincoln photo caught my eye around the same time while browsing the blogosphere (it wasn't a current news item, and is nothing new to people who study such things). Doctored photos have been around as long as photography has been around, and certainly the Civil War era was fair game for pre-Photoshop photographers looking to spice up or repair a shot.

Apart from staged photos (see William Frassanito's expositions on the movement of corpses at Devil's Den, for example), there is the case of Lincoln's head on Calhoun's body (see here), and some housekeeping with group photos (see here for the complete before and after shots of Sherman's generals, with and without Francis Blair). To see a parade of digital manipulations from the Civil War era to more modern shenanigans, have a look at this photo essay, "Digital Tampering in the Media, Politics and Law," which includes brief explanations of the two snippets above (click on the images there to see side-by-side comparisons).

All of those pages are from the website of Hany Farid, Professor of Computer Science at Dartmouth, who has an big time interest in digital forensics.

WALKING TOURS

Another neat idea, this one made available free from the folks at Civil War Traveler magazine: podcasts of walking tours, recorded on the battlefield, narrated by National Park Service historians—with accompanying pdf maps you can print out. Ahhh, sweet, sweet technology.

ATLANTA, THE MUSICAL

First, there was the world premiere of the opera Appomattox in San Francisco (see my review here). Now, as if to poke a finger in the other eye of conservative, California-phobic Civil War buffs, the musical "Atlanta" is opening in Los Angeles.

Playbill offers these particulars: "Grammy Award-winning Nashville songwriter Hummon—who has penned hits for Dixie Chicks, Rascal Flatts, Wynonna, Tim McGraw and more—teams with actor, writer and director Pasdar ('Heroes,' 'Desperate Housewives') on the musical, which mixes select prose by William Shakespeare with original bluegrass music and country tunes. Hummon provides the music and co-wrote the book with Pasdar. Set 'toward the end of the Civil War, in the waning days of the Confederacy,' reads a show description, 'a young Yankee, Paul, assumes the persona of a Confederate soldier in order to keep alive behind enemy lines.'"

Shakespeare. Desperate Housewives. Bluegrass. Sounds pretty damn good to me. In all seriousness, the centrality of American roots music to this production, and the subject matter, cause me to reconsider my (opera review) vow that the only current musical I would consider attending is Spamalot. I'm not expecting something so transcendent as Jack White singing "Wayfaring Stranger" on the Cold Mountain soundtrack, or the haunting renditions of "Man of Constant Sorrow" from Oh Brother Where Art Thou, but maybe something along those lines.

Go to the Geffen Playhouse site, and click on the "Preview Atlanta Here" box for sense of what they're trying to deliver.

EASTERN KENTUCKY GRAVEHOUSES

Somehow, even with a life-long near-obsession with cemeteries, and as an earlier subscriber to the on-again off-again Grave Matters newsletter, I came to be in my late 40s without ever hearing anything about "gravehouses"in the style of these structures in Eastern Kentucky. Check out the photos at this site. I am utterly fascinated by this. Out of curiosity, I have queried the photographer about the Union soldier he references in the text. Click on the "Project Home Page" link, and have a look at the whole site, entitled, "Sickness and Death in the Old South."