Dead Confederates, A Civil War Era Blog

The new issue of the Civil War Monitor is now online, and should be appearing on newsstands and in mailboxes in short order. It’s a great issue this time (again — they keep doing that), with a focus on events in the sesquicentennial year of 1862. Feature articles in this issue include:

Lee: Initial Stride to Greatness
In his first campaign as Confederate army commander, Robert E. Lee established his reputation as a bold leader—and changed the course of the war in the East. By Jeffry D. Wert

 

A Capital in Crisis
Twelve summer days in 1862 marked the darkest time of the Civil War for Washington, D.C. By Stephen W. Sears

 

Faces of 1862
The war’s second year forever changed the lives of countless Americans—soldiers and civilians—on both sides of the conflict. By Ronald S. Coddington

 

Fighting for South Mountain
On the eve of Antietam, Union soldiers won a decisive victory—then fought again to have it remembered. By Brian Matthew Jordan

 

Northern Divide
The elections of 1862 seemed to offer a severe rebuke to Abraham Lincoln and his preliminary Emancipation Proclamation. The president and his allies, however, read the results much differently. By Louis P. Masur

 

I particularly like the article by author (and blogger) Ron Coddington, who’s made a sort of scholarship all his own by starting with period CDVs of Civil War soldiers and using those as a jumping-off place for biographical essays that explore the Civil War experience at the micro level. It’s what Barbara Tuchman once described as “history by the ounce,” and it makes for great reading. Toss in some quick book reviews by Brooks Simpson and a fun article on counterfeiting Confederate currency by Ben Tarnoff, and there’s a lot of good stuff in there.

I think I’ve said before that the CWM is not your father’s Civil War magazine. But a subscription would make a nice Father’s Day gift, ya know?

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