Over the years, we have built up an array of special online resources designed to assist with teaching the story of Gettysburg, but this summer, we’ve done some of our best work yet on this front.  Our 2018 interns –Frank Kline, Becca Stout, and Cooper Wingert– have organized a series of fascinating posts that tackle less-familiar topics related to the 1863 battle, and the famous cemetery dedication which followed.  

Teachers and students can now learn first-hand many of the tragic details about the so-called “slave hunt” that occurred during the Confederate invasion of Pennsylvania in June 1863.  Wingert provides links to diaries and other records that detail how the Army of Northern Virginia captured black residents in south-central Pennsylvania, treating them like fugitive slaves.  One of the cases involved a free black man named Amos Barnes, who was actually later released from a Confederate prison in Richmond because of the intervention of two Dickinsonians.  This summer, Wingert also wrote about the Confederate occupation and shelling of Carlisle in late June and early July, which was part of the famous 1863 campaign, but has mostly been forgotten because of the immense scale of the battle which followed at Gettysburg.  Wingert actually wrote a book about the Confederate approach to Harrisburg a few years ago, but now he has curated several primary sources related to the campaign, included several that have never before been available online.  

Our other interns focused on the story of the cemetery dedication in November 1863 and Lincoln’s famous Gettysburg Address.  Kline organized an incredibly useful post detailing contemporary newspaper reaction to Lincoln’s remarks and subsequent recollected accounts about how the short speech was written and received.  Kline’s work was inspired by Gabor Boritt’s thought-provoking study, The Gettysburg Gospel (2005).  Many teachers too easily embrace myths about the Gettysburg Address –that it was written on the back of envelope, for example, or that it was poorly received at first– and this post offers a helpful corrective.  Stout’s post also provides an important supplement, especially for classes or families that might be visiting the Soldiers’ National Cemetery themselves.  Stout describes how a half a dozen black army veterans came to be buried in the Civil War section of the national cemetery at Gettysburg.  The story is far more complicated than you might imagine, beginning with the sad revelation that even though the Battle of Gettysburg occurred seven months after the Emancipation Proclamation and Lincoln’s endorsement of black soldiers, Union commanders still excluded black men from combat roles in the 1863 fighting in Pennsylvania.  That meant, at first, that the soldiers’ cemetery at Gettysburg was segregated, despite all of the hope of “a new birth of freedom.”

Other House Divided Project resources on Gettysburg

• Lincoln’s Gettysburg Addresses (2013) exhibit for Google Arts & Culture which tells the story of the five known copies of the speech in Lincoln’s own handwriting
• Gettysburg Virtual Tour (2013) video tour of the battlefield co-produced by the Gilder Lehrman Institute that includes 13 stops and one-hour total of material hosted by Mathew Pinsker
• Blog Divided posts (2007-2018) make sure to check out over two dozen posts on the battle, campaign and its aftermath at our main project blog site
• Research engine records (2007-2018), our main research engine database contains over a thousand records related to Gettysburg, including some amazing zoomable maps
• Lincoln’s Writings (2015), our multi-media edition of Lincoln’s writings ranks the Gettysburg Address as the #1 most teachable Lincoln document –check out the array of resources on this page
• Confederate monument (2015) –Did you know there is a Confederate monument in Mechanicsburg, PA marking an element of the 1863 Confederate invasion?  Check out this classroom-friendly discussion post to find out more.

 

 

“He said, in substance, Ninety years ago our fathers formed a Government consecrated to freedom and dedicated to the principle that all men are created equal.” Centralia (IL) Sentinel  November 26, 1863, from coverage of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address

Ninety years ago? Imagine being the Civil War-era reporter who did not believe that the phrase “Four score and seven years ago” was memorable enough to record in its exact language. Yet historian Gabor Boritt includes this passage from the Sentinel’s slightly botched coverage of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address in his book, The Gettysburg Gospel (2006).  Boritt uses the example as a way to highlight the surprisingly complicated story about how Lincoln’s brief speech at the Soldiers’ National Cemetery dedication was received in late 1863 and then how the memory of it changed 0ver the years that followed.  Boritt’s book introduces readers to a host of primary sources, including numerous historical newspaper accounts, that show a wide range of reactions to Lincoln’s now-famous and universally-celebrated words.  This post attempts to organize some of these sources for teachers and students to view themselves.  In addition, I have started to collect various post-war recollected accounts of the dedication ceremony, including some that Boritt does not feature, as a way to provide first-hand accounts of that memorable day on November 19, 1863.

Local Reactions

“How the president’s words were reported would impact how they were received. People often read papers out loud, and what they heard, if they read his remarks, varied widely.” (Boritt, 142)

• (Gettysburg, PA) The Adams Sentinel, “Speech of the President,” November 24, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com) 
• (Lancaster, PA) Daily Inquirer, “The Gettysburg Celebration,” November 20, 1863 [IMAGE][FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Genealogy Bank)
• (Harrisburg, PA) The Patriot News, “President Lincoln’s Last Speech,” December 3, 1863 [IMAGE] (Courtesy of Genealogy Bank)
  • This one is especially teachable because the paper retracted their criticism many years later.
• Union County (PA) Star and Lewisburg Chronicle, “Dedication at Gettysburg,” November 27, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Chronicling America)

Republican Reactions

“The Republican papers printed overwhelmingly favorable editorial comments.” (Boritt, 131)

• Chicago Tribune, “The Consecration of the Battle Cemetery,” November 21, 1863  [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com) 
• (Montpellier, VT) The Daily Green Mountain Freeman, “Consecration of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg,” November 21, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
• New York Times, “The Heroes of July,” November 20, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL ARTICLE] (Courtesy of New York Times Online Archives)
  • The editor of the Times, Henry Raymond, served as chairman of Lincoln’s reelection campaign in 1864.
• (Springfield) Illinois State Journal, “Inauguration of the Gettysburg Cemetery,” November 23, 1863 [IMAGE][FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Genealogy Bank)
  • This article by Lincoln’s hometown newspaper ends with noting the tremendous applause he received following his remarks at the cemetery.
• (Washington, DC) Weekly National Intelligencer, “The Ceremonies at Gettysburg,” November 26, 1863 [IMAGE][FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)

Democratic Reactions

“Most of the Democratic papers tried to hide, or entirely ignore, the president’s speech, which they regarded as the start of his presidential campaign.” (Boritt, 140-141)

• Baltimore Sun, “The National Cemetery,” November 20, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • The Sun mostly avoided criticism of the president’s remarks.
• Clearfield (PA) Republican, “A Voice From the Dead,” December 2, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • The column attacked both Edward Everett and Lincoln for allegedly making the dedication about themselves.
• (Ebensburg, PA) Democrat and Sentinel, “The Gettysburg Cemetery,” December 2, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • This account aggressively misquoted the president to make it appear as if he was not appreciating the fallen.
• (Indianapolis) The Indiana State Sentinel, “The President at Gettysburg,” November 30, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • Lincoln is yet again attacked for trying to be political at the dedication.
• New York Herald, “Consecration of the National Sepulcher at Gettysburg,” November 20, 1863 [IMAGE][FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • The Herald focuses on the soldiers who fought rather than any of the speeches at the dedication.
• Philadelphia Inquirer, “Gettysburg Celebration,” November 20, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL ARTICLE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com) 

British Coverage

• (Colchester, UK) The Essex County Standard,  “Later Intelligence,” December 4, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
• (London, UK) The Morning Post, “The Civil War in America,” December 12, 1863 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)

Recollections

• Noah Brooks,  “Personal Reminisces of Lincoln,” Scribner’s Monthly, Vol. 15 (Feb. 1878), p. 565 [IMAGE] (Courtesy of HathiTrust, digitized by Cornell University)
  • Brooks was a leading journalist who described his interactions with Lincoln leading up to the speech, and how he remembered the president writing the speech.
• [John Hay], The Holton Recorder (KS), “Lincoln the Author of His Gettysburg Address,” January 3, 1884 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • Hay, who was Lincoln’s personal aid, admitted to signing the President’s name often but assured he had nothing to do with the Gettysburg Address.
• [Samuel Schmucker], Adams County News (PA), “Death of Judge S. D. Schmucker,” March 11, 1911 [IMAGE]  [FULL PAGE] (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • Schmucker was a local jurist who viewed the speech as a young man.
• [James Speed], The Chicago Tribune, “A Pretty Little Fiction,” April 20, 1887 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE]  (Courtesy of Newspapers.com)
  • Speed, who served as Lincoln’s second attorney general, disputed the impression that Lincoln wrote the speech on the train to Gettysburg.
• [David Wills], The Carlisle Sentinel (PA), October 7, 1885 [IMAGE] [FULL PAGE]
  • Wills was the local attorney who hosted the president at Gettysburg and recalled that Lincoln wrote at least the final version the speech in his house.

Further Reading

Boritt, Gabor. The Gettysburg Gospel: The Lincoln Speech that Nobody Knows. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006.

Pinsker, Matthew.  Lincoln’s Gettysburg Addresses.  House Divided Project exhibit at Google Arts & Culture, 2013.

 

For the first twenty years of its existence, there were no black veterans buried in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery at Gettysburg.  That famous military cemetery, where President Lincoln had spoken so eloquently about a “new birth of freedom,” was not integrated until 1884, with the burial of Henry Gooden, an African American Civil War soldier from York, PA who had originally enlisted in Carlisle.  Over the next few decades, the U.S. army interred at least five other black veterans  in the cemetery’s Civil War section.  The question is why?  Were they buried there intentionally, to help integrate the “hallowed ground”?

 

Congress authorized the enlistment of black men in the Union army with the Militia Act of July 17, 1862, though President Lincoln did not lend his public support to this policy until the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863.  Yet by the time of the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, only some black regiments had been mobilized (as United States Colored Troops), and none of them were yet incorporated into the Army of the Potomac.[1] In addition, during the Confederate invasion of Pennsylvania in June 1863, Union general Darius Couch, the departmental commander in charge of the state’s defense, actually turned away a group of black volunteers from Philadelphia.[2] For these reasons, no African Americans fought officially at Gettysburg for either the Union field army or the local militias and thus there were no black soldiers to bury afterwards at the national cemetery when President Lincoln was present to help dedicate it on November 19, 1863

In 1884, however, Henry Gooden, a black veteran who had died in 1876, was reinterred at the Soldiers National Cemetery in Gettysburg. Private Henry Gooden does not seem to appear in census records, but his enlistment papers indicate that he was born in York, Pennsylvania in 1821, worked as a laborer, and stood 5’3″.  Gooden enlisted in Carlisle in August 1864 for one year, where he was signed into the Union army by Provost Marshal Robert M. Henderson, a graduate of Dickinson College.  Gooden, who was literate,  served in Company C of the 127th United States Colored Troops. [3] The 127th USCT saw combat briefly near the end of the war and was present for General Lee’s surrender at Appomattox. [4] Gooden survived the war, and actually mustered out of service from Texas in late 1865.  He seems to have returned to Carlisle, however, where he died in August 1876. [5] However, on November 8, 1884, Gooden was reburied in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery in Gettysburg in the U.S. Regulars Plot, section D, site 30. [6]  Local historian Deb McCauslin claims that the family of the white soldier buried next to Gooden then had his body removed in protest, though park historians have remained somewhat skeptical of that connection, arguing there is no documentary evidence detailing the motivation for the re-interment. [7] 

In 2012, Gettysburg military park historian D. Scott Hartwig wrote a fascinating blog post about the discovery of a photographic image in the NPS archives depicting black army regulars burying one of their own at Gettysburg in 1898. Hartwig identifies a total of four black soldiers who died from disease during the Spanish American War and were buried at Gettysburg in  late 1898. These men were Clifford Henderson, Emmert Martin, and Nicholas Farrell, all of whom served as privates in the 9th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Battalion, and Corporal Harry Prager, who served in Company H, 2nd Tennessee Infantry.[8] 

Hartwig identifies the picture (featured right) as the burial of Clifford Henderson.[9] I found additional information about this story in various newspapers from the period. According to a September 7, 1898 report in Cleveland, “Private Clifford Henderson, Company A. Ninth Ohio (colored) battalion, died of typhoid fever this morning in the Red Cross hospital. His body was sent home to Cleveland for burial.”[10] However, by September 9, the Philadelphia Inquirer was reporting that “this morning the body of Private Clifford Henderson, Company A, Ninth Ohio Battalion, whose home was at Springfield, [OH], was taken to the Gettysburg National Cemetery for burial.”[11]

While there is little other information regarding these soldiers or the particular motivations for burying them in the Civil War section of the national cemetery, Find a Grave has solid entries on Gooden, Prager, Henderson, Martin, and Farrell that show pictures of their grave markers and explain the exact placement of their burial locations. [12] Prager was from Tennessee and served with a unit from his home state, but for some reason, he was buried in the Illinois section.[13] I was also able to find

some interesting information on the 9^th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Battalion, in which three of the soldiers served. This was the unit headed by Col. Charles Young, a famous nineteenth century African American leader. He attended West Point, becoming only the third black graduate of the military academy and later served as the first black U.S. National Park Superintendent. [14] According to a book by Brian G. Shellum, the 9^th Ohio battalion was in the nation’s press quite a bit during the Spanish-American conflict for “its superior discipline and training.” However, the battalion also experienced low morale, especially after their time at Camp Meade, the place where all three soldiers died before being buried at Gettysburg.[15]

The story of the final black veteran buried at Gettysburg is even stranger in some ways than the ones that brought Gooden or Prager and his 1898 peers to the cemetery. Steve Light’s 2012 blog post “Forgotten Valor – The Lincoln Cemetery”   and  James M. Paradis’s  African Americans and the Gettysburg Campaign (2013) help explain how Civil War veteran Charles H. Parker arrived at the cemetery in 1936.[16] Charles H. Parker served in Company F of the 3rd United States Colored Troops. [17]  Upon his death on July 2, 1876, he was buried in the Yellow Hill Cemetery, which became essentially abandoned. [18] Parker’s grave was rediscovered as a part of a restoration project and then reinterred at Gettysburg.[19]

Why these decisions to integrate the Soldiers’ National Cemetery?  The newspaper record is almost completely silent.  Hartwig argues that the four Spanish American War soldiers were buried there because it was the closest National Cemetery.[20] The men had been stationed at Camp Meade in Middletown, Pennsylvania, so the Gettysburg National Cemetery was just under 50 miles away. Margaret S. Creighton’s The Colors of Courage: Gettysburg’s Forgotten History (2005) argues that segregation within national cemeteries was a major issue for African Americans. She claims that local veteran Lloyd Watts, an African American sergeant during the Civil War, and the “Sons of Good Will,” a black fraternal society he co-created, fought for integration at the various local cemeteries. While

African Americans were permitted to partake in the burials of white soldiers, white soldiers often refused to assist in and attend black soldiers’ burials. Creighton suggests that there was local segregation between the black and white communities in Adams County throughout the 1880s and 1890s. [21] However, the timing of Gooden’s burial in 1884 points to the beginning of the end of this segregation regime at least in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery . As historian John R. Neff argues in  Honoring the Civil War Dead: Commemoration and the Problem of Reconciliation (2005), the burial of black soldiers in national cemeteries established them as “the first publicly funded integrated cemeteries in American history.”[22]

Neff assumes that Gooden’s burial was intentional, designed to insure that the  “the color line of segregation…was between blue and gray, not black and white.”[23] Yet the odd stories of the scattered six black burials at Gettysburg and the near total lack of commentary on these developments in the national press, raise questions about this assumption.  Does anyone have more detail, or new theories about how to interpret the halting story of integration at the Soldiers’ National Cemetery?  Feel free to comment below and we will update this post as more information becomes available.

 

Endnotes

[1] James Oakes, “The Emancipation Proclamation,” Freedom National: The Destruction of Slavery in the United States, 1861-1865 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2013), 378, 387.

[2] Daniel R. Biddle and Murray Dubin, Tasting Freedom: Octavius Catto and the Battle for Equality in Civil War America (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2013), 291-293. [Google Books]

[3] D. Scott Hartwig, “A Burial in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery,” The Blog of Gettysburg National Military Park, April 2012. [WEB]

[4] Brenna McKelvey, “Henry Gooden,” House Divided Research Engine. [WEB]

[5] D. Scott Hartwig, “A Burial in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery,”

[6] Gettys Bern, “PVT. Henry Gooden,” Find a Grave, August 8, 2006. [WEB]

[7] Brandie Kessler, “Did Union soldier’s family move body away from black soldier’s grave?” Evening Sun, November 19, 2013. [WEB]

[8] D. Scott Hartwig, “A Burial in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery,”

[9] D. Scott Hartwig, “A Burial in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery,”

[10] Brian G. Shellum, “Volunteer Officer in the Spanish-American War,” Black Officer in a Buffalo Soldier Regiment: The Military Career of Charles Young (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2010). [Google Books]

[11] “Governor’s Day at Camp Meade,” The Philadelphia Inquirer, (September 9, 1898), 5. [Newspapers.com Proquest]

[12] Karl Stelly, “CPL Harry S. Prager (1860-1898),” Find A Grave Memorial, August 23, 2009. [WEB]

[13] Karl Stelly,  “PVT Emmert Martin (Unknown-1898),”  Find A Grave Memorial, November 3, 2010. [WEB]; Karl Stelly, “PVT Clifford Henderson (Unknown-1898),” Find A Grave Memorial November 3, 2010. [WEB]; Karl Stelly, “PVT Nicholas Farrell (Unknown-1898),” Find A Grave Memorial, November 3, 2010. [WEB]

[14] “Colonel Charles Young,” National Park Service, May 21, 2018.

[15] Brian G. Shellum, “Volunteer Officer in the Spanish-American War,”

[16] Steve Light, “Forgotten Valor – The Lincoln Cemetery,” Battlefield Back Stories, September 29, 2012. [WEB]; James M Paradis, African Americans and the Gettysburg Campaign (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2013), 107-109. [Google Books]

[17] Don Sailer, “Charles H. Parker,” House Divided Research Engine. [WEB]

[18] Steve Light, “Forgotten Valor – The Lincoln Cemetery,” Battlefield Back Stories, September 29, 2012. [WEB]

[19] Savannah Labbe, “Separate but Equal? Gettysburg’s Lincoln Cemetery,” The Gettysburg Compiler: On the Front Lines of History, March 12, 2018. [WEB]

[20] D. Scott Hartwig, “A Burial in the Soldiers’ National Cemetery,”

[21] Margaret S. Creighton, The Colors of Courage: Gettysburg’s Forgotten History (New York: Basic Books, 2005), 217-218.

[22] John R. Neff, Honoring the Civil War Dead: Commemoration and the Problem of Reconciliation (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2005), 133.

[23] John R. Neff, Honoring the Civil War Dead: Commemoration and the Problem of Reconciliation, 134.

 

Additional Readings

Primary Source Documents

The Emancipation Proclamation

The Militia Act of July 1862

Secondary Source Documents

Gettysburg General Reading

• Tasting Freedom: Octavius Catto and the Battle for Equality in Civil War America. 291-293.
• Map of Cemetery
• African Americans in the Cemetery – The Blog of Gettysburg National Military Park.
• Burials and Lincoln Cemetery

United States Colored Troops

• Henry Gooden – Find A Grave
• Henry Gooden – House Divided Research Engine.
• Henry Gooden – African Americans and the Gettysburg Campaign.
• Henry Gooden Controversy – Evening Sun
• Charles H. Parker – Find A Grave
• Charles H. Parker – House Divided Research Engine.
• Charles H. Parker and Henry Gooden – Battlefield Back Stories

Ninth Ohio Battalion

• Clifford Henderson – Find A Grave
• Emmert Martin – Find A Grave
• Nicholas Farrell – Find A Grave
• Life in the Ninth Ohio Battalion, Clifford Henderson’s Death, and Charles Young – Black Officer in a Buffalo Soldier Regiment: The Military Career of Charles Young.
• Charles Young – National Park Service

Second Tennessee Infantry

• Harry S. Prager – Find A Grave

One hundred fifty years ago today James Buchanan was at his home in Lancaster, Pennsylvania and wrote a letter to New York Herald editor James Gordon Bennett in which he reflected on his administration. The Herald, as Buchanan explained, had provided “able & powerful support…almost universally throughout my stormy and turbulent administration.” Yet overall Buchanan saw his administration as  a success. “Under Heaven’s blessing the administration has been eminently successful in its foreign & domestic policy,” Buchanan noted. As for “the sad events which have recently occurred” during the secession crisis, Buchanan argued that “no human wisdom could have prevented” them. While “I feel conscious that I have done my duty,” Buchanan acknowledged that it “will be for the public & posterity to judge” if he had provided “wise & peaceful direction towards the preservation or reconstruction of the union.” After the Civil War, Buchanan continued to defend his administration’s policies in Mr. Buchanan’s Administration on the Eve of the Rebellion (1866).

On Thanksgiving day in November 1863 two children whose fathers were killed during the Civil War went to the executive mansion in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and asked for food. Apparently this experience inspired Governor Andrew Curtin to ask the Pennsylvania legislature to establish an organization to care for orphans of Union soldiers. While legislators did not appropriate the necessary funds, they accepted a private donation to set up an institution whose mission was “the education and maintenance of destitute orphan children of deceased soldiers and sailors.” Children remained in the system until age sixteen – for example, see this list of “Sixteeners” who left in 1877. Schools were set up in communities across the state, including the White Hall School in Camp Hill. Professor David Denlinger opened the school in May 1866, but he quickly ran into trouble. As “the building was…unsuitable for a school of this kind,” James Laughery Paul explains that that “typhoid fever prevailed to an alarming extent in the fall of 1867 and quite a number of deaths occurred.” While the school closed in 1890, alumni returned to Camp Hill in 1926 and dedicated a monument in Willow Park (located at intersection of 24th & Walnut Streets). You can learn more about the organization in James Laughery Paul’s Pennsylvania’s Soldiers’ Orphan Schools (1876), the 1877 and 1909 Annual Report of the Superintendent of Soldiers’ Orphans, and William Henry Egle’s Andrew Gregg Curtin: His Life And Services (1895).

The skirmish at Oyster Point was a small engagement that took place in late June 1863 in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania between Confederate forces under General Albert G. Jenkins’ command and Union militia from New York under General William F. Smith’s command. After Confederates entered Mechanicsburg, General Jenkins set up artillery and sent Virginia cavalry in pursuit of Union militia who had been in the town. At Oyster Point the Confederates encountered two militia regiments from New York and Landis’ Philadelphia Battery of Light Artillery. Later that day General Jenkins ordered his force to withdraw to the Rupp House in Mechanicsburg. Confederates returned on June 29, but they were unable to dislodge the Union militia. The Battle of Sporting Hill took place on the following day as Confederates left Mechanicsburg and marched towards Gettysburg. As a veteran who served with the 22nd New York Regiment recalled:

While this skirmish was of no particular account in itself, it is really historic. It was at the furthest northern point which was reached by the invaders, and marks the crest of the wave of the invasion of Pennsylvania. The retreat of the Confederate force there commenced did not end until the Potomac was crossed. The success obtained must be largely ascribed to the gallant conduct of Landis’ Battery,….”

A historical marker is located at the intersection of 31st Street and Market Streets in Camp Hill. You can read more about this battle in an essay on ExplorePAhistory.com, Robert Grant Crist’s article “Highwater 1863: The Confederate Approach to Harrisburg” (Pennsylvania History 1963), and in Wilbur Sturtevant Nye’s Here Come The Rebels! (1965).

The Rupp House in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania served as the headquarters for Confederate General Albert G. Jenkins’ brigade during the Gettysburg campaign in late June 1863. On June 28 Jenkins’ troops captured Mechanicsburg without encountering any resistance. Two days later, however, Jenkins received General Robert E. Lee’s order to regroup at Gettysburg. As Jenkins’ brigade left on June 30, his rearguard became involved in the Battle of Sporting Hill. The Rupp House was built in 1787 by Jonas Rupp. His grandson’s family owned the house in 1863 and they remained in Lancaster, Pennsylvania while the Confederates were in Mechanicsburg. The Rupp House is at 5115 East Trindle Road, but it is currently not open to the public.

You can learn more in an essay on ExplorePAhistory.com, Robert Grant Crist’s article “Highwater 1863: The Confederate Approach to Harrisburg” (Pennsylvania History 1963), and in Wilbur Sturtevant Nye’s Here Come The Rebels! (1965).

Image courtesy of Flickr user cthoyes.

The Battle of Nashville took place on December 15-16, 1864 in Davidson County, Tennessee as a part of the Franklin-Nashville Campaign.  Beginning in November 1864, Confederate General John Bell Hood led the Army of Tennessee towards Nashville in a last attempt to move Union Major General William T. Sherman out of Georgia.  By December 1, 1864 Union Major General George H. Thomas and his forces reached Nashville and spent the next two weeks preparing for battle.  The fighting began in the morning on December 15 with most of the Union assaults on the Confederates ending successfully.  The following day, the Union troops charged the Confederate forces and made them abandon Nashville and retreat across the Tennessee River.  The Civil War Preservation Trust’s website offers an article: “The Decisive Battle of Nashville” that provides an overview of the fighting.  The website also includes a map that depicts troop movements on both sides as well as brief biographies of General Hood and General Thomas.  Also, the Battle of Nashville Preservation Society website offers historic sites and photographs related to the battle. Some other resources that may be useful are the Memoir of Major General George H. Thomas and John Bell Hood’s Advance and Retreat: Personal Experiences in the United States and Confederate Armies which could provide contrasting views from commanding officers in both the Union and Confederate Armies to give different perspectives of the battle.  Richard M. McMurry commented on the Battle of Nashville in his book:   

“Late that rainy day, as Hood was conferring with Stewart, the Yankee’s swarmed over Shy’s Hill, annihilating the defenders and sending the remnants of Cheatham’s corps flying off in mad panic.  The rout spread to Stewart’s corps.  Only Lee’s men preserved a semblance of order, as most of the army dissolved and fled southward in darkness and rain.  Hood and other officers tried desperately to rally the fleeing soldiers, but, save for a brave, defiant few who turned to fire at the Federals, their efforts were in vain.  Over the fast thawing ground and through sticky mud, the Confederates made their way southward, while Lee strung his corps across the rear of the army to slow the Yankee pursuit.  All that night Hood’s men jammed the roads southward from Nashville, abandoning wagons and cannons, throwing away muskets, swords, knapsacks, and camp equipment.”

The Battle of Mobile Bay (also known as the Passing of Forts Morgan and Gaines) took place from August 2-23, 1864 in Mobile and Baldwin Counties, Alabama.  In early August, a large Union fleet under the command of Admiral David G. Farragut entered Mobile Bay and came under fire from Confederate forces.  Farragut led his forces past the forts and forced Confederate Admiral Franklin Buchanan to surrender.  On August 23, Fort Morgan was the last place to fall and Mobile Bay’s port closed.  The Civil War Preservation Trust’s website offers an article, “Damn the Torpedoes: The Battle of Mobile Bay,” which provides a detailed summary of the battle and its commanding officers.  The website also includes a map that depicts the movement of Union and Confederate forces as well as a list of recommended readings for more information on Mobile Bay.  The National Park Service’s website includes a lesson plan on Fort Morgan and the Battle of Mobile Bay that includes images, readings, and maps.  Foxhall Alexander Parker commented on Farragut as he and his forces crossed into Mobile Bay:

“As they were passing the Brooklyn, her captain reported ‘a heavy line of torpedoes across the channel.’ ‘Damn the torpedoes!’ was the emphatic reply of Farragut. ‘Jouett, full speed!  Four bells, Captain Drayton.’ And the Hartford, as if eager to bear the admiral’s flag to the front, bounded forward ‘like a thing of life,’ and, increasing her speed at each instant, crossed both lines of torpedoes, going over the ground at the rate of nine miles an hour; for so far had she drifted to the northward and westward while her engines were stopped, as if to make it impossible for the admiral, without heading directly on to Fort Morgan, to obey his own instructions to ‘pass eastward of the easternmost buoy.’”

Another resource that may be useful is West Wind, Flood Tide: The Battle of Mobile Bay, available as a preview on Google Books, which provides a detailed overview of the Battle of Mobile Bay and its significance during the Civil War.  Also available on Google Books is By Sea and By River: The Naval History of the Civil War which includes details on the battle as well as the aftermath and consequences of Mobile Bay.  The Civil War Trail’s website has information for those planning on visiting the battle site for a field trip as well as details on the different stops within the area and historic sites close by.

According to the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission, the farthest northern point attained by an organized body of the Confederate Army was present day Pennsylvania Route 34, about 1 mile north of Carlisle Springs. The Pennsylvania Historical marker, erected in 1929, states that on the morning of June 28, 1863, an organized band of the Confederate Army of Robert E. Lee reached the farm of Joseph Miller near Sterrett’s Gap. There is no evidence as to whose command these Confederates belonged to as none of their records from the Gettysburg campaign indicate an exploration near Sterrett’s Gap. Check out ExplorePAhistory.com for more information and details on the historical marker.

Another common conception of the farthest northern point or high-water mark of the Confederate Army was during day 3 of the Battle of Gettysburg. Union troops were positioned behind a small grove of trees within a confined area known as “The Angle” on July 3, 1863 during “Pickett’s Charge.” The first government historian of the Gettysburg battlefield, John B. Bachelder, conferred the title “High Water Mark of the Rebellion” to this small grove or “copse” of trees. Bachelder’s influence led to the creation of the “High Water Mark of the Rebellion Monument,” dedicated in 1892. For more information the National Parks Service website and the Historical Marker Database provides further details, maps and images.

In the western theater, there are several locations that stake claim as the northern most point obtained by the Rebels. During the Battle of Salineville on June 26, 1863 near Salineville, Ohio, Confederate Major General John H. Morgan evaded Union capture before finally surrendering near West Point, Ohio. A marker commemorating Morgan’s surrender and the northern most engagement of the Confederate Army is located on present day Ohio Route 39 about 3.4 miles west of Salineville. In Davis County, Iowa, a plaque observing a Confederate raid on October 12, 1864 led by Lieutenant James “Bill” Jackson is located in Bloomfield, Iowa, slightly north of the Morgan marker in Ohio.

Further north than all these locations is St. Albans, Vermont where on October 19, 1864, Confederate Lieutenant Bennett H. Young raided the small town from Canada located about 15 miles south of the border, robbing several banks with a small Rebel force. While there was never an engagement between Young’s forces and a Union force, the St. Albans Raid is considered the northern most point occupied by the Confederates.