Harrisburg’s Civil War Patriot and Union

Richard L. Dahlen, “Harrisburg’s Civil War Patriot and Union: Its Conciliatory Viewpoint Collapses,” Cumberland County History 15 (1998): 115-127.

Richard L. Dahlen’s essay explores the shifts and eventual “collapse” of the Harrisburg (PA) Patriot and Union’s editorial stance during the Civil War. As the editors were “staunchly Democratic,” Dahlen explains that “[they] printed dispatches calculated to prove that the Republican administration’s military performance was a failure.” In addition, the Patriot and Union supported George McClellan in the 1864 election based on the idea that he would quickly end the war if elected. Yet by September 1864 the editors faced a crisis as events seemed to prove that their positions were wrong. The Union army won several key victories and McClellan rejected the idea of a truce. The paper’s “credibility [was] shattered,” as Dahlen notes. The “collapse” of a prominent Democratic newspaper had an important impact on the results of 1864 election. As Dahlen argues, “the Patriot and Union helped drag the famous General George Brinton McClellan down.”

This essay has been posted online with permission from the Cumberland County Historical Society.