Month: September 2010

“In Old Bellaire”

On September 6, 2010

Old West, 1860

D. W. Thompson, In Old Bellaire (Carlisle, PA: Hamilton Library Association, 1963).

D. W. Thompson explains Carlisle’s connection to Mary Dillon’s novel In Old Bellaire (1906). While set in the fictional town of Bellaire during the Civil War, Thompson describes how Dillon based her story on people, places, and events in Carlisle. “In Old Bellaire’ will always be the novel about old Carlisle in Civil War days, with allusions to actual local scenes and charters on every page,” as Thompson notes. Dillon’s family lived in Carlisle during the Civil War because her father, Herman Merrills Johnson, was the President of Dickinson College from 1860 to 1868. You can read In Old Bellaire online at the Dickinson College Chronicles Reading Room.

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

Carlisle Women in the War Effort

By donsailer

On September 6, 2010

In Articles, Civil War (1861-1865)

Central Square, Carlisle, PA (1860)

Lenore E. Flower, Women in the War Effort (Carlisle, PA: Hamilton Library Association, 1963).

Lenore E. Flower’s essay discuses the letters that two sisters wrote after Confederates shelled Carlisle on July 1, 1863. “We never dreamed that by evening the Rebel demons would attempt to shell the town, and that too without giving the usual warning,” as seventeen year old Margaret Murray noted in a letter to her brother. In addition, Flower includes a letter that Sara A. Myers wrote to Union General William Farrah Smith’s wife. “I am indebted to the exertions of Gen. Smith and his brave soldiers – I wish I could something for each of them – that I still have a home,” as Myers explained.

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

“Captain Miller’s Medal of Honor”

By donsailer

On September 6, 2010

In Articles, Civil War (1861-1865)

Captain William E. Miller

Captain Miller’s Medal of Honor (1963)

Merrill F. Hummel’s essay discusses Captain William E. Miller’s Medal of Honor, which he received as a result of his actions during the Battle of Gettysburg on July 3, 1863. Miller lived in Carlisle on North Hanover Street and served in the Third Pennsylvania Calvary during the Civil War. Hummel includes Miller’s account of his actions during the battle, which are from a letter he wrote to his brother on July 7, 1863. Miller received his Medal of Honor on July 21, 1897. After the war, Miller returned to Carlisle and helped establish the Captain Colwell Post No. 201 of the Grand Army of the Republic. He also joined the Historical Association of Cumberland County and wrote an article in 1902 about the Confederates in Carlisle during the Civil War, which is available on Library Divided.

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

“Fitzhugh Lee Returns, and Returns”

By donsailer

On September 6, 2010

In Articles, Civil War (1861-1865), Reconstruction (1865-1880)

Fitzhugh Lee

D. W. Thompson, Fitzhugh Lee Returns, and Returns (Carlisle, PA: Hamilton Library Association, 1963).

D. W. Thompson’s essay discusses Confederate General Fitzhugh Lee’s connection with Carlisle, Pennsylvania. General Lee was stationed at Carlisle Barracks before the Civil War, returned as a Confederate general who shelled the town in the summer of 1863, and came back again in 1896 to speak at the Carlisle Indian School. As Thompson explains, Superintendent Richard Henry Pratt invited Lee and Union General Oliver Otis Howard “to show that North and South were united with East and West in a common life, hope, and allegiance.” Yet some Carlisle residents believed that Pratt should not have invited Lee. As an editorial in the Carlisle Herald argued, “it was a mistake not because [Lee] was a rebel but because he did a disgraceful and unsoldierly thing that can not be justified.” This essay also has several related documents, including transcripts of two letters that Lee wrote and excerpts from newspaper articles.

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