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The Death of Elmer Ellsworth
The Death of Elmer Ellsworth: A Union Martyr and the First Casualty on Virginia Soil On This Day – May 24, 1861 In the early days of the Civil War, long before the nation had fully grasped the scale of the conflict to come, the death of one young Union officer sent...
The Extraordinary Life of Pauline Cushman: Actress, Spy, and Brevet Major
Pauline Cushman, born Harriet Wood in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1833, led a remarkable life that intertwined theater and espionage. Her mother was French, her father a Spanish merchant with a lineage allegedly linked to one of Napoleon’s soldiers. As a young girl, her...
Dealing with the Dead
The American Civil War was the bloodiest struggle in American history and the estimated 620,000 deaths of soldiers between 1861 and 1865 are roughly equivalent to the combined American casualties in the Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Mexican War, Spanish...
Embalming the Dead
Even though embalming has been a common practice since the time of ancient Egypt, it did not become popular in the United States until the Civil War. There was a need to preserve their remains for the voyage because so many troops died distant from...
Famous Civil War Photographs
The following are some of my favorite images from the Civil War. Let me know in the comments which ones are your favorites.
Civil War Photography Equipment
Several years ago, my family and I had the opportunity to stop by Rob Gibson's Photographic Studio in Gettysburg. He was gracious enough to spend some type teaching us about how Civil War era photographs were taken and developed. I finally got around to...
Civil War Era Brass Bands
Regimental brass bands of the Union and Confederate armies served many purposes throughout the war. One of their more important roles was of morale booster. Brass bands would play various tunes and songs in camp and on the march to help brighten the...
Google Tools for Teaching the Civil War
Google Tools for Teaching the Civil War The more popular Google tools like Search, Drive, Docs, Slides, Sheets, and Forms, are known to most teachers. But there are a ton of other incredibly cool Google tools that we should be using that frequently fly under the...