By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2016, All Rights Reserved
The year 2016 marks the 100th anniversary of the United States Supreme Court decision in Ex Parte Milligan. In 2012, I wrote about “Lincoln’s Suspension of Habeas Corpus” for The Charger. In this archived article I recounted the issues and U.S. Supreme Court cases surrounding Lincoln’s controversial wartime policy.
Continue reading “Ex Parte Milligan Anniversary”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2015, All Rights Reserved
As the United States celebrated its Centennial in Philadelphia in July 1876, President U.S. Grant was nearing the end of his second term in office. Saddled with scandals affecting high officials in his administration, Grant had given up on the possibility of seeking an unprecedented third term. Attention turned to several other Republican politicians as the GOP nominating convention met in Cincinnati in June.
Continue reading “The Contested Centennial Presidential Election of 1876”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2016, All Rights Reserved
In addition to the murder of General “Bull” Nelson, Union General Jefferson C. Davis is also remembered for what occurred on December 9, 1864 at Ebenezer Creek, Georgia. As Sherman’s army neared Savannah in its March to the Sea, the 14,000-man XIV Corps commanded by Davis was the rear guard. Union engineers had to place a pontoon bridge across the creek swollen by rain to replace a removed bridge. As the troops passed over the creek, they were trailed by a mass of former slaves that was following Sherman’s army across Georgia.
Continue reading “Jefferson C. Davis and the Ebenezer Creek Controversy”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2017, All Rights Reserved
The American Civil War was much seen through the cameras of a group of early photographers. The best known was Mathew Brady.
Continue reading “Civil War Photography”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2008, All Rights Reserved
On my mother’s German side from Western Pennsylvania, I had a great-grandfather and two of his brothers who served in Pennsylvania volunteer regiments in the Civil War. Even though the Irish on my father’s side had not yet arrived in the United States and Ohio during the Civil War, I have been interested more in the Irish-Americans who fought for the Union than the German-Americans.
Continue reading “The Irish in the Civil War”By John C. Fazio
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2007, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: A debate on the cause or causes of the Civil War was held on January 10, 2007 as part of the Cleveland Civil War Roundtable’s monthly meeting. It was an intercollegiate-style debate, i.e., two on the affirmative and two on the negative. The resolution debated was: Resolved: That the Institution of Slavery Was the Cause of the Civil War. The negative won, based on a vote of the attendees. Following the debate in that forum, John C. Fazio, the Roundtable president at the time of that debate, weighed in with the following.
By Dan Zeiser
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2007, All Rights Reserved
Of course, you say, the Constitution caused the Civil War. By recognizing and institutionalizing slavery, the war was inevitable. But this is not the only reason that the Constitution caused the Civil War. There was another, perhaps more important, reason that the founding fathers caused our particular sectional strife. This reason is the electoral college.
Continue reading “The Constitution Caused the Civil War”By William F.B. Vodrey
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2000, 2008, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in the fall of 2000.
They say when it rains, it pours. And just when the United States was locked in a deadly struggle with the Confederacy, just when the military picture was at its bleakest, just when Abraham Lincoln’s desk was piled highest, it looked very likely that Great Britain – the mightiest empire on the face of the Earth – would, for the third time in ninety years, wage war against us. Fortunately, it didn’t happen. A conflict spanning the Atlantic was averted, and the U.S.-British war of 1861 became the war that never was.
Continue reading “The War that Never Was: Britain, the U.S. and the Trent Affair”By William F.B. Vodrey
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2007 Weider History Group
This article originally appeared in the October 2004 issue of American History magazine.
The cost of political greatness, it’s been said, is to be forced to campaign long after your death. That’s certainly true of George Washington, whose name, image, and legacy were appropriated by the Confederacy.
Continue reading “George Washington: Hero of the Confederacy?”By Peter Holman
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2015, All Rights Reserved
One hundred and forty years ago, a man hailed as a modern Robinson Crusoe made a brief appearance in newspapers across the world and continues today to impact genealogists, historical societies and miscellaneous bloggers throughout the world-wide web. And he was, with all moral certainty, long dead.
Continue reading “Five Hundred Dead and a Hoax that Lives On”