By Brian D. Kowell
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2026, All Rights Reserved
The weather was nasty, cold, windy, and rainy in Vicksburg, Mississippi on Christmas Eve 1862. The Civil War, supposed to last only 90 days, had dragged on now for 21 months. Despite the inclement weather, Mrs. Emma Balfour was determined to celebrate the season by hosting her annual Christmas Eve ball.
Continue reading “‘Twas the Night Before Christmas at Mrs. Balfour’s”By David A. Carrino
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2026, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in March 2026.
Civil War enthusiasts are familiar with the fact that William H. Seward, the man who was the secretary of state throughout the entire Civil War, was also the person who, after the Civil War, orchestrated the purchase of Alaska for the United States. This purchase was in keeping with Seward’s stance as a staunch proponent of Manifest Destiny. By negotiating the purchase of Alaska, Seward redirected Manifest Destiny from its westward advance to a northern leapfrog over Canada (which was known as British North America at that time) and into a territory that Seward had long believed would become part of the U.S. Seward had set his sights on Alaska well before he entered into purchase negotiations in 1867, as indicated by his 1846 assertion that “our population is destined to roll its resistless waves to the icy barriers of the north.” Seward was such an ardent advocate of Manifest Destiny that he even had designs on absorbing both Mexico and British North America into the U.S. (It is not known if Seward, in a presaging of a 2026 presidential craving, wanted to also assimilate Greenland.) While Seward was never able to acquire Mexico and British North America, he did oversee, in addition to the acquisition of Alaska, the annexation of Midway Island by directing the U.S. Navy to occupy it and claim it for the U.S., which thereby pushed Manifest Destiny far westward into the Pacific Ocean.
Continue reading “Seward’s Icebox and the First Civil Rights Law in America”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2026, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in January 2026.
During the Civil War, Rhode Island provided 25,236 volunteers to the Union’s armed forces. That included 8 infantry regiments, 3 cavalry regiments, and 14 artillery batteries. Of the over 25,000 Rhode Islanders who served, 1,685 died, including Brigadier General Isaac Peace Rodman at the battle of Antietam.
Continue reading “Rhode Island: The Smallest State’s Contribution to the Union Cause”By D. Kent Fonner
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2026 All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in May 2026.
Tom Dula (pronounced “Dooley” based on the Appalachian dialect that pronounces a letter “a” ending a word like a “y” – “Grand Ole Opry” for example) served in Company K, 42nd North Carolina Volunteers. Dula, after his service in the Civil War, including time as a POW at Point Lookout, Maryland, returned to Wilkes County, North Carolina, to his home in Happy Valley on the Yadkin River. Prior to the war, Dula had an affair with a woman named Ann Melton, the wife of a local farmer, James Melton. When Dula returned in 1865, he soon resumed his relationship with Ann Melton, but eventually cohabitated in a cabin in the woods with Ann’s cousin, Laura Foster.
Continue reading ““Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dula””By Brian D. Kowell
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2025, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in October 2025.
On September 14, 1814, lawyer Francis Scott Key stood aboard a truce ship outside Baltimore Harbor and watched through the night as the British bombarded American-held Fort McHenry. As the sky lightened and he glimpsed the American flag still waving above the ramparts, the inspired Key removed a letter from his pocket and began to write verses upon the back. The finished poem was later titled “Defense of Fort McHenry” and put to music as “The Star-Spangled Banner.”1
Continue reading “Armistead, Ashby, and “The Star-Spangled Banner””By David A. Carrino
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2026, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in February 2026.
The Civil War is often called the first modern war because many advances in technology and in military practices had their first widespread use during the Civil War. This is articulated nicely and succinctly in an article on the website of the Chicago Historical Society: “The Civil War demonstrated for the first time how industrial technology had transformed the nature of warfare.” After the Civil War, wars and the methodology of waging war would never be the same as before, a fact that European nations cruelly learned in World War I. Rifled muskets, ironclad warships, the use of railroads to transport troops and supplies, faster and better medical treatment of the wounded, the use of the telegraph to enhance the speed of communication, surveillance balloons, and trench warfare all experienced their first widespread wartime use in the Civil War. Moreover, the practice of total war came to prominence during the Civil War, which also saw the first sinking of an enemy warship by a submarine. The Union war effort was even aided by the mass production of horseshoes with a machine that could make a horseshoe per second.
Continue reading “A Civil War-Era Invention That Literally Was a Game-Changer”By Thomas M. Cooper
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2025, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in October 2025.
This is a story of discovery, of happenstance, of survival, of collaboration – and of gratitude.
Directly after Dan Masters’ March 13, 2024 presentation to our Cleveland Civil War Roundtable on the Battle of Stones River, I approached him about my having had two great-great grandfathers involved in that engagement – one from Ohio and one from Indiana. He asked which Indiana unit, and I recalled the 4th Battery, Light Artillery. Dan said in fact he had posted information about Capt. Asahel Bush’s 4th Indiana Battery on his website just the day before his CCWRT presentation. (See reference and website: “Reminders of the 4th Indiana Battery’s Fight along the Wilkinson Pike,” March 12, 2024.)
Continue reading “Brothers in Arms: Edgar and William Abbott at Stones River – In Their Own Words”By David A. Carrino
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2016, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in October 2016.
The Civil War is occasionally referred to as the North vs. the South. However, people who are knowledgeable about the Civil War know that that is not entirely correct on an individual level. This is because quite a few of the combatants were from the opposite part of the country, but felt loyalty to the other side and chose to fight on that side. One such person is General Bushrod R. Johnson, who was a Northerner by birth, but who fought for the Confederacy. Ironically, just like Johnson’s life had a geographic dichotomy across the Civil War’s sectional divide, Johnson has two final resting places with a similar geographic duality, one in the North and one in the South.
Continue reading “Bushrod Johnson’s Final Resting Places”By Dennis Keating
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2025, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in March 2025.
In my book Cleveland and the Civil War, I mention the relationship formed in 1863 between Clara Barton and Clevelander John J. Elwell (pp. 43-44). Born in Massachusetts, Barton moved to Washington City and was employed in the U.S. Patent Office. When the Civil War broke out, she volunteered with the Union Army, first bringing medical supplies after battles beginning with First Bull Run and then also nursing wounded soldiers at Second Bull Run, Antietam, and Fredericksburg. She became known as “The Angel of the Battlefield,” but she did not join the official Union nurses corps headed by Dorothea Dix.
Continue reading “Clara Barton and Clevelander John J. Elwell: A Civil War Romance”By Brian D. Kowell
The Cleveland Civil War Roundtable
Copyright © 2025, All Rights Reserved
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in The Charger in January 2025.
After writing my article about Gutzon Borglum and his work on Mount Rushmore and at Stone Mountain, I wondered what other Civil War monuments Borglum sculpted. Turns out quite a few.
Continue reading “Gutzon Borglum: Part Deux”